Mutoscope Murder

By Lincoln Reed

Inspector Gustav Ackerson removed his bowler hat and knelt next to the corpse. A boy of fourteen years stared at the nickelodeon’s plaster ceiling with glazed eyes. According to the night guardsman, the poor lad had snuck into the theater after hours and had been discovered lying on the floor next to a mutoscope.

Gustav scratched at his mustache. Too young to drop dead.

“A painless passing, I hope.” Doctor Llyod Stevens snapped shut his medical bag. “The boy must have been here for hours, turning the handle until he collapsed. Spent too much time at those dreadful machines, watching those pictures.”

“As I remember, Lloyd, during our first year at university, you almost dedicated your life to pictures.”

“Painting, yes.” Stevens frowned. “These mutoscopes, they are not art. They don’t direct minds to the higher things. And what pollutes the mind poisons the body.”

Gustav noted the green residue on the boy’s right hand. “Anything strange about this?”

“Cheap paint, I presume. Though nothing to fear. Mere dye wouldn’t kill a man.”

“Perform the autopsy. Sooner the better.”

While police officers assisted Doctor Stevens in transporting the victim, Gustav strolled through the empty nickelodeon known as Mutoscope Mansion, searching for clues, any detail he could have missed. The establishment boasted rows of mutoscopes and kinetoscopes. Gustav didn’t quite understand the science behind such magic, but he could appreciate the public’s fascination.

He stopped at a row of mutoscope machines. Unlike the newer kinetoscope, customers of the mutoscope had to crank a handle to turn the wheel of pictures, each card clapping one after the other, creating the illusion of shifting images.

The mutoscopes were painted red, yellow, or blue. What struck Gustav as strange was the consistency in the color of crank handles. All were painted the same shade of emerald.

Gustav chose a mutoscope advertising a glimpse of the world’s strongest man. He removed a nickel from his pocket, slid the coin into a slot, and stooped toward the viewfinder. With his right hand turning the green crank, he watched as a shirtless figure flexed taut muscles with each progressing flip of a card.

Gustav spent another fifteen cents sampling other mutoscopes with green handles, surprised by the scandalous nature of the images, their moral ambiguity and lascivious presentation of women. Even as one familiar with the worldly pleasures of city life, Gustav found himself unnerved by such machines, their ability to mesh realism with fantasy.

Gustav studied his right hand. A greenish sheen stuck to his fingers.

The same.

He checked his pocket watch. Considered his options.

If such paint were…

Gustav rushed from the nickelodeon. Fighting the urge to wash his hands, he completed several errands in quick succession.

First, he stopped at the local college where a chemist inspected his stained fingers.

Next, he interviewed the Mutoscope Mansion’s owner.

Finally, Gustav visited the office of Doctor Stevens.

“So soon?” The physician adjusted wiry spectacles. “Gus, old fellow, forgive me, but my next appointment—”

“Won’t take long. I’ve found our killer.”

Stevens’s eyes glinted. “Have you now?”

The doctor locked the office door and retreated behind his desk. Gustav took a seat in a nearby chair as Stevens leaned forward, elbows planted on the mahogany surface, eyebrows scrunching. “Autopsy revealed nothing unique in the boy’s case. But none of that matters if you’ve found the culprit. Perhaps my findings will corroborate.”

Gustav studied a framed painting on the wall behind the doctor—a tapestry of a winter vista, snowcapped mountains, shades of blue, gray, and white. No hint of green.

“I remember when you painted that piece at university.” Gustav crossed one leg over the other. “When your passion for the painter’s brush was greater than the scalpel.”

“You still want to reminisce? What about our killer?”

“Maybe you will recall a discovery that dissuaded you from the artist’s life, that sparked your medical career?”

Gustav opened his right palm, revealing a greenish hue on his skin. “The victim had green stains on his hands. From hours at the mutoscopes, no doubt. Cheap paint, too. But not entirely paint, as the chemist confirmed.”

Stevens’s face turned a dark shade of red, eyes narrowing.

“Scheele’s Green, when mixed with various other chemicals, is quite toxic.” Gustav wiggled his fingers. “Arsenic, if exposed to a heavy dose on a regular basis, day after day—”

“So, that’s it then?” The doctor frowned. “They used a toxic paint. Put too much of the stuff on the crank handles. Mutoscope Mansion killed that boy. Maybe it’s time we closed them down.”

Gustav shook his head. “They denied placing fresh paint on the machines. Someone did the service without their knowledge. After consulting a chemist about the toxicity of the compound on the mutoscope handles, I came away with a harrowing truth. Only someone with a keen knowledge of paint and poison could concoct a substance ten times as deadly as Scheele’s Green.”

The ticking clock on the wall chimed the noon hour.

“What I cannot figure is why?” Gustav’s fist tightened. “Why did you, a man sworn to preserve life, poison an amusement attraction? Why conceal what an autopsy should have revealed?”

Stevens’s neck flexed, his posture stiffening like an animal trapped in a cage. “That’s it then?”

“Unless you have a better suspect… or theory.”

The physician’s shoulders sagged. “So be it. The truth? Moving pictures. Peep shows. All starting a moral disease, Gus. Crime is up. Haven’t you noticed?

“With the new year dawning, I resolved to do something. But I’m a doctor. I treat the body. For an illness of spirit? I could make the children a little sick… heal them after. I would convince parents, the public—jolt them into an awakening, a moral revolution. Destroy the machines! I never intended death, but the concoction was too strong. By then it was too late.”

Gustav removed a pair of handcuffs from his coat. “I’m afraid, old friend, you’ve painted yourself into a corner.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Lincoln Reed is a writer, filmmaker, and professor. He holds an MFA in creative writing from Miami University (OH). More than 50 of his short stories are featured in online publications and print anthologies. The short film adaptation of his Havok story Tritanopia is currently in its film festival run.

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