The Midnight Visitor           (Robert Arthur)

1. “Ausable did not fit any description of a secret agent Fowler had ever read.” What do secret agents in books and films look like, in your opinion?

Answer: Secret agents in fiction are projected like ideal men, ‘Tall dark and handsome’. They are usually well built and keep have beautiful women for company. They would always smoke pipe or cigar and do death defying stunts. James Bond is a very famous character by Ian Fleming. Movies based on James Bond show hi-tech gizmos which assist the detective in countering villains. There are some exceptions as well. There is a character named Feluda which was created by Satyajit Ray, the famous Bangla Filmmaker. Feluda was typical bhadralok by appearance.

2. How does Ausable manage to make Max believe that there is a balcony attached to his room? Look back at his detailed description of it. What makes it a convincing story?

Answer: Ausable creates a detailed description of how his office was part a bigger apartment and how the next room had direct connection with the balcony. His statement that somebody else also broke into his office through that balcony made it a convincing story.

3. Looking back at the story, when do you think Ausable thought up his plan for getting rid of Max? Do you think he had worked out his plan in detail right from the beginning? Or did he make up a plan taking advantage of events as they happened?

Answer: Ausable is very clever the way a detective should be. He made the plan to get rid of Max from the very beginning which is evident from the story of the imaginary balcony. He knew the waiter would come to deliver his drinks. He planned carefully to create an imaginary policeman which would have compelled Max to jump on the non-existent balcony.

4) How did Ausable befool Max? or, Describe the meeting between Ausable and max.

or, How did Ausable prove that he was smart and intelligent.

Answer: Ausable did not look smart and intelligent but inwardly he was actually so. Seeing Max with his pistol Ausable did not grow agitated but remained cool. As he knew that the waiter would come, so he waited for the moment. He would convert it to the coming of a police. It was his plan to tell about the imaginary balcony outside the window. He knew that Max would escape through the balcony and would get killed. Accordingly Ausable was successful and proved himself a smart and intelligent secret agent.

5) Ii don’t answer the door , they wil entre anyway. The door is unlocked. And they will not hesitate to shoot. “ explain these words with reference to the context.

Answer:  These words are spoken by Ausable, the secret agent.

                 Switching on the lights of his hotel room, upon his return there in the evening with Fowler, Ausable finds his rival Max half way across the room, aiming an automatic pistol at them. Without a trace of panic, the fat secret agent drops down into a chair nearby only to comment that it was the second time somebody had got into his room through the window by climbing into the balcony from the floor below.

               Max express his ignorance about the balcony and informs Ausable that he has come the report that is scheduled to arrive in his room in half an hour. Just then, there is a knock at the door and the lines referred to are spoken. Ausable knows that the knock is by the hotel waiter. With great present of mind, he take the opportunity to outwit his opponent and ultimately manages to finish him off.