Lydia

by Howard Fast

  While I was thus assessing and toying with my possessions, Josie Morris, who performed the duty of personal secretary to six investigators—in line with the policy of a carefully run and economy-minded company—burst in and asked me whether what she had heard she had actually heard, and whether it was true?

  “It is true,” I admitted.

  She had hair that was dyed to a lovely blond shade, and eyes of baby blue, except that now they sparkled with rage as she stood to my defense and let me know exactly what she thought of Alex Hunter.

  “I agree with you completely,” I said. “I am also deeply touched, Josie. I didn’t know you cared so much.”

  “How could they? You know, Mr. Krim, I will tell you something about this Alex Hunter creep—”

  But she never did, because at that moment Hunter opened the door of the office, observed her coldly, and asked her whether she didn’t have something more important to do than to pass the time with someone who had ceased to play a part in the advancement and elevation of the company?

  “If you have any tasks for me, Mr. Hunter,” she said, with what I considered a remarkable display of courage and independence, “or if you have any particular complaints about my work, I will be at my desk.”

  With that she brushed past him, and left him staring bleakly at my short line of possessions.

  “Ready to leave, Harvey?”

  “Just about. Also, Mr. Hunter, sir, I have thought of some trenchant things that I should have said to you inside but couldn’t think about under the stress of the moment. If I may have two minutes of your time?”

  “Save them, Harvey. Mr. Smedly wants to talk to you before we cast you out into the cold world.”

  “Oh?” Smedly was the president of the company, and while I had seen him on this occasion and that occasion, he had never expressed a desire to hold conversation with me.

  “Yes—‘oh.’ Look, Harvey, it never leads to anything constructive when we talk to each other. Why don’t we just walk over to his office in silence?”

  “Very well, in silence,” I agreed.

  The company is in a modern building, but Mr. Smedly’s office is paneled in walnut and all the furnishings have that substantial nineteenth-century look that speaks well for the sound and conservative position of a large insurance company. Mr. Smedly himself was a small, wiry, sharp-nosed man, gray hair, gray complexion, unenthusiastic gray eyes behind pince-nez, and all of it encased in a gray suit with a faint pin stripe. After observing me sourly for a moment or two, he nodded at a chair. Mr. Hunter took the other chair flanking the desk.

  “So you’re Krim,” Mr. Smedly said without enthusiasm. “Mr. Hunter here tells me you’re the best investigator we have.”

  “Had. He fired me.”

  “So I understand. And perfectly proper of him. You must realize, Mr. Krim, that I stand foursquare behind Mr. Hunter’s decision. He is the department head, and management puts full trust in its department heads. However, he and I have been discussing your case, and I have never known anything to be lost by second thoughts. Have you?”

  I shrugged. I already knew that the job was going to be offered back to me, and that made my position a very good one.

  “He tells me,” Smedly went on, “that you demanded a finder’s fee in the Sarbine necklace case.”

  I nodded. “That’s so.”

  “You know that our internal policy here forbids finders’ fees for employees.”

  “I know that.”

  “Then you must also realize that your demands were radical. For myself, I take the position that good men are hard to find—in any division of a large corporation. When we have such men, we should attempt to hold on to them—unless the difficulties entailed in such a policy are too great. In other words, Mr. Krim, I asked you to come in here so that we might clear away some of these difficulties. Do you like your work?”

  “Sometimes.”

  “Do you feel that you are underpaid?”

  “Yes,” I said flatly.

  “We appreciate such feelings. Ambitious men frequently express dissatisfaction with the measure of their rewards. Suppose I were to suggest a ten per cent increase?”

  I shook my head. “No. I don’t want an increase.”

  “Exactly what do you want, Mr. Krim?” he asked acidly.

  “I told that to Mr. Hunter.”

  “Come now,” Mr. Smedly said, displaying his patience and his tolerance with a thin smile, “surely you are not serious about a fee of fifty thousand dollars? Even if it were not against our policy to pay any finder’s fee, the sum is preposterous.”

  “Granted. But only one fifth as preposterous as the check you are going to write in a couple of weeks if the necklace is not recovered.”

  “Just how do you know you can recover the necklace?”

  “I don’t know. And I also do not know how many ways that fee might have to be split. I only want to cover the ground in advance.”

  “And you consider such a demand to be worth the loss of your position here, Mr. Krim?”

  “I don’t have a position here, Mr. Smedly. I have a job—and it pays about what a busy plumber would make. The fee is worth five years of my job.”

  “I see. Suppose we were to offer you not a fee, but a bonus of five thousand dollars?”

  I shook my head.

  “Do you realize how much fifty thousand dollars is, Mr. Krim?”

  “Not really,” I admitted. “But once I have it in the bank, and spend my nights at home counting up to fifty thousand dollars, I’ll get used to the idea. I’m adaptable, I learn easily.”

  “So?” Mr. Smedly sighed and placed the tips of his fingers together on top of his desk. “I want you to understand, Mr. Krim, that I place the good of this company above emotion and even above tradition. If I were to have you thrown out of here, I would be indulging an act that would satisfy my desire but not my sense of balance. However, let me make this plain. A recovery by the police or the FBI or any other official or quasi-official police or peace organization or protective organization in this or any other country, or a recovery in conjunction with any such organization will eliminate any claim you might have to such a fee. The fee is limited to recovery by you—or by you in conjunction with thieves, fences, etc. Is that plain?”

  “Yes, sir. It’s plain, but I would like it put in writing.”

  “I will dictate a memo to that effect, and you may take it with you. I want to tell you, Mr. Krim, that I do not admire either your personality or your methods. I hope that I shall have occasion to admire your ability.”

  “I hope so, sir.”

  Then he called in his secretary and dictated the memo. I waited until it was typed, and then, with a piece of paper in my hand that would be worth fifty thousand dollars if and when I turned up the Sarbine necklace, I permitted myself one small smirk in the direction of Mr. Hunter before I left.

  CHAPTER TWO

  I HAVE my own way of working, and it differs from that of the police in that it is directed toward an entirely different goal. The police want the thief. I want the property we have insured. If the thief comes with the recovery of property, I am always willing to be public-spirited, just as the police are satisfied to hand back the property once they have the thief. There are other differences: the police have a vast organization that connects with every other police organization in the country—and, to a degree, in the world. And while I can get a certain amount of help from these organizations, they are not mine—nor are the police ever forgetful of the fact that I am always willing to make my deal with the thief or the fence. The memo Smedly gave me had no mention of such deals in it, and he and Hunter would swear on a stack of Bibles that they do not deal with thieves. But when an investigator does deal with thieves, they conveniently close their eyes.

  So I do it my own way, and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. How it worked in the case of Lydia Anderson, which is the way I remember this case and always will remember it, is put down in wha
t follows.

  The robbery had taken place on Sunday night, and this business that I described was the following morning. From what I had read about the robbery, it would be just as well to let the police run it through their detail mills until Thursday. The very strong likelihood was that they would not turn up either the thief or the necklace. If they did, I would add nothing to the score by bothering them. I was interested in the necklace—deeply interested, fifty thousand dollars interested—but only if I could turn it up myself. So I left the police alone for the time being and walked over to the Donnell Branch of the New York Public Library. If you want exotic facts, I suppose the Central Branch on Forty-second Street is the place; but you can’t go into the stacks there and it’s full of files and formality. All I wanted was a copy of Who’s Who that was five years old, and I could find that at the Donnell and read in it peacefully and comfortably.

  Also, the Donnell is on Fifty-third Street, facing the Museum of Modern Art, where you can eat the best lunch at the price that is served anywhere in New York. I have been a member there for over ten years, feeling that among the very few admirable attributes of the human race is their ability to produce a thing called art.

  Lucille Dempsey is one of the librarians at the Donnell, and definitely an asset to the whole system. I had dated her just once and had become painfully aware that she combined in herself the worst aspects of Presbyterian decency with a desire to uplift me and turn me from a wasted existence. After that we were friends, and about once a month we would get together for lunch across the street. She greeted me today with a pleasant smile. It was almost twelve o’clock then, and I made a lunch date for twelve-thirty, which she accepted with a sigh. There are women who always sigh when they agree to anything.

  In Who’s Who, 1956–57, I looked up Richard Cotter and found the following: “Cotter, Richard Henry, builder; b. Boston, March 9, 1912; s. James and Anne (Fredericks) C.; B.S., M.I.T., 1933; m. Jean Felton, Feb. 6, 1935; 1 daughter, Sarah. Chief Engineer CuthbyWallace 1939, etc., etc.” Then I tried Mark Sarbine, discovered he had not made the grade, and continued the hunt to Who’s Who 1962—63. Evidently Sarbine did not rate in the eyes of those who choose the select few for public acknowledgment.

  Then I called the office and spoke to Alex Hunter, who told me icily that he was not employed there to do my work for me.

  “I know that, Mr. Hunter, sir,” I replied politely. “But I thought that—”

  “You will damn well stop calling me ‘Mr. Hunter, sir,’ Harvey, or I will know the reason why!”

  “Yes, sir. Of course. All I want to know is where Richard Cotter’s deceased daughter, Sarah, went to college? I’m sure research didn’t miss out on that one. Is it asking too much?”

  “No, certainly not, Harvey. I am here to serve you. Sarah Cotter went to Chelsee College, which is located at Chelsee, Mass. And now, to quote you, drop dead.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Hunter, sir,” I said.

  When I had taken Lucille Dempsey across the street and up to the Museum Penthouse and had gallantly placed her tray of food in front of her, and had observed that on a beautiful April day like this one, we might have walked up to the zoo and had our lunch on the cafeteria terrace there, she replied unkindly,

  “I believe, Harvey, that you have every dollar lunch in New York spotted and cataloged.”

  “I just don’t like to throw money away.”

  “Well, for a single man, you certainly don’t.”

  “That’s not very kind. And furthermore, I am only technically single. I happen to be divorced from a miserable witch I pay fifty hard-earned dollars a week to.”

  “I really don’t think you like women at all, do you, Harvey?”

  “I like you.”

  “Oh yes, you do—but not as a woman. You—”

  “All right,” I interrupted. “I dislike women and men both. I am cynical and removed, but let’s not try to do anything about it today. Let’s talk about something else.”

  “What?”

  “College, for example. Where did you go to college?”

  “Radcliffe. And now I am a librarian. How are the mighty fallen!”

  “The mighty are fallen? I’ve lost you.”

  “You don’t know much about anything except insurance and crooks, do you, Harvey?”

  “Not much. Why? How does Radcliffe rate?”

  “Only number one. The most, as far as college for girls is concerned. Some might say Swarthmore—but no, I think it’s Radcliffe. We were all of us the bright young female geniuses of America, the very most. So I am a librarian—”

  “A very pretty one. It’s a part of Harvard, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. I am pleased that you have at least heard of it.”

  “And Chelsee? How would you rate Chelsee?”

  “It’s a good school, Harvey. If you made a score card, you might call it number three, or number four. It’s a girls’ school, and somewhat posher than Radcliffe. Very pretty and well-bred young ladies. It has a reputation for that.”

  “Is it far from Cambridge? Have you ever been there?”

  “It’s about twenty miles from Cambridge, and I’ve been there. A lovely place, halls of ivy—a dream campus. But why this sudden interest in girls’ colleges? Have you found a young lady you choose to educate?”

  “When I do, I’ll let you know. Look, Lucille, I’m a City College boy myself, so I am not entirely up on these matters. Suppose I drove up to Chelsee? Could I just walk into the place?”

  “Why not?”

  “Well, I don’t know. Is the place open?”

  “Of course it is. It’s not a jail.”

  “Could I walk into one of the dorms?”

  “Certainly. You’ll find a house mother somewhere, and she’ll be happy to help you, so long as you behave.”

  “I always behave.”

  “I suppose you do,” she admitted. “It’s not very flattering. What are you up to, Harvey? Why don’t you let me in on it? There’s nothing in the world I’d like better than to watch a detective work.”

  “I’m not a detective, honey, but if this one comes off I’ll be buying you lunch at Le Pavilion.”

  I think I meant it, and I thought a good deal about Lucille the following morning, driving up to Chelsee, Massachusetts. It’s a good drive for thinking, because there is nothing on the Merritt or Wilbercross Parkway particularly worth looking at, and one might as well think as listen to the radio. I drive a Ford Falcon, because as Lucille pointed out, I am a careful man with a dollar and it gets me where I want to go. I never considered that a car had to do much more than that.

  I turned over in my mind what Lucille had said about me, that I didn’t really care for women, and my own rejoinder that I didn’t care a great deal for men or women. Both remarks in jest, but wisecracks always carry a bitter substratum of truth and earnestness. I couldn’t explain myself or apologize for myself by reminding myself that my work was petty and routine work with an element of the population that lacked even a shred of nobility, petty cheats who hid some piece of jewelry to collect a few hundred dollars from the insurance company, parlor con men and con women who sold jewels and then faked a robbery to collect on them, ignoble thieves without courage or audacity. I held no brief for the insurance companies; they already owned half of America and, given time, they would own the rest of it; but I despised the people who cheated them, the fences who did business with me, and the half-witted crooks who made the same mistake over and over and were caught over and over. Yet my association with them was a matter of choice. I could have done other things—no one sat on me and twisted my arm.

  I was nobody, a current American plaint, but that didn’t change the fact. With the help of my ex-wife, I had knocked all the hope out of one marriage and I didn’t have the guts to enter into a second one. I was what some called good-looking—nose a bit long and thin, chin a bit sharp, but good-looking enough, healthy enough, bright enough, decently educated—and to no purpose. And now I was chas
ing a big fat pot of gold at the end of a rainbow that did not exist.

  That kind of thinking turned my attention back to the assembly-line scenery that bordered the parkway, and then finally to the radio, the disc jockeys and the cretin-directed advertising. It took four and a half hours of sensible driving and another hour for lunch to reach Chelsee and be directed by the local cop to the college. I got there sometime before three o’clock.

  Lucille had not exaggerated the beauty of the campus. At this time, late in April, Chelsee looked like a stock dream of a college turned into substance and reality, half a hundred acres of gentle green hills scattered over with old ivy-covered buildings and shaded by great, spreading hardwood trees, the leaflessness softened by a mist of yellow-green buds and by the brilliant yellow splashes of forsythia. I turned my car through the gates, drove slowly by streams of girls, some on foot, some on bicycles, crested one of the hills and saw a charming lake lying below in the hollow, drove back and forth through the maze of narrow roadways that connected the various buildings, and then finally parked in a quadrangle that included half a dozen dormitories. I chose one at random, made inquiries of a few girls standing in the entranceway, and discovered that while Sarah Cotter had not lived in this building, she had spent her last two years at the school in one directly across the quadrangle.

  The dormitory they directed me to was called Seavey Hall. It was old, so old that the stone steps leading to the door were hollowed, and inside there were the woodwork and atmosphere of the eighteen-eighties. To one side of the entranceway there was a large living room, in which a dozen girls sprawled in overstuffed chairs reading or sat at tables working; at the other side a very pretty girl behind a switchboard asked what she could do for me. The question was accompanied by a smile I was beginning to take for granted, and I was also beginning to realize that any man was a most welcome intrusion at a girls’ college. I told her that I would like to speak to the house mother.

  “In there, sir,” she nodded, “where it says office. Are you a brother?”