The Ectoplasmic Man Read Free

he’d also switched around every prisoner in the entire wing! Seventeen prisoners and not one of them was in his right cell! We had quite a job just — Mr Holmes! I fail to see what is soamusing in all this!”
    “Quite so, Lestrade,” said Holmes with a short cough, “forgive me. But still, I don’t see that your problem is as grave as you suppose. I’m sure it’s simply a question of improving the design of your goal. Perhaps Mr Houdini could be persuaded to cooperate—”
    “My God, Mr Holmes!” Lestrade cried impatiently. “Do you really think me such a fool as all that? The cells are nothing! That was only the beginning! But if he can get in and out of our gaol cells he can get in and out of anything! Anything at all! Some of the men even suspect... well, they suspect...” He paused and looked down at his notebook.
    “Yes?”
    “It’s nothing.”
    “There, Lestrade, you were on the point of saying something.”
    Lestrade cast a wary eye at Holmes and then at me. “I don’t believe any of it, mind you, but some of the men say that Houdini is a... a spirit medium.”
    “Oh, come!”
    Lestrade held out his palms in a gesture of disavowal. “It’s not my theory, I assure you, but it has to be taken into account. I’ve done a bit of research on this fellow and the results are very surprising. Very surprising indeed. Just consider the facts for a moment, Mr Holmes, and see what you make of them. Every night, on stages all over the world, Houdini allows himself to be tied up, wrapped in chains, nailed into packing crates, and I don’t know what all, and he always gets free! Now what does that suggest to you?”
    “Great skill and technical proficiency?”
    “Perhaps, but don’t you find it in the least strange that he never fails? Not once? Can you say the same?” Here Lestrade was referring, rather indelicately I thought, to the theft of the black pearl of the Borgias, an affair which even Holmes had been unable to penetrate. Though hewould soon recover the pearl in a case I have recorded elsewhere, * the matter weighed heavily on him at present. I realised then how great was Lestrade’s sensitivity over the issue at hand, for he was never one to open old wounds.
    Holmes reached into the scuttle and threw a lump of sea coal onto the hearth. “Occasionally my methods fail me,” he observed quietly, “but then, I receive no assistance from the other world.”
    Lestrade looked away quickly. “I didn’t mean to give offence, Mr Holmes, I’m simply asking you to keep an open mind to this thing, as I’ve done.” He flipped through the pages in his book. “Now, there’s a group in America that calls itself the Society for Psychic Research. These aren’t witch-doctors in this group, they’re scientists and doctors, reasonable sorts like you and me. This society swears up and down that Houdini achieves his effects through psychic means. They say no other explanation is possible.”
    “And what of Houdini himself? Does he claim to traffic with the spirits?”
    “No, he’s denied it repeatedly. But don’t you see? Even that fits the theory. If he were using special psychic powers to make a living as a magician, he’d have to conceal his gifts in order to protect his livelihood!” Lestrade gave a nervous laugh. “I know that what I’m saying sounds incredible, but two days ago this fellow walked out of one of our tightest cells without turning a hair. No one has ever done it before, and frankly I doubt if anyone will ever do it again. A thing like that sets me thinking maybe we are dealing with... well, with the unknown. Now I’m not saying I hold with all of this psychic claptrap, but after Houdini was at the Yard I went down to the Savoy to see one of these performances of his.What do you suppose I saw?”
    “Do tell.”
    “It was astonishing. I’ve never seen anything like it. During the course of his magic show, Houdini had his workmen construct a solid brick wall on the stage behind