The Valentine Estate

by Stanley Ellin

‘Why are you always so impatient, Joseph? Now, of all times I beg you to be very patient. I have been through a dreadful time. I had our fish on the line, I had him on board the boat, and he got away.’ Mookerjee’s voice became ever shriller. ‘I swear it was not my fault. It was that monstrous girl. I think she became infatuated with him. When my back was turned she connived at his escape. You were right about her, Joseph. She is as evil as she is beautiful. Altogether treacherous. But be patient. I will attend to her, and then I will go fishing again. I know his flight plans for London, so I will be there right on his heels. Do you agree?’

  ‘Yes,’ Chris said shortly.

  ‘Ah, you can be understanding.’ Mookerjee’s voice was breathy with relief. ‘I will call you from London when it is all over. Our fish is as good as dead, Joseph.’

  He abruptly hung up on that. Evidently, he wasn’t quite as sure of Prendergast’s forbearance as he sounded.

  7

  Chris slowly put down the phone. He became aware of a loud honking of automobile horns, of the sounds of early morning traffic now starting to fill the avenue. They were reassuring sounds to hear. They made sense in an otherwise crazy world.

  So from the start, Prendergast’s business with him had been murder. When he had walked in on the man a few hours before, and Prendergast had stared at him with the shock of someone seeing a corpse rise from the grave it was because Chris Monte had, in a sense, risen from the grave. He was supposed to be dead in the Caribbean fifteen hundred miles away, and here he was, all too alive.

  And that was not because he had been so brilliant in turning the tables aboard Chirica II. It was because Gosala Mookerjee and his girl friend who had gotten the contract to dispose of him were out to double-cross Prendergast. They wanted to make a deal with Monte, not toss him to the sharks. Now that the double-cross was in the open, Baby was being handed the rap for it. Baby was destined for the sharks. But not really. Mookerjee would never sacrifice his luscious red-head just to back up his long distance lie. Which was lucky for any shark or barracuda that might have come face to face with Baby. She was at least as tough and mean as any of them.

  Prendergast must be starting to think he was dealing with an indestructible man in this Monte. Mookerjee had failed to get rid of him, then, thanks to Big Brother with the tommy-gun, Degan had also failed. Seen from that angle, the world might be brutal, but it wasn’t really crazy. It was a gigantic chessboard with Prendergast and Big Brother facing each other across it. And to judge from the amount of interest he drew, Chris Monte was the vital piece on the board. It was a sound analogy. King or pawn, no piece on the board was intended to know the motives of the players manipulating him.

  How much did Beth know of them?

  He went upstairs to her room and ruthlessly searched every inch of it. The qualm of conscience he felt while digging through her belongings he anaesthetized by the self-reminder that he was, after all, her husband. When she had hopped into his bed on their wedding night she had surrendered all claims to privacy.

  The contents of closets and drawers were in keeping with the staid décor of the room. Every dress and under-garment had that no-nonsense quality. Not that they didn’t provoke a curiously sensual reaction in their own way. Picturing the real Beth, the hot-fleshed, eager, astonishingly imaginative Beth of the wedding night, dressed in these decorous garments somehow made her image even more sexy than that of, say, Hilary Talbot, who dressed to be sexy.

  When he was finished foraging through the room, it looked as if a hurricane had hit it. With the feeling that any effort to conceal his raid would really be dirty pool, he deliberately left it in disorder, went back to Prendergast’s office, and made himself at home in the big, leather swivel chair, feet propped on the desk, phone within arm’s reach. The noise from the avenue had settled down to a soothing drone. The fog and rain of the past night had been a harbinger of a warm spell; the house, with every window shut, was growing warm and close, but opening a window would be a signal of occupancy to anyone outside, so he decided to leave things as they were. If Prendergast was warily sniffing out the lay of the land, wondering whether to return here, it would be foolish to scare him off. Prendergast was the man with the answers.

  The gathering heat, the soothing street noises, the flicker of sunlight against the drawn window-shades, Chris found, were like a drug. He closed his eyes, struggled to open them, then gave up. How long he slept when the ringing of the phone finally cut through a nightmare which had something to do with menacing chess pieces he didn’t know. All he knew when he came awake was that he ached in every joint, and that his legs, still propped on the desk, were totally numb. He had to shove them off the desk with his hand before he could reach forward and pick up the phone.

  ‘Mr Prendergast?’

  ‘No, it’s Chris. Beth, where are you? What the hell are you up to?’

  ‘Oh, no!’ It was a wail of despair. ‘Oh, Chris, are you all right? What are you doing here? You shouldn’t be here.’

  Which, he thought, coincided too perfectly with Prendergast’s feeling about it.

  ‘What’s wrong with my being here?’ he asked.

  ‘Everything. It can be terribly dangerous for you.’

  So she knew that much. It was beginning to look as if he wouldn’t have to wait for Prendergast’s return to get some answers.

  ‘Dangerous or not,’ he said, ‘I’ve got to see you right away. Where are you? I’ll meet you there.’

  She hesitated. ‘No, I’d rather you didn’t.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I don’t want to tell you right now, darling. Anyhow, you’ll find out soon enough.’ Her voice was apprehensive. ‘Chris, I had my airline ticket changed to tomorrow night. Can’t we meet at the airport then?’

  ‘I said right away. All you have to do is tell me where.’ It struck him that if Prendergast sent other emissaries of the Degan calibre to attend to him, it would be stupid to be boxed up here in the house with the girl. ‘The Ritz is near here, isn’t it? Next to the park?’

  ‘Yes. The Public Garden.’

  ‘All right, I’ll meet you in the lobby there.’ He had a vivid memory of that lobby. It was hard to imagine any kind of violence taking place there. ‘How long will it take you? Are you close by?’

  ‘Yes. But I won’t be able to make it before three.’

  He glanced at his watch and saw it was not quite noon.

  ‘That’s three hours. Can’t you make it sooner?’

  ‘No, I can’t. I really can’t.’ She sounded almost tearful. ‘And Chris –’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘When we meet please don’t be angry with me. Don’t even say anything until I’ve explained. Or maybe you won’t be angry at all,’ she said confusingly. ‘Hell, I wish I knew how men really felt about things.’

  ‘Very touchy about some things. Where were you last night?’

  ‘Isn’t Mr Prendergast there? Didn’t he tell you?’

  ‘No, he’s not here right now. Yes, he told me you were staying with some people named Degan.’

  ‘That’s right. I was.’

  ‘Sure you were, baby.’

  ‘Well, you don’t have to sound like that about it, darling. They’re a perfectly nice respectable doctor and his wife. Hey, are you jealous?’

  ‘Frantically.’

  ‘Good. I like that. And the reason I called was to tell Mr P. I wouldn’t be back there until later in the afternoon, so now you can leave him the message.’

  ‘You can count on me,’ Chris said, ‘darling.’

  8

  At two-thirty, he left the house and walked down the block to the car, his shoulder blades rigidly braced against the bullet that might come smashing between them. But there was no bullet. Only one of those deceptively flawless New England days – early summer today, snow tomorrow – full of a warm, golden sunlight and a smell of fresh greenery. Obviously the most peaceful and placid of worlds with no hint of menace in it.

  Yet he knew that fr
om close by – a parked car, a window, one of those fat trees – every move he made was being watched. Maybe Prendergast wasn’t on the scene, but Big Brother hadn’t followed him this far to give up on him now. He got his suitcase out of the car and brought it back to the house, trying to look casual but unable to relax those taut shoulder blades.

  He had already gotten the lay of the land from the window of Beth’s room which overlooked the back yard. He went out the back door with its shattered pane of glass, across the yard, through a hedge, then down an alleyway between two buildings that fronted on the next block over. Newbury Street. Spacious sidewalks crowded with young collegiate types, square and hip both. Chic little shops, sedate art galleries, gleamingly antiseptic hamburger joints. As harmless a looking world as Commonwealth Avenue. Who in this world would dream of carrying tommy-guns?

  A few blocks away, Newbury terminated at the Public Garden, and there he found the Ritz Carlton. He registered at the desk in the names of Mr and Mrs Frederick Walker. Signing the card, he reflected that it was obliging of his father to have had such a neutral name. It wasn’t too colourless either. Unlike the suspect Smith or Jones, it was the kind guaranteed to be overlooked by anyone thumbing through registry cards.

  He tipped a porter to take his bag up to his room and settled down in the lobby to wait for his wife. The hotel had two entrances – the other on Arlington Street faced the Public Garden – and there was a heavy traffic through both. No collegiate types in here, at least not of the hippie persuasion. Just staid and solid citizens who might have come from the womb with hornrimmed eyeglasses and attaché cases, and whose expensively turned-out women looked indistinguishable from each other. With one exception. A tall, eye-fetching blonde who strolled along the carpeted length of the lobby looking positively incandescent among all that weak candle power. A completely psychedelic blonde, mini-skirted up to here, the fishnet stockings revealing a long, lovely stretch of thigh between the tops of the leg-hugger boots and the hem of the skirt. Chris, taking good note of her from the opposite end of the lobby, saw that it didn’t matter much if he stared openly since every male around him was doing the same. The women, too, but with coolly appraising eyes.

  The girl turned in his direction.

  ‘Chris!’ she called, and came flying across the lobby to him.

  He stood up, trying to shake off his daze, and his wife came into his arms. She was a strong girl. Her hands, clenched into fists, dug into the middle of his back hard enough to hurt. Over her shoulder he saw that the near-by males were now looking at him with what might have been cordial envy. But, he thought, they didn’t know what a tricky baggage he had to contend with here.

  She released her arms from around him.

  ‘Is this what you were so worried I’d be angry about?’ he said. ‘This get-up?’

  ‘Scared is the word for it, darling, not worried. The hair especially.’ It was now sherry-coloured, reddish gold, the glossy length of it caught in a ribbon at the nape of her neck, then spilling loose over her shoulders. ‘The clothes are trousseau things I got in Miami, so at least I was getting used to the idea of them. I mean, how I’d look when I put them on. But not the hair. I had to get used to it walking over here and looking at myself in store windows. First it was awful. Then I thought, hey, that’s a real cool chick I’m looking at. If I was her husband, I’d go for her very big. Now I’m scared again.’

  ‘Well, don’t be. Anyhow, not about the way you look.’

  ‘Then you don’t mind? You like?’

  ‘I like the way you look. I don’t like being kept in the dark about what the hell you’re up to. We’ve got a room reserved for us here. We’re going up there now to have a real heart-to-heart talk. Where’s your suitcase?’

  ‘I left it at the airport yesterday. It’s got all my stuff for England, so I thought I’d just pick it up on my way out. Chris, you are angry with me. But the only reason I didn’t tell you why I took off from Miami like that and where I was going was because I didn’t want you to follow me. It is dangerous for you to be with me, no matter what you think.’

  ‘I’ll tell you what I think upstairs,’ he said, but when he slipped his arm through hers and started to lead her to the elevator she hung back.

  ‘Can’t I at least have lunch while you’re telling me?’ she said woefully. ‘I haven’t eaten since breakfast. I’m famished.’

  It was possible she was, he thought. It was even more possible she was trying to put off their private confrontation. Either way, he was reminded that he himself was ravenously hungry.

  At this hour, the dining-room upstairs was almost empty. When he rejected the head waiter’s offer of a choice table overlooking the Public Garden and pointed to one in a far corner of the room the man looked unhappy. It was obvious that the young lady, placed in her proper location, would have added much to the room. This way she was being sadly wasted.

  Beth looked around.

  ‘I like this. It’s the way Boston is supposed to be. I’ve never been here before. Have you?’

  ‘Yes, when I was on the circuit. Frenchy always liked the best, as long as it was on my expense account. Now what was that big danger you were saving me from when you took off from Miami so fast?’

  ‘Didn’t Mr P. tell you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I don’t know why. He got a cable from Warburton just before he was to start on that cruise. It said Teodorescu had left for Miami by plane the day before and to be very careful. So he cancelled out the cruise and came around to tell me about it. He felt the best thing I could do was go back to Boston with him right away and then take the London plane from there. That was while you were out of the house. And I thought, well, that way you wouldn’t be with me if Teodorescu somehow followed me to Boston and there was trouble with him. And we could just as easily meet in London.’

  ‘Did Prendergast give you that cable? Can you show it to me?’

  ‘No, he told me about it.’

  ‘Then you never saw any cable?’

  ‘No, but what difference does that make?’ Suddenly, she realized the difference. ‘Are you trying to tell me there was no cable from Warburton? That it was all a story?’

  ‘I’m letting you do the telling. Where were you last night?’

  ‘You already know that, Chris. There’s this nice couple, Dr Degan and his wife, who have a place out in the suburbs. I was in their guest-room all last night. Alone.’

  ‘Why there?’

  ‘Must we talk about it?’ Beth said. She tried to smile. ‘I guarantee it was a perfectly sinless night.’

  ‘Your sins are your business, baby. I just happen to be interested in this Degan. I’d like to hear more about him.’

  ‘All right then. He’s head psychiatrist at the sanatorium my mother is in. When I make an evening visit to her, he and Mrs Degan insist I stay with them overnight because it’s a long trip back to town unless you have a car. Chris, I’m sorry. I suppose that’s what you’re really angry about, that I didn’t tell you all about my mother before this. But I don’t even like to think about her. And I don’t want my sins to be only my business. I want them to be yours too.’

  ‘What’s wrong with your mother?’

  ‘She was in an auto crash when I was a little kid, and she had a brain injury that got worse and worse. She’s a hopeless catatoniac now. Totally withdrawn. Just sits and stares and doesn’t know me at all. It’s just conscience that makes me visit her. My father’s conscience really, because he made me promise I would. When that accident happened she was in the car with some man on their way back from his apartment. My father found out afterwards that she’d been having affairs like that with quite a few men while he was busy tending the flock. Now you know. I would have told you about it sooner or later anyhow.’

  ‘I always say the sooner the better,’ Chris remarked. ‘By the way, when you were at the Degan place last night you didn’t hear anything unusual going on, did you? Gunshots? People yelling? Big excitement?’


  ‘Gunshots?’ She frowned at him. ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Don’t let it throw you, baby.’ The waiter appeared at the table then and made an elaborate job of serving them. He waited until the man was gone. ‘I’m talking about a great big jigsaw puzzle I happen to be working on.’

  ‘It’s beginning to sound more like a great big inquisition.’

  ‘No, a jigsaw puzzle. Pick up a piece here, a piece there, and fit them together until they make a picture. And no hiding a piece in your hand. Was there any excitement at that place you were last night? Including a noise that sounded like gunshots?’

  ‘No, there wasn’t.’

  ‘All right, let’s try another piece. Saturday night, when you walked in on me with that wild phonograph record that was sneaked into your room at Cobia, you didn’t tell me you had a record player right there to hear it on. In fact, you gave me the impression you didn’t have one and were coming over to use mine. Why?’

  ‘Because I wanted to be with you. I wasn’t going to hang around alone in that hotel room and listen to records after what happened. I got out of there as fast as I could. And that player wasn’t really mine. It was Hilary’s. I left it at the desk there for her.’

  ‘And you still don’t know who sent that record to you?’

  ‘How could I know, Chris? What makes you think I might?’

  ‘Because,’ Chris said pleasantly, ‘I think you know somebody named Mookerjee. Gosala Mookerjee.’

  The shock of recognition was written all over her face. It should have provided him with a sense of triumph, he suspected, but it only made him feel sick.

  She must have realized at once that her expression had given her away and that there was no use trying to cover up now.

  ‘He sent it?’ She shook her head as if bemused by the idea.

  ‘So you do know him?’

  ‘Yes. I met him at the house a few months ago. He had some business to do with Mr P.’

  ‘What kind of business?’

  ‘Real estate, I guess. But how did you find out about him? I mean,’ she hastily corrected herself, ‘about his sending me the record?’