The Chinese Orange Mystery

“Very well,” he said in crisp tones. “To work . . . .” He lighted a cigaret and half-closed his eyes. “The crux of this case was the astounding fact that everything on the scene of the crime, including the very clothes of the victim, had been inverted, turned backwards. I say ‘astounding/ Even in my mind, trained in the observation and diagnosis of just such phenomena, there was a distinct reaction of amazement. I daresay not even the murderer, conceiving the backwards business and carrying it into effect, realized just how amazing it was going to appear.

“After the shock had passed I proceeded to analyze the facts, or rather the fact. Experience has taught me that rarely does a criminal do something positive¯as opposed to an unconscious act¯without purpose. This was a positive, a conscious act. It required hard work and the expenditure of precious time in the accomplishment. I was justified in saying at once, therefore, that there was reason behind it; that while its manifestations seemed insane its purpose, at the least, must have been rational.”

They were listening with painful attention.

“I will confess,” continued Ellery, “that until yesterday that purpose eluded me. I pursued it mentally with the tenacity of desperation, but for the life of me I couldn’t see why everything had been turned backwards. I assumed, of course, that the backwardness of the crime pointed to something backwards about somebody in the case. It seemed the only possible tack. And yet it enmeshed me in strands of philology, philately, and nomenclature so confused that more than once I was tempted to throw the whole puzzle up. There were all sorts of bewildering questions to be answered. If everything was turned backwards to point to a backwards significance about somebody, then that somebody must have been criminally involved. What was the real backwards significance, then? Whom was it intended to involve criminally? And, more important, who had turned everything backwards in the first place? Who was pointing to whom?”

He chuckled. “I see confusion here, and I can’t say I blame you. I found plenty of leads. They performed the function of leading, to be sure, but unfortunately in the direction of obfuscation, not toward a lucid solution of the problem. As for who had done the job, was it the criminal? Was it some one who had inadvertently witnessed the killing? But if it was the criminal pointing to some one else, then that some one was being framed. And yet it was the sorriest frameup conceivable, since it was so inconclusive, so vague, so really incomprehensible. If everything was turned backwards by some one who had witnessed the crime, why didn’t that witness come forward with his knowledge instead of taking that hideously tangled, complex method of leaving a clue to the murderer’s identity? You see what I was up against. Wherever I turned I met darkness.

“And then,” murmured Ellery, “I saw how simple it was, how easily I had led myself astray. I had made a mistake. I had misread the facts. My logic had been imperfect. I hadn’t taken into consideration the startling fact that there were two general explanations for the backwardnesses, not onel”

“I can’t say I understand this Ciceronian oration,” said Felix Berne suddenly. “Is this something characteristically esoteric, or do you know what you’re talking about?”

“The gentleman from The Mandarin,” said Ellery, “will please to observe the amenities and preserve the peace. You’ll find out soon enough, Mr. Berne . . . . For you see, I found on reconsideration that there were two possible answers to the riddle. The first I’ve already related: that everything had been turned backwards to point to something backwards about somebody in the case. Its alternative, which had escaped me,” continued Ellery, leaning forward, “was that everything was turned backwards to conceal something backwards about somebody in the easel”

He paused to light a fresh cigaret. Cupping his hands about a match, he scrutinized their faces. But he saw only bewilderment.

“I see expansion is required,” he drawled, puffing away. “The first possibility led away from the crime; the second led to the crime. The first possibility involved revealment; the second concealment. Perhaps I can make it clearer by asking you: By everything about the body and the crime-scene being turned backwards, against whom could concealment have conceivably been directed? What about whom in the case could have been meant to be hidden, camouflaged, disguised?”

“Well, if everything was turned backwards on the body,” ventured Miss Temple in a low voice, “then it must have been the victim about whom something was being concealed, I should think.”