Fool's Mate

—

"What did you call us up to?" asked Jenny to them when they arrived in the lounge.

"Is there something you would tell us?" seconded Nakahara.

"Speaking of which, I have. I will now reveal to you the murderer of Aldern and Sari."

"What!? What do you mean by that?" exclaimed Gabriel.

"Inasmuch as I hate to declare this, but the criminal is among us in this room," replied Rook.

The others were shocked to what they have heard. Is Rook just lying or showing off something?

"Rook, it is good to play detective but, I guess you are going too far," advised Jenny.

"I wish I am just playing, but no. I really found the evidence for this. At first, all of them are circumstantial, but Inspector Krauss will supplement my deductions with hard evidence later on."

After hearing what Rook has said, Inspector Krauss arrived at the mansion. Police car siren has invaded their ears, as Inspector Krauss entered the mansion.

"So, Sherlock, I have brought the evidence just in case," Krauss said, showing everyone all the evidence needed to supply his deductions.

"Thank you, Inspector. I will first explain to you the murderer's trick of killing Aldern. When I went to the mansion's incinerator, I found burnt rubbers and plastic masks, which I thought the murderer used to lure out Aldern. The plastic mask I believe is Nakahara-san's face. The murderer wore it first, went into the storage room and carried with him a rope and a large ply wood. The killer then places the ply wood unto the ground passing into the victim's window. That explains the flat surface Inspector and Tatsumi found on the ground, near the left side of the window. The murderer knocks the window, as Aldern saw him. The murderer probably told Aldern to open the window and let him in. Inside, the murderer used a piano wire and strangled Aldern until he dies. Since it is ligature strangulation, the victim was asphyxiated and lost air. To mask the murder, he used the rope and hanged Aldern, tying the noose on the beam. Since the murderer pulled the long rope from the ground, marks have been created on the beam and of course, the victim's neck. Inspector Krauss' investigated it and he found out that the rope marks were post-mortem, meaning done after death. But the murderer forgot one thing…since it was raining and he saw the maids coming near Aldern's room, the murderer masks the murder by going back into the storage room and carried a hammer, returned the ply wood to its original place and went back to the crime scene, as if he saw Aldern was hanged."

The others listened carefully in each detail. They looked at each other and turned their eyes to Gabriel after hearing the deduction.

"That's right. There was no other person in this mansion who could have killed Sir Aldern but you, Gabriel Zelezny," he confirmed and pointed at Gabriel, who was petrified by his conviction.

Gabriel's face turned pale and looked at him and replied with a very defensive tone.

"Hey, stop joking. I saw Aldern in his room and was already hanged at that time!" he defended.

Rook called one of the maids and asked, "Miss maid, have you and the others saw Aldern's window and the victim hanged at that time?"

"No, we just saw Sir Gabriel holding his hammer and saying that Secretary Aldern was hanged and he must break the window to save him. We then called you all inside the mansion leaving him alone."

"Just as I thought it would be," continued Rook.

"W-wait a minute! How will you explain the piano wire? Where is it now? The broken window?" interrupted Krauss and paused the excitement.

"That's easy, Inspector. When Rook and I went to the crime scene, we noticed that Gabriel made a mistake," replied Tatsumi, who was listening and was having his own inferences about the case.

"A mistake?"

"Yeah. When you break a window from the outside, won't the broken glasses be inside the room?"

Krauss clicked his fingers in realizing the truth about those broken glass.

"Of course! The murderer broke it to look like as if he is saving the hanged victim!"

Rook smiled. "Not bad Tatsumi!"

"The murderer also made another mistake. Ligature strangulation needs extreme force to execute. The piano wire was on the murderer's possession until now, but the piano wire left marks on the murderer's hands due to the extreme force he made pulling the wire," Rook continued.

Inspector Krauss quickly held Gabriel's hands and saw rope and wire marks in his right hand, like what Rook described.

"You…you really killed him?" asked Nakahara and looked at Gabriel who was silent, his eyes on the ground.

"Now, the rope, was found with your prints on the fingerprinting. Although because it was raining at that time, we only found mud prints but then we determined the time. The time you killed Aldern, the time you told us during the alibi check."

Gabriel's eyes widened by surprise. By that time, he knew that his method was rather fool proof, no one could have seen anything aside from mud prints.

"To the second crime, Sari first suffered from ligature strangulation and blunt force trauma. The murder weapon is a blunt straight object, which I believe is a pole or a golf club. Gabriel choked her to death and dismembered her body."

"Hah, how can I kill Sari? I was with you in the dining room all the time!"

"Your trick has been exposed, Gabriel. The time of the victim was not right after we saw her. Dismembering her body is post mortem, meaning the act was done for about 30 minutes to 1 hour; you cannot dismember a body right away after that. Probably, you went into her room before hand, brutally beating her to death, choked her and dismembered her body."

Inspector Krauss was wondering about the evidence.

"And the evidence? I think we haven't found the piano wire and the murder weapon of Sari. Dismembering her would need a blade."

"All can be found in his room. Because of what happened to Sir Hansel, Gabriel was given time to keep the murder weapons, but not close enough to disposing them. The reason we were not able to find anything in the crime scene is because we never searched other places aside from it," Rook explained.

Krauss alerted some of his men to check Gabriel's room. After a few minutes, the officers returned and found the evidence they need. Piano wire, bloody saw, a wide chopping blade and lastly, a golf club.

Gabriel took a deep breath and looked back at the ground. He kneeled in disappointment and confession.

"So I guess this is the last chapter," he said, softly.

"Why did you do this sin?" Tatsumi asked.

"It was fifteen years ago. Alaina, my girlfriend, had high hopes for her dreams. She was an energetic woman and never had her hopes down. She dreamed to be a mystery writer. Every day, she asked me to check her manuscript and plots. She said that one day, mystery novels would be a staple here in Sweden. That one day, she would become the best mystery novelist in the whole world. When a contest in America about mystery writing was announced, she quickly wrote a new manuscript and was planning to submit it as an entry. I was able to check it and I told her that indeed, it was worthy of an entry and should be read by the whole world. It was two days before the submission when she came by saying that her house was robbed. The police was not able to find who the robber is. All of her expensive things were stolen. It was not those things that she worried about. It was her manuscript. If it was a robber looking for valuable things to rob and sell, then why were her manuscripts stolen too? No robber really would care about it, unless, it was someone who knew the value of that manuscript."

"W-wait, you mean that Aldern was – ", Nakahara asked.

"Yes! That disgusting pig stole Alaina's work. She found out about it when she read the whole novel when it was published! She confronted Aldern about it. She knew that the robber who took her manuscript was him. she asked that the books should be reprinted with her name and not his. But guess what that man replied. He said she should just be happy that her work is being recognized as a masterpiece worldwide! I was wondering why Alaina was not responding to my calls so I went straightly to her house and check what's happened to her. My world stopped when I saw her body hanging from the ceiling of her room. She committed suicide. She left a note saying that she was not able to contain what happened in life, and ending it would be her last resort. I was not able to save her. I was not able to give comfort and support when she needed it most. Since that day, I swore I will have my revenge!"

"But why my sister!?" asked Jenny, with her tears.

"It was about the case five years ago, right?" Rook interrupted.

"Hey, you mean it has some connection to this case?" Krauss asked, surprised.

"Serena was your sister, right? The message of the CD was what hinted me about this case," he continued.

Gabriel nodded. "You knew that Serena was my sister, huh. The CD was her dying message. I think she grabbed it in the verge of her death. The CD was an album from a famous local band here from Sweden, generös chans."

"Swedish words meaning Generous Chance," Rook added.

"Generous Chance was the play Sari was the star!" replied Jenny to Rook, who looked at them what the Swedish words connects to the crime.

"Arrest me, Inspector. You have found out the last card in my pocket. Yes, I murdered them both," admitted Gabriel.

Krauss brought out his hand cuff and cuffed Gabriel's hands. "Gabriel Zelezny, you are under arrest for the murder of Aldern Bach and Sari Mortensson."

Krauss bowed for thanks to Rook and Tatsumi and signed that he will go back to the police station with Gabriel. Outside, police officers are waiting in the car. The others followed them, specially Jenny who seem to realize her sister's murder was because Sari herself is a murderer. Before entering the car, Gabriel looked at Rook and smiled.

"It's not for me to tell this to someone after what I have done, but please continue to fight for the truth and protect justice, detective," he said. Rook nodded and bowed to him.