Twelve—thirteen?—years ago; and now they were gathered together, eight of them—to talk it over, to try to excise the scar that had formed in the mind of a boy—of the boy whose father had been dismissed from the force ‘for negligence on duty’, had ever afterwards suffered from the results of the act that day, and who now was dead.
For the boy had developed an obsession of resentment against the only other person involved, the man on the roof, who nowadays called himself ‘Mr. Photoze’—whose first step on the road to fame had come with the picture he had taken that day of the lion head raised, the brilliant eyes glaring, the outraged defiance. ‘My father didn’t fire that shot—therefore you must have,’ was the burden of the young man’s message, and there had been a succession of threats and at last a physical attack.
They had sent him to see a psychiatrist, and the psychiatrist had muttered darkly about paranoia and complexes and ‘a disturbed oedipal pattern—the boy is subconsciously jealous of the father’s domination of the mother, which seems to have been considerable. He feels guilty towards the father, and now seeks to cover up the recollection of his inner hatred by an exaggerated feeling of protection towards the father, now that the father is dead and unable, as it were, to protect himself.’ A long period of treatment, said the psychiatrist, would be necessary.
Half an hour of treatment, said Mr. Photoze to his friend Mysterioso, would be more like it. Once convince the boy…‘Hold a little court, get together some of the people who were present and talk it out.’
‘The very thing!’ Mysterioso had agreed, delighted. It would be entertaining; he was an old man now, long retired from the stage. It would give him something to do, sitting here crippled and helpless in his chair all day.
So here they were, gathered together in Mr. Mysterioso’s large lush apartment: Mysterioso himself and Inspector Block, who as a young constable had been on the scene of the crime; and a lady and gentleman who had been on the hospital balcony and seen the young policeman running up the stairs after the shot had been fired; and a lady who had been close to the site and seen and heard it all. And a once-lovely lady, Miss Marguerite Devine, the actress, who might also have something to say; and Mr. Photoze. Mr. Photoze was madly decorative in dress, and a half-dozen fine gold bracelets jingled every time he moved his arm.
The boy sat hunched against an arm of the sofa, strained against it as though something dangerous to him crouched at the other end. He hated them. He didn’t want their silly help; he wanted to be avenged on Mr. Photoze, who had committed a crime and got off scot-free, as a result of which his father had lost his job and his happiness and his faith in men. And his mind wandered back over the frightening, uneasy childhood, the endless bickering and recrimination over his too perceptive young head; the indigence, the sense of failure… I don’t want to hear all this, I know what I know. Because of what he did, my father’s life was ruined. I meant all those threats. I failed last time, but next time I’ll get him.’
‘You do see!’ said Mr. Photoze, appealing to the rest of them with outflung arms and a tinkling of gold.
‘Your father was never accused of anything,’ said Inspector Block. ‘He was dismissed—’
‘ “Dismissed for negligence”—everyone knew what that meant. He lived under suspicion till the day he died. He died with no job and no money; my mother has no money to this day.’
‘We are going to lift that suspicion,’ said Mysterioso. ‘That’s what we’re here for; we’re going to clear the whole thing up. You shall represent your father, Mr. Photoze will be in the dock with you, defending himself. And here we have our witnesses—who also will be our jury. And I shall be the judge. If in the end we all come to the conclusion that your father was innocent, and Mr. Photoze was innocent also, won’t you feel better?’ He said very kindly, ‘We only want to help you.’
The boy watched him warily. He’s not doing this for my sake, he thought. He’s doing it because he wants to be on a stage again, and this is the nearest he can get to it. He’s just a vain, conceited old man; he wants to show off.
A vain man, yes: a man consumed with vanity—enormously handsome once, with the tawny great mane, now almost white, a man of world wide fame, a great performer—and not only on stage if his boastings were at all to be trusted—despite the fact that the car accident at the height of his career had left him unable to walk more than a few steps unaided. It was whispered behind mocking hands that on romantic occasions his servant Tom had to lead him to the very bedside and lower him down to it. Certainly he was never seen in public without Tom: a walking stick was not enough, and as for a crutch, ‘Do you see me hopping about playing Long John Silver?’ Close to Tom, gripping Tom’s strong left arm, the lameness was hardly noticeable. On stage he had continued to manage brilliantly with the aid of cleverly positioned props which he could hold on to or lean against. It was a total lack of strength only; he suffered no pain…