Murder in E Minor

by Robert Goldsborough

  “Mr. Hirsch, do you concur with this assessment?” Wolfe asked.

  Hirsch cleared his throat again. “Yes, yes I do. I was also associate conductor under Milan’s predecessor, and when Milan was chosen, I was disappointed. I won’t deny that I’d hoped I might be picked as music director myself, but”—he shrugged in acceptance—“that was not to be. I resolved to work with the new director, but almost from the beginning, Milan made it clear to me by his actions that I would have almost nothing to say about how the orchestra was run. I often wondered why he even kept me around, but one day I figured it out. It didn’t matter who the associate conductor was; under Milan Stevens, he would have very little responsibility, so he probably felt it might as well be me as anyone.”

  “I understand you have a composition that you hoped the orchestra would someday play,” Wolfe said.

  Hirsch passed a hand over his forehead. “Yes, that’s so,” he said after a pause.

  “But it was not played?”

  Another pause. “No. Milan apparently felt it was not … of sufficient caliber to merit a Symphony premiere.” Hirsch compressed his lips.

  “Why ‘apparently’?” Wolfe asked.

  “I say ‘apparently’ because Milan never came right out and said the symphony wasn’t good. But every time I brought it up, he changed the subject or put it off by saying something like ‘Oh, yes, we’ve got to sit down and talk about this when things ease up, but right now is such a hectic time.’ He was always too busy. And yet I know it is a good work—I’ve shown it to many people in the music world whose opinions I respect, and everyone has been enthusiastic, far more than they needed to be just to make me feel good.”

  “Other than its quality, what reason might Mr. Stevens have for not playing your symphony?”

  Hirsch shook his head. “I don’t know, unless he just didn’t want his assistant to get a share of the spotlight.”

  “Mr. Hirsch,” Wolfe said, “was there an open hostility between you and Mr. Stevens?”

  Hirsch fiddled with his glasses and uncrossed his legs. “I wouldn’t say so. We did argue sometimes, usually in private, about his treatment of some of the orchestra members.”

  “You thought he was too much the martinet?”

  Hirsch nodded. “Yes, he humiliated some of them during rehearsals, shouting insults, generally demeaning them. I felt it upset the whole orchestra, destroyed morale. Instead of getting them to play better, which I assume was the intent, it had the opposite effect.”

  “This was a frequent occurrence?”

  “Yes, at practically every rehearsal. It was as if he enjoyed being so cruel.”

  “And you reminded him of it?” Wolfe asked.

  “Quite often. But he would just brush me aside. ‘They are professionals,’ he would say, ‘and I expect them to play like professionals, not like members of some community orchestra.’”

  Wolfe shifted his weight. “Is it true, Mr. Hirsch, that you once told Mr. Stevens you would kill for the orchestra?”

  “What?” Hirsch twitched like he’d just gotten a high-voltage jolt. “Who told you that? I never said such a thing!”

  By this time, both Meyerhoff and Sommers were trying to jump in. “Gentlemen!” Wolfe snapped it off. It wasn’t loud, but it shut all three of them up. “If you please, at the risk of being repetitious, you’ll all be able to leave here sooner without interruptions.” He turned back to Hirsch.

  “It has been said that you spoke the following, or something very similar, at a meeting in Mr. Stevens’s office: ‘I’d kill before I saw this orchestra go to hell. And if things keep on this way, that’s where it will go.’ Well, Mr. Hirsch?” Wolfe’s eyes narrowed.

  Beads of perspiration were forming on Hirsch’s nose bridge, above his glasses. He looked at Meyerhoff and Sommers, then licked his lips. “Mr. Wolfe, I never said that, or anything like it.” His voice was tense but low, and he accented each word. “I don’t talk that way,” he continued, gaining speed. “Ask anyone I know. I wouldn’t use a word like ‘kill,’ or even ‘hell.’ I can’t—”

  “That’s true,” Meyerhoff cut in. “I’ve never heard David—”

  “Enough!” Wolfe spat, silencing Meyerhoff. “Mr. Hirsch, please go on.”

  “I started to say, I can’t imagine who would make up a story like that. It just isn’t true. I was angry with Milan quite a few times—many times—but I would never, ever say such a thing.” He looked around again, at each one of us, and then down at his lap. I started feeling sorry for the guy.

  “Mr. Hirsch,” Wolfe continued, “can you imagine why anyone would concoct such a story?”

  “No, I don’t think I have enemies within the orchestra, other than …”

  “Yes?”

  “Other than Milan,” Hirsch said, slumping in his chair.

  “You considered Mr. Stevens an enemy?” Wolfe asked.

  “No, but I think he considered me one,” he said.

  Wolfe eyed Hirsch. “Were you planning to resign?”

  “I had … considered it at one time, but recently Charlie—Mr. Meyerhoff—had said there might be a change in music directors before too long.”

  Wolfe turned to Meyerhoff. The managing director leaned forward on his elbows again. “That’s true. Jason had always been Stevens’s big defender, and the board pretty well went along with whatever Jason wanted. I’ve been telling him for over a year how bad the orchestra’s morale is, and recently he seemed to be coming around to my view, although he was giving up very hard.”

  “I gather that if Milan Stevens were to have been fired, it would have been a major setback for Mr. Remmers,” Wolfe said.

  “Yes, I think that’s a fair statement,” Meyerhoff said. “He had made a lot out of our getting Stevens originally, and it hadn’t improved things at all—in fact, just the opposite.”

  “Did Mr. Stevens resent you?” Wolfe asked Meyerhoff.

  “I’m sure he did—he resented anybody who tried to tell him what to do in any way at all.”

  “And did you in turn resent him?”

  Meyerhoff shrugged. “I guess you might say I resented what he was doing to the orchestra, his inability to pull it together, his refusal to show them any warmth or understanding.”

  Wolfe drained his second beer and set down the glass. “Lucinda Forrester-Moore had been a frequent companion of Mr. Stevens’s recently. Is it true that you and she once spent a lot of time together?”

  Meyerhoff smiled for the first time since he’d set foot in the brown-stone. “Oh, we’d gone to a number of plays and parties and dinners together—just a thing of convenience,” he said gently. “It was never what you’d term a serious relationship.”

  Wolfe nodded and shifted his attention. “Mr. Sommers, I hadn’t meant to omit you from this discussion. Will you share your feelings on your late music director?”

  Sommers uncrossed and recrossed his long legs. “They’re pretty much like David’s and Mr. Meyerhoff’s,” he said in a high-pitched voice that seemed somehow to go with his build. “He was certainly anything but a warm man, at least in his dealings within the orchestra. As David said, rehearsals were grim affairs, and he often singled out musicians who he felt weren’t doing as well as they should.

  “I don’t want to come on like I’m paranoid,” Sommers said, “but I’m sure Mr. Stevens wanted to be rid of me. I could tell by the way he acted whenever we discussed anything one-on-one, such as a solo I was going to do. He always seemed terribly impatient with me. And then there was that newspaper article …”

  “Yes?” Wolfe asked.

  “A few weeks ago in a Sunday interview, Mr. Stevens said that several soloists were more interested in their own careers than in the good of the orchestra. That article ran just two weeks after one of my solos, and I’m sure he meant me specifically. Again, that sounds paranoid, doesn’t it? Well, I do think he was out for me.”

  “Are you more interested in your career than in the orchestra as a whole?” Wolfe a
sked.

  “I love the Symphony,” Sommers said. “It’d always been my goal to play here, even when I was growing up in Boston. I would never have done anything that ran against the orchestra’s best interests, and I always thought of myself as a team player.”

  “Would you have left the Symphony if you felt Mr. Stevens was holding you back?” Wolfe asked.

  Sommers looked at both Meyerhoff and Hirsch before talking. “I haven’t told anyone this, but now I suppose it doesn’t matter. I’d thought a lot lately about leaving. Chicago was interested and so was Boston, and I had some initial talks with people in both places.”

  Meyerhoff looked stunned. “Don, why didn’t you come in and at least talk to me first?”

  “I know, I know, I should have,” Sommers squeaked, holding up a hand. “But I had to sort this out myself. I didn’t want to leave, but …”

  “You see?” Meyerhoff said, bounding from his chair and leaning on Wolfe’s desk with one arm. “You see now what that man was doing to our orchestra? Here’s the finest flutist anywhere, a man who loves the Symphony, and he was being driven away.”

  “Please sit down, sir,” Wolfe said peevishly. “Your point is made, and I prefer having people at eye level.” Meyerhoff shook his head and sat down. “Thank God you’ll be staying with us now, Don,” he said. Sommers nodded and smiled weakly.

  “Well, Mr. Sommers, it seems that congratulations are in order,” Wolfe said, turning back to the flutist. “You’ve decided that without Milan Stevens, the New York Symphony is a better place to work, is that true? Is that a fair statement?”

  “I didn’t say that,” Sommers croaked.

  “But it seems apparent. Do you deny it?”

  Sommers looked down and then back up at Wolfe. “No, but I had nothing to do with his … death.”

  “You’ll have a chance to prove that,” Wolfe said dryly. “We’ve already gone well over your half-hour, Mr. Meyerhoff,” he continued, looking at the wall clock. “Because this is a murder investigation, two basic questions need of course to be asked of each of you: One, did you kill Milan Stevens, and two, where were you Wednesday evening between seven and nine o’clock? Would you like to start, Mr. Meyerhoff?”

  “Of course I didn’t kill him—we all know who did, although I would never have guessed Milner had it in him. As to where I was—not that it really matters—I had a lot of desk work to grind through, so after supper I went back to my office in Symphony Hall and worked until, oh, it must have been close to ten.”

  “Was anyone there with you?”

  “No, I was alone. There’s a night watchman, but I didn’t see him in the lobby when I left. He must have been somewhere else in the building.”

  Wolfe turned to Hirsch.

  “Did I kill Milan? Definitely not,” he said curtly. “And on Wednesday night, my wife was out playing bridge. I stayed home reading and listening to music. And to answer your other question, yes, I was alone from about seven until, well, it was ten-thirty or so when she got home. But I can assure you I was there the whole time. We live in New Jersey—Ridgewood—and I took a commuter train that got me there just after six.”

  Wolfe turned to Sommers, who swallowed hard and uncrossed his legs again. “A classmate from Juilliard was in town from Denver,” he said, “and we went to the theater that night. I think I may still have the stub at home if you want to see it.”

  Wolfe shook his head. “No, that’s not necessary, but I’d advise you to keep it. Is your friend still in New York?”

  “He’s gone back to Denver, but I can give you his name and phone number if you want to—”

  “Don, this is ridiculous!” Meyerhoff snapped. “This man isn’t a policeman, you don’t have to explain anything to him. Let’s get going—we’ve given him too much time already.” Meyerhoff was on his feet, and the other two looked uncertainly at Wolfe, who made no move to stop them. They tramped to the front hall, with me at their heels. Meyerhoff already had his coat on, but I was quick enough to help Hirsch and Sommers with theirs. I said good-bye, but only Sommers replied; the others were already on their way out and obviously not in the mood for parting pleasantries.

  Wolfe was sitting behind his desk in a pout when I walked back into the office. “Jovial group, eh?” I said. “It looks like all we accomplished was eliminating Sommers, and even that isn’t for sure. It’s simple enough to find ticket stubs and friends who’ll lie for you.”

  “Bah,” Wolfe said, glowering at the clock. He put his hands on the chair arms and made the supreme effort to get himself erect, then headed for the kitchen, undoubtedly to monitor Fritz’s progress on dinner.

  18

  MY CLOCK RADIO WOKE ME Monday morning with the news that it was still snowing and that the seven inches that had fallen in the last twenty-four hours were a record for the date. To hell with records. When I went down for breakfast, Fritz started asking about the case again, and I told him that as far as I could see we were nowhere. “But wipe that long look off your face,” I said. “At least there still is a case.”

  Fritz went right on looking glum anyway, and for that matter, I was a little on the glum side myself. After the three music men had left yesterday, Saul and Fred both called in, and neither had anything to report. “Archie, I’ve talked to more streetwalkers today than most traveling salesmen meet in a lifetime,” Saul moaned, “and that includes a fair share of redheads. But nothing. Even after I convinced them I wasn’t a cop, most of them said they never work that far north. Not enough action. I gotta go now—it’s almost dark, and like werewolves, they come out at night, in case you didn’t know.”

  I told him that’s what I’d heard and gave him a keep-at-it pep talk that really wasn’t necessary. I fed the same pep talk to Fred when he checked in half an hour later, only with him, it was needed. He had two reasons for his dark mood: one, he hadn’t had any more luck than Saul, and two, his wife, Fanny, wasn’t exactly doing handstands over the assignment. But he signed off by saying he was headed back into the streets. “Intrepid fellow,” I said, hanging up.

  If Wolfe was disturbed by their lack of success, he didn’t show it, preferring to concentrate on the Times Sunday crossword. After dinner when we were back in the office with coffee, he finished the puzzle, tossed it aside with disdain as he did every week, and looked at the clock, which read eight-fifty-five. “What time is it in London?” he asked.

  “Let’s see, they’re six—no, make that five hours ahead of us,” I answered.

  “Far too late to call Mr. Hitchcock,” he said. “All right, we’ll telephone him tomorrow after lunch.” He picked up a book and began reading. I decided not to give him the satisfaction of asking why he wanted Hitchcock. Geoffrey Hitchcock is a private investigator in London whom we’ve used on a number of cases; we’ve also been able to help him a few times ourselves, which keeps things pretty well in balance. In fact, just a few months before, Hitchcock had called about an American con man who’d shifted to London and was bilking widows and divorcees. Using the Gazette clips and the recollections of one of Lon’s best police reporters, I was able to give him a good rundown on the guy’s methods, for which he was grateful. And Wolfe got a letter from him a few weeks later saying that in large part because of our help, the con man was in jail and Hitchcock collected a fat fee from an angry victim.

  As soon as Wolfe got settled at his desk Monday morning following his plant-room playtime, I swiveled to face him. “Big Ben is at this very moment chiming four o’clock,” I said.

  He breathed deeply and scowled. “I haven’t even seen the mail yet, but I suppose you’ll hector me until we make the call. Confound it, yes, go ahead and get him.”

  Hitchcock’s number was on a file card in front of me, and with the grace of New York Telephone, I had no trouble getting through. He answered on the second ring, and I nodded to Wolfe, who picked up his instrument while I stayed on the line.

  “Mr. Hitchcock? This is Nero Wolfe. How are you, sir? … Yes, I’m in good
health also, thank you. When we spoke a few months ago, I said we might ask your help again someday, and that day has come. Yes, it’s a case—the murder of Milan Stevens.”

  Hitchcock said the London papers were filled with stories on it, and he already knew about Milner’s being charged. He started asking questions, but Wolfe cut him off. “Mr. Hitchcock, I can’t at this time tell you very much because I don’t know a great deal myself, although Mr. Goodwin and I are certain that the killer has not yet been found. What I need from you is information on Stevens’s activities in Europe before he came to America. He was a conductor in a number of places—London, of course, Milan, Munich, and …”He turned to me.

  “Vienna,” I added, and he repeated it to Hitchcock.

  “My question is this: Was there an occurrence in one of these cities that could have resulted in an intense enmity toward him? I’m interested in anything you find, however trivial the incident might seem.”

  Hitchcock said he could check easily enough in London himself, and that he’d call a colleague in Frankfurt to find out about Stevens’s years in the two Germanic cities. “I know a man in Italy who may be able to help there,” he added. “I suppose you’re in a hurry for this?” Wolfe said yes and Hitchcock promised to get back to us within a day. Having thus indulged me by conducting business—all of two minutes’ worth—Wolfe submerged himself in reviewing the mail and filling out the order blanks from two new seed catalogs.

  That afternoon, Stevens’s memorial service was held at three. I thought about going, but decided I would be of more value at home in case Saul, Fred, or Hitchcock called in while Wolfe was up with the plants. None of them did, though, and about four-thirty the cabin fever was so bad that I told Fritz to cover the phone while I went for a walk. The air was cold and clear, ideal for sorting things out, I said to myself. But as I started east on Thirty-fifth Street, I couldn’t find anything to sort. We were noplace, and I began to think maybe Wolfe had spent too long on the shelf, like an outfielder who holds out until May and doesn’t get his batting eye back before August. Both the Saul-Fred project and the Hitchcock thing seemed like the long shots of a gambler who was way behind and trying to catch up fast. I was still muttering when I got back to the brownstone at five-thirty after having walked a good four miles. “Only one call while you were gone,” Fritz said as I hung my coat up. “Miss Adjari, a little while ago. I told her Mr. Wolfe was with the plants, and she said not to disturb him, but to tell him that the services for Mr. Stevens were very nice and that she is going back to London on a plane this evening.”