The Case of the Seven Sneezes

by Anthony Boucher

  The fat woman said, “We’d better collect Janet. She’s a stranger in town and I don’t dare let her too far off the leash. I have to present her in good condition at a silver wedding party tomorrow.”

  “Your parents’?” Fergus asked gracefully and the woman said he wasn’t Irish for nothing and if he’d get some more beer she’d go look for Janet and he did and she did and when he came back there was Janet and, he admitted, well worth looking for.

  Though the leash, he thought, was not necessary. Not that she wasn’t attractive. Janet was tall and not quite too slender; her hair was a light brown, almost blond, and her eyes were a darker tone of brown, with gold flecks. She certainly would not go unmolested; but she gave a disconcerting impression of being damned well able to take care of herself. She wore a well-tailored suit and made you think that women’s tailoring had been invented because of her.

  Fergus liked her. Besides the concentrated glamor of promising young actresses in the room (from where they stood he could see a Second Gaynor, two Second Pickfords, a Second Stella Paris, and a handful of Second Harlows), she seemed exactly what she was—a charming, capable, and very real white collar girl.

  “Miss Brainard,” the fat woman said, “may I present Mr.—Ah, beer! Thank you. And what is your name?”

  “O’Breen. Fergus O’Breen, at your devoted service.”

  The woman hesitated and tried not to stare at him. “She knows Maureen,” Fergus thought grimly, “and she’s heard about me and my Sinister Profession.” The idea seemed to bother her for a moment. Then her face cleared and she completed the introduction.

  Janet Brainard smiled and shook hands firmly. The grip was efficient, but the hand was smooth and well-shaped. “Stella tells me you’re carrying us off,” she said. “Just Sabines, that’s what we are. Not that I mind.”

  Fergus waved at the room. “Don’t mind being torn away from Glamor—capital G and all?”

  “I’ll try to hide my tears.” Her voice was low and pleasing. “Where are we going?”

  “Where the Sabine twineth,” said Fergus unashamedly. “Only look: While we’re asking people’s right names … ?” He cocked an inquisitive eyebrow at the large woman.

  “Oh dear,” she said. “After five marriages that’s a question that always brings you up short. The last was … Yes. It was Rollo Devlin.”

  “Only the name you might know best,” said Janet, “is Stella Paris.”

  Fergus stood stockstill a moment. Then he lifted his beerglass to his lips and slowly drained it. When the last drop was down, he paused and carefully articulated, “Stella Paris?”

  “Or would you remember?” Janet pantomimed stroking a long white beard.

  “Stella Paris,” Fergus repeated reverently. “And you sit here lone and lorn in a corner while everybody celebrates the remake of your greatest opus.”

  Miss Paris finished her beer. “Why not? When talkies came … Sit down, children. This is a long story, and it has a profound moral.

  “When talkies came, they said to me, ‘Miss Paris, your voice stinks.’ Oh, they said it a trifle more politely, you understand, but I got the idea. And I looked at myself in the mirror and I saw that a dozen years is a long time to play ingenues. And I looked at my bank balance, and I found it good.

  “So I retired. Boom, like that. The columnists said I had vanished. They built it up into quite something, and every so often they’d demand, ‘Where is Stella Paris?’ And all the time I was right here in Hollywood. But I never saw the right people or went to the right places. Rollo wanted to; but when he saw I was in earnest he went off to England and the last I heard of him was when he got the divorce in Paris. So I just went on living in a little bungalow and let my weight pile up and was comfortable. And I still am. Hollywood’s a very nice town if you’re not part of it.”

  Fergus looked at the nearest Second Harlow. “That’s a story,” he pronounced, “that should be forcibly poured down the shell-like ears of every one of those baby stars. How to Outgrow Glamor Gracefully. Bless you, Miss Paris. And now where to?”

  “Canapes,” said Miss Paris, “are all very well. But the afternoon’s getting on, and I’m hungry. Why don’t you drive us home and I’ll cook dinner?”

  “With your own fair hands?”

  “I know. When I was bigtime I always used to pose for publicity stills—Miss Paris Whipping Up a Cake in Her Adorable Louis XV Kitchen—and I never even knew how to break an egg. But I’ve learned a lot in the past ten years. Want to find out how much?”

  “I recommend it,” said Janet.

  An angel passed over the hubbubbling crowd, and the radio announced that neutral military observers scoffed at the rumors of parachute troop concentrations since the Finnish war had proved the complete impracticality of such operations.

  “Have you got a radio?” Fergus asked.

  “With a patented filter,” said Miss Paris. “Nothing comes over it but music and gags.”

  “Then in that case—”

  And the three strode cheerfully out of Metropolis.

  iii

  Miss Paris set on the coffee table a whisky bottle, a chilled siphon, and two glasses. “You children stay here and talk,” she commanded. “I can do better in the kitchen without what people quaintly call help.”

  Fergus looked around the pleasant and unpretentious little room. “Most stars,” he observed as the kitchen door swung to behind their hostess, “even the ex-est of the ex, would think this a hovel. But you can breathe in it.”

  “Stella has sense,” said Janet.

  “Straight?” Fergus asked. “Or soda?”

  “Soda please.”

  Fergus tended bar and expressed his growing admiration of Janet’s cool efficiency in the size of the drink he poured. “Madame?”

  “Thank you.” As she took the glass her forefinger bent over its rim and then retreated.

  “You’re from the East, Miss Brainard? New York, I imagine.”

  “Yes. But don’t tell me you’re one of those people who go around identifying you by your accent, like that radio program?”

  “No. It’s the way you took your highball. No barkeep ever serves a swizzlestick in the West, but in New York you always get them. In fact, I think you can divide New Yorkers into two great schools: those who always remove the swizzlestick and let it roll about the bar, and those who always carefully prop it up out of nose-reach with the forefinger.”

  “And which are you when you leave your unswizzled West?”

  “Same like you. I’m a swizzlepropper.”

  “A bond,” Janet observed dryly.

  “And what line are you in in New York, if you’ll pardon my ’satiable curiosity?”

  “I’m an editor,” she announced proudly.

  “Noble! Editing does seem to be a woman’s game nowadays, doesn’t it? And what house are you with?”

  Janet took her time with her drink. “Afraid it’s not a house exactly—not if you mean like a real major publishing house. It’s just—forgive this, but I didn’t name the firm—it’s just I. Q. Publications. Maybe you know our puzzle magazine Brain Wave?”

  “Do I?” Fergus beamed. “I’m one of your regular customers.”

  “How nice. I’m crossword puzzle editor. It’s strange work and hard work, but it pays fair-to-middling and I’ve got ideas for building it up.”

  “The crosswords are good,” said Fergus. “Much harder than in most of those magazines. But they aren’t my main interest in your magazine. What’s an unfailing joy are those magnificent crime puzzles of Lester Ferguson’s.”

  A shadow passed over the girl’s face. “They’re all right,” she said. “But you do do the crosswords?”

  “They’re a help when work’s slow, especially if you do them diagramless. But tell me …” He was watching Janet’s face. That momentary shadow had vanished at once; but people whose faces clouded at the name of a great criminologist stirred the O’Breen curiosity. “Tell me this; it’s a point I’ve al
ways wanted to make to a crossword puzzle editor. Why do you insist so rigidly on having no unkeyed letters?”

  “Unkeyed letters,” said Janet in her most formally editorial manner, “were all very well back in the early Plaza Publishing Company days of crosswords, when constructors didn’t know any better. But technique has improved since then. We have talkies now too, and radio. Unkeyed letters are as dated as silent pictures.”

  “Which,” said Fergus, “I likewise prefer. But that’s irrelevant. What I think the trouble is, is that you editors have hold of the wrong end of the stick. Sure, a puzzle with no unkeyed letters is technically more of an achievement to construct; but who cares about that? It’s a lot easier to solve, and it’s for solvers that you publish your magazine.”

  “Don’t you want it easy?”

  “Why should I? If all you want is easiness, it’s a damned sight easier just not to do puzzles. As long as you want puzzles at all, you want good solid honesttogod bastardly braincrackers. And unkeyed letters, especially if you insist as I do on doing all puzzles diagramless, add no end to the difficulty and to the fun.”

  Janet shook her head. “Sorry, O’Breen, but your psychology’s all off. What you say may be true of yourself, but you’re not a typical part of the puzzle public, at least in America. I’ve heard they’re different in England, but the American puzzle fan wants something that looks hard and is easy. He wants to pat himself on the back and say Wasn’t he smart to do that one so quick? And if it’s too hard, he can’t pat himself on the back and he won’t buy the next issue of the magazine. So no unkeyed letters, or the fans raise hell. The hard work belongs to the constructors; they get paid for it.”

  “All right. I give up. But then I’m no authority on crosswords. As I said,” he went on, watching her face closely, “it’s the logic-puzzles that I really devour. Curious, isn’t it, that a great criminal scholar like Ferguson should have such a firstrate light puzzle sense as well?”

  There was no mistaking it. It was Ferguson’s name that brought the shadow across her face. “And just which classic murder,” he asked lightly, “did the great man accuse you of, Miss Brainard?”

  Janet grinned at him. “It is ’satiable, isn’t it?”

  “Sorry.”

  “Not at all. There is something … O’Breen, if you’re a Ferguson fan you might help explain this. It’s ridiculous and yet … well, it bothers me. I had lunch with Ferguson the other day. You know perhaps what he’s like—seventy-odd and half again as large as Stella, with a roar and a limp.” She hesitated.

  “What did he do?” Fergus prompted. “Denounce the waiter for arsenic in the soup?”

  “Hardly. But it was curious. We met in a hotel lobby, where there’d been a famous shooting once. I forget the details, but it’s one of Ferguson’s pet cases. One shot chipped a marble pillar and you can still see the scar. And when I met him, he was sitting there staring at that pillar and—well, just gloating over it.”

  “That’s natural enough. Any man’s a mild maniac on his specialty. Ferguson would gloat over that pillar the way a philatelist might leer at a block of mint Cape triangles.”

  “No, but that isn’t it. I mean, that’s merely the build-up. During lunch we were talking about things and I said I was coming out here for my parents’ silver wedding anniversary. That seemed to interest him, and he muttered ‘Brainard …’ and ‘1915 …’ and then he asked me if my mother had had a bridesmaid named Martha Stanhope.”

  Fergus hoped that he controlled his features. “And did she?”

  “I didn’t know then. You naturally don’t know much about your mother’s wedding attendants. But I asked Stella later and she said Yes, she was maid of honor and this Martha was bridesmaid, only Martha isn’t going to be at the reunion party because she’s dead. Stella seemed worried and as though she wished I hadn’t mentioned it.”

  “Of course. If they were girls together, Miss Paris wouldn’t want to be reminded of the empty chair at the reunion. Nothing to bother you in that.”

  “It isn’t that. It was Mr. Ferguson. Now I’m not one of those women who simply exude intuition and sensitivity; but this … this did strike me rather forcibly. You see, O’Breen, when he asked me that question he looked at me, and I swear that he gave me exactly the same look he gave that chipped pillar.”

  Fergus laughed. “Any man, Miss Brainard, who could bestow the same look on you and on a chipped pillar can be only nominally male.” And he prayed that his own eyes did not display the chipped-pillar gleam that he could feel in them.

  For a moment, as she spoke of the criminologist’s gloating appraisal, Janet’s composure had been a trifle shaken; but she had recovered it almost instantly. “I should have known you’d laugh at me,” she said. “I don’t know why I told you anyway.”

  “Because for centuries untold every generation of O’Breens has produced at least one priest. This generation broke the tradition. There’s just me and my sister; but in honor of the family heritage I am a naturalborn confessor. People tell me things.”

  Fergus’ tone was light; but he finished his drink in something close to a nervous gulp. There was no use telling this girl the truth about Martha Stanhope. The thought of those cats had shocked even the unconnected Maureen; and if you knew that three slit throats had poured a libation for your parents’ wedding … Not pretty. And one more reason for leaving Lucas Quincy’s quarter-century dead case alone. Why rake up scandal and horror when there is a new generation to be slimed by it? To be a chipped pillar for the reading public of the country …

  “And what are you,” Janet asked, “aside from a confessor?”

  “Oh,” Fergus lied breezily, “I confess too. Professionally, I mean, for the magazines. I’m ruined twice a month regular. More fun. But tell me, Miss Brainard: you follow football at all?”

  “Avidly.”

  “Who looks good in the East for this fall?”

  “Well, around the office you hear great things about Cornell. All the alumni think it’s going to be something terrific. And oddly enough Boston College, if you’ve ever heard of that out here …”

  And so they drifted peacefully away from the subject of chipped pillars and Martha Stanhope.

  The dinner was simple; but clearly affection, care, and artistry had gone into its making. The delicately seasoned flavor of that ground round steak, for instance, was no matter of happenstance. And the zucchini, embellished with onions, tomatoes, green peppers, and a suspicion of unidentifiable herbs, were enjoyable enough to make Fergus forget completely how rich they were in vitamins.

  “You must tell me all about these afterwards,” he said, “and write it down. I want to try them.”

  “Mr. O’Breen!” Miss Paris cocked an eyebrow. “You cook?”

  “Sure. I gave up hope of my sister’s ever learning and decided I might make a more promising scholar myself. And to my own surprise I like it. But I never thought squash could taste like this. How do you do it?”

  “It is good then,” she sighed with relief. “If people sniff and taste and say ‘Hm! So you use cumin in your zucchini? Yes, and a spot of oregano. Interesting,’ that means you’re wrong. But if they taste and wonder and say, ‘How do you do it?’ then you know it’s just right.”

  “Cumin and oregano,” Fergus murmured. “I’ll get the details later.”

  “Do. You know,” she smiled, “people can say what they like about Southern California. It’s a strange place, Lord knows, but green vegetables all the year round isn’t anything to sneeze at.”

  And just then, with a timing that must have rejoiced all Miss Paris’ half-forgotten theatrical instincts, Fergus sneezed.

  “Gesundheit,” said Janet. “Or does that make me a Fifth Columnist?”

  “Sorry.” Fergus gave a rueful grin. “I was not trying to contradict. I only—”

  The second sneeze was a honey. He turned away from the table and let the third and the fourth and the fifth shake him mercilessly. In a momentary pause he l
ifted his head and announced, “Two more.” And when the foretold two had passed, he turned his chair back and resumed dinner.

  “But how precise!” Janet exclaimed. “Is it always seven?”

  “Just about. Trust the O’Breens to have a unique and screwy type of hay fever all their own. Seven sneezes. Mystic number and stuff. But where’s the cat? I haven’t met him yet.”

  Miss Paris and Janet looked at each other and were silent.

  “Come now. There’s just one thing on earth that sets me off that way, and that’s a long-haired cat. There must be one around.”

  “I do not have a cat,” Miss Paris said slowly.

  For over a minute conversation was dead. Fergus took another mouthful of those once splendid zucchini, but the taste seemed to have gone out of them. Janet was taking little sips of water and dabbing her lips too precisely after each sip. Miss Paris was staring at her plate as though it were a crystal ball.

  “Mr. O’Breen,” she said at last, “Janet and I, as you have gathered, are going to a silver wedding party tomorrow. It will be a small house party on Blackman’s Island—you know the place?”

  “That’s that bleak rock off Santa Eulalia, isn’t it? I didn’t know anybody lived there.”

  “Janet’s father acquired this house there as part of a business deal. I think he insists upon using it in order to prove that he was not swindled. But that is beside the point. This is, as I think I told you, an anniversary party, and the only guests—aside of course from Janet as offspring—are the members of the original wedding party, my own contemporaries. I have been afraid that Janet might be lonely without any young people in the group. Should you care to join the party?”

  “This is so sudden, Miss Paris,” Fergus murmured. “Just a pick-up, that’s what I am.”

  “But should you?”

  “You don’t know a thing about me. I might be a highclass jewel thief who struck up this acquaintance for just such a purpose.”

  “I know enough about you.”

  So that’s it, thought Fergus. It had happened to him before—invitations to houseparties so warmly and personally phrased that only a foul-minded low-life could suspect the genial host of saving the expense of a private detective to guard his treasures. But more than treasures might need guarding on Blackman’s Island. The Stanhope case was getting in Fergus’ hair more entanglingly than a gum-chewing bat. First a bastard approaches you with an illegal proposition, but a good round fee. Then nice people give you a friendly invitation, but strictly nonprofessional and no cash. If you could just strike an average …