by Rex Stout
"Why shouldn't you recognize him?" Wolfe demanded.
"Because he had a beard, and he wore glasses, and his hair was slick and parted on the left side. That sounds like a freak, but Uncle Paul would know better than to look freaky. The beard was trimmed, and somehow it didn't make him conspicuous. It was lucky I didn't completely recognize him when I first saw him, or I would probably have stood and gawked at him. Later in the dressing room Polly Zarella asked Bernard – that's Bernard Daumery, Jean's nephew – who was the man that was growing his own wool, and Bernard said he didn't know, probably from the Daily Worker. Of course we know most of the guests at a press showing, but not all of them. When I modeled another number – a full-back calf-covering coat in tapestry tones of Kleinsell ratiné – I took him in without being obvious about it, and all of a sudden I knew who it was – I didn't guess, I knew. It staggered me so that I had to get off quick, quicker than I should have, and in the dressing room it was all I could do to keep them from seeing me tremble. I wanted to run out and speak to him, but I couldn't because it would have ruined the show. I had four more numbers to model – one of them was our headliner, a tailored dress and jacket in black with white stripes, with slightly bouffant sleeves and a double hemline – and I had to go on to the end. When it was over I hurried out front and he was gone."
"Indeed," Wolfe muttered.
"Yes. I went outside, to the elevators, but he was gone."
"You haven't seen him since?"
"No. Just that one time."
"Did anyone else recognize him?"
"I don't think so. I'm sure they didn't, or there would have been a noise. A dead man come back to life?"
Wolfe nodded. "Many of those present had known him?"
"Certainly, nearly all of them. He was famous, as famous as you are."
Wolfe skipped that one. "How sure are you it was he?"
"I'm absolutely positive. There simply isn't any argument about it."
"Did you find out who he was supposed to be?"
She shook her head. "I couldn't find out a thing about him. I didn't want to ask questions of too many people, but no one could tell me anything." She hesitated. "I must admit the ticket thing is handled pretty loosely. The tickets aren't just scattered around, but anyone who knows the ropes wouldn't have much trouble getting one, and my uncle certainly knows the ropes."
"Whom have you told about this?"
"No one. Not a soul. I've been trying to decide what to do."
"You might," Wolfe suggested, "just erase it. You say you inherited a half-interest in that" – he grimaced – "that business from your uncle?"
"Yes."
"Anything else? Property, securities, money in the bank?"
"No. He had no property, except the furniture in his apartment, and the lawyer said there were no securities or bank accounts."
"Hunh," Wolfe said. "Those are portable. But you have half of that business. Is it solvent?"
Cynthia smiled. "As Polly Zarella puts it, we grossed over two million last year with a swelled-up profit."
"Then why not erase it, if your uncle likes his beard and his hair slicked? If you corner him and make him shave and wash his hair, and make him take his old label, you'll have no share of the swelled-up profits. He will. I would charge moderately for this interview."
"No." She shook her head emphatically. "I have to know what's going on, and I have to know where I stand. I –" She stopped and bit her lip. Apparently she had been keeping emotions, whatever they might be, under control, and they were trying to break loose. When she was ready for speech again all she said was, "I'm upset."
"Then you should reserve decision." Wolfe was being very patient with her. "Never decide anything while you're upset." He wiggled a finger. "And in spite of your dogmatism you may be wrong. True, you might have recognized him when others didn't, since you lived with him and knew him intimately, but others knew him intimately too. One especially – his business partner, Mr. Daumery – for twenty years, you say. Was he there that day and did he see the man with the beard?"
Cynthia's eyes had widened. "Oh," she exclaimed, "didn't I – I thought I had mentioned that! Of course Bernard Daumery, the nephew, was there – I know I mentioned him – but Jean Daumery, my uncle's partner, he's dead!"
Wolfe's eyes opened to more than a slit for the first time. "The devil he is. Jumped in a geyser?"
"No, in an accident. He was drowned. He was fishing and fell from the boat."
"Where was this?"
"In Florida. Off the west coast."
"When?"
"It was – let's see, today is June ninth – a little over six weeks ago."
"Who was on the boat with him?"
"Bernard, his nephew."
"Anyone else?"
"No."
"And the nephew inherited that half?"
"Yes, but –" She frowned. Her hand fluttered. She had a habit of making gestures which were graceful and a pleasure to look at. "But that's all right."
"Why is it all right?"
"That's a silly question," she said with spirit. "I merely mean that if there had been any question of anything wrong the Florida people would have attended to it."
"Perhaps," Wolfe conceded grumpily. "Only it's quite a list. Mrs. Daumery thrown from a horse onto stones and killed. Mr. Nieder propelled into a geyser and boiled. Mr. Daumery hurtled into an ocean and drowned. It's not my affair, thank heaven, but if it were I should want better testimony than that of what you call the Florida people." He got brusque. "About your uncle, what do you want me for?"
She knew the answer to that one. "I want you to find him, and I want to see him."
"Very well. It may take time and it will be expensive. A retainer of two thousand dollars?"
She didn't blink. "Of course," she agreed, speaking as a millionaire. "I'll mail you a check today. I suppose it's understood that this is extremely confidential, as I said at the beginning, and no reports are to be phoned to me, and written reports are not to be mailed but handed to me personally. One thing I was going to suggest."
She directed her clear blue eyes at me, and back at Wolfe.
"I'll be glad," she said, "to tell you all I know about his former associates, but I doubt if that will help. He had no relatives but me, and no really close friends that I know of. The only person he ever loved was Helen Daumery – unless he had some affection for me; I guess maybe he did. But he loved designing, his work, and he loved that business. I think he came there last Tuesday because he simply couldn't stay away. I don't believe he knew I recognized him, so why wouldn't he come back? If he does, it will probably be today, because this afternoon we have our big show of the fall line for buyers. That's why I came to see you this morning. He wouldn't even need a ticket, and I have a feeling he'll be there. I know you do everything in your office and practically never go out, but couldn't Mr. Goodwin come? He could sit near the front, and I could arrange to give him a signal if I see my uncle – only he would have to be extremely careful not to spoil the show in any way –"
Wolfe was nodding at her. "Excellent," he declared.
IV
At 2:55 that Monday afternoon in June I entered the building at 496 Seventh Avenue and took an elevator to the twelfth floor.
Since that was only a ten-minute walk from Wolfe's place my choice would have been to hoof it, but Wolfe was proceeding to spend chunks of the two grand even before he got it. He had called in Saul Panzer, the best free-lance operative on earth, and Saul and I went together in a taxi driven by our old pal Herb Aronson, whom we often used. Saul and Herb stayed at the curb in the cab, with the flag down. It had developed that Cynthia didn't want Uncle Paul's whiskers yanked off in any public spot, and therefore he would have to be tailed. Tailing in New York, if you really mean it, being no one-man job, we were setting it up right, with me on foot and Saul on wheels.
Cynthia had filled in a few gaps before leaving our office. She had inherited her uncle's half of the business under
a will he had left, but was not yet in legal possession because of the law's attitude about dead people who leave no remains. There had been no serious doubt of his being pressure-cooked in the geyser, though no one had actually seen him jump in, since his clothes had been found at the geyser's rim, and the farewell letters in the pocket of the coat, one to his lawyer and one to his niece, had unquestionably been in his handwriting. But the law was chewing its cud. Apparently Jean Daumery, up to the moment he had fallen off the boat and got drowned, had done likewise, and, in the six weeks since his death, his nephew Bernard had carried on with the chewing. That was the impression I got from a couple of Cynthia's remarks about her current status at Daumery and Nieder's. She was still modeling, and most of the designing was being done by a guy named Ward Roper, whose name she pronounced with a good imitation of the inflection Winston Churchill used in pronouncing Mussolini.
She had got in another dig or two at Helen Daumery, replying to Wolfe's casual questions. It was possible, she said, that Jean Daumery had known what was going on between his wife and his business partner, but it was doubtful because Helen had been an extremely slick article. And when Wolfe inquired about Helen's death and Cynthia told him that it happened on a country lane where Helen and her husband were out for a Sunday morning ride on their own horses, and the husband was the only eyewitness, she added that whoever or whatever was in charge of accidents might as well get the credit for that one, and that anyway Jean Daumery was dead too.
So it still looked as if we were fresh out of murders as far as Cynthia was concerned. To get any attention from Wolfe a murder must be attached to a client with money to spend and a reason for spending it. Cynthia didn't fit. As for her uncle, he wasn't dead. As for Helen Daumery, Cynthia wasn't interested a nickel's worth. As for Jean Daumery, Cynthia was stringing along with the Florida people who had decided there was nothing wrong.
Therefore there was no tingle in me as I got off the elevator at the twelfth floor.
Double doors were standing open, with a few human beings gathered there. As I approached, a bulky female who had been in my elevator swept past me and was going on through, but a man sidestepped to cut her off and asked politely, "What is your firm, please?"
The woman glared at him. "Coats and suits for Driscoll's Emporium, Tulsa."
The man shook his head. "Sorry, there's no place for you." His face suddenly lit up with a cordial smile, and I thought unexpected grace was about to drop on her until I saw that the smile was for another one from my elevator, a skinny dame with big ears.
"Good afternoon, Miss Dixon," the smiler said, serving it with sugar. "Mr. Roper was asking about you just a minute ago."
Miss Dixon nodded indifferently and went on in. I maneuvered around Driscoll's Emporium, who was looking enraged but impotent, and murmured at the man in a refined voice.
"My name is Goodwin, British Fabrics Association. Miss Cynthia Nieder invited me. Shall I wait while you check with her?"
He looked me over and I took it without flinching, wearing, as I was, a tropical worsted tailored by Breslow and a shirt and tie that were fully worthy. "It isn't necessary," he finally conceded and motioned me through.
The room was so nearly packed that it took a couple of minutes to find an empty seat far enough front to be sure of catching Cynthia's signal, which was to be brushing her hair back on the right side with her left hand. I saw no point in pretending I wasn't there, and before sitting down I turned in a slow complete circle, giving the audience the eye as if I were looking for a friend. There were close to two hundred of them, and I was surprised to see that nearly a third of them were men, though Cynthia had explained that they would be not only buyers from all over the country, but also merchandise executives, department heads, presidents, vice-presidents, fashion writers, fabrics people, and miscellaneous.
I saw no one with whiskers.
Also before sitting I picked up, from the chair, a pad of paper and a pencil. The pad consisted of sheets with Daumery and Nieder and the address neatly printed in an upper corner. I was supposed, as I soon learned from watching my neighbors, to use it for making notes about the numbers I wanted to buy. On my right was a plump gray-haired specimen with sweat below her ear, and on my left was a handsome woman with an extremely good mouth, fairly young but not quite young enough. Neither had given me more than an indifferent glance.
The room was high-ceilinged, and the wood-paneled walls were pretty well covered with drawings and photographs. Aside from that, and us on our chairs, there was nothing but a large raised platform, in the open space between the front row of seats and the wall beyond. That wall had two doors, twenty feet apart. I had been seated only a minute or two when the door on the left opened and a woman emerged. She was old enough to be my mother but wasn't. My mother wouldn't use that much lipstick in a year, and her shoulders would never get that much padding no matter what high fashion said.
The woman stood a moment, looking us over, turned to signal to someone through the open door, closed the door, and went to a chair near the end of the front row that had evidently been held for her. She was no sooner seated than the door opened again and out came the girl that I was waiting to marry. I put my teeth together to keep from whistling. I got the impression that she was the girl they were all waiting to marry, seeing how concentrated and alert everyone became the second she appeared, and then I realized what this meant to the buyers. For them it was the make or break. It meant their jobs. They had just so many thousands to spend, on so many numbers, and it was up to them to pick the winners or else.
Anyone could have picked the girl with one eye shut, but they weren't picking girls. She stepped up on the platform, came to the front edge, walking in a highly trained manner, extended her arms to the sides, full out, and said in a clear and friendly voice, "Six-forty-two." Six-forty-two was a dress and coat, looking like wool and I suppose it was, sort of confused about colors like a maple tree in October. She gave it the works. She walked to the right and then to the left, threw her arms around to show that the seams would hold even if you got in a fight or wore it picking apples, and turned around to let us see the back. She said "Six-forty-two" four times altogether, at appropriate intervals, distinctly and amiably, with just the faintest suggestion in her voice and manner that she wouldn't dream of letting that out except to the few people she was very fond of; and when she took the coat off and draped it over her arm and lifted her chin to smile at the back row, there was some clapping of hands.
She left by the other door, the one on the right, and immediately the one on the left opened and out came the girl I was waiting to marry, only this was a blonde, and she had on a gray fur evening wrap lined in bright red, and what she said was "Three-eighty and Four-nineteen." The 380, I gathered from neighbors' mutterings, was the wrap, and the 419 was the simple red evening gown that was disclosed when she ditched the wrap. It was fairly simple in front at the top, just covering essentials, but at the back it got even simpler by simply not starting until it hit the waistline. The woman on my right whispered to the one on her other side, "The hell of that is I've got a customer that would love it but I wouldn't dare let her buy it."
To clear up one point, they had there that afternoon six of the girls I was waiting to marry, if you count Cynthia Nieder, and I don't see why you shouldn't. Each of them made around a dozen appearances, some more, some less, and as for picking and choosing, if the buyers were as far up a stump as I was by the time it was over the only way they could possibly handle it was to send in an order for one of each.
As I explained to Wolfe in the office that evening, after I had reported a blank and we were conversing, "Imagine it! After the weddings I will of course have to take a good-sized apartment between Fifth and Madison in the Sixties. On a pleasant autumn evening I'll be sitting in the living room reading the newspaper. I'll toss the paper aside and clap my hands, and in will come Isabel. She will have on a calf-exposing kitchen apron with a double hemline and will be carrying a
plate of ham sandwiches and a pitcher of milk. She will say seductively, 'Two-ninety-three,' make interesting motions and gestures without spilling a drop, put the plate and pitcher on a table at my elbow, and go. In will come Francine. She will be wearing slim-silhouette pajamas with padded shoulders and a back-flaring hipline. She'll walk and wave and whirl, say 'Nine-thirty-one' four times, and light me a cigarette and dance out. Enter Delia. She'll be dressed in a high-styled bra of hand-made lace with a billowing sweep to the –"
"Pfui," Wolfe said curtly. "Enter another, naked, carrying a basket full of bills, your checkbook, and a pen."
He has a personal slant on women.
Back to the show. It lasted over two hours, and for some of the numbers the applause was unrestrained, and it looked to me as if the Daumery and Nieder profits were likely to go on swelling up. Cynthia, in my opinion, was the star, and others seemed to agree with me. The numbers she modeled got much more applause than the rest of the line, and I admit I furnished my share, which was as it should be since I was her guest. Remarks from my neighbor on the right, who was evidently in the know, informed me that Cynthia's numbers had all been designed by herself, whereas the others were the work of Ward Roper, who had been Paul Nieder's assistant and was merely a good imitator and adapter.
In the office that evening I explained that to Wolfe, too, partly because I knew it would bore and irritate him, and partly because I wanted to demonstrate that I hadn't been asleep although my report of results had had no bodice at all and a very short skirt.
A breath and a half had done it. "I got in by following Cynthia's instructions, found a seat in the fifth row, and sat down after doing a survey of the two hundred customers and seeing no whiskers. Miss Nieder made fourteen appearances and did not signal me. When she came out front after the show she was immediately encircled by people, and I beat it, again following instructions, went down to the sidewalk, told Saul nothing doing, and handed Herb Aronson a ten-dollar bill."
