Over My Dead Body

by Over My Dead Body (lit)

  That was the crop. Miss Lovchen, looking at her wrist and stating that it was five minutes to four, added that Wolfe must come immediately—fast.

  Without moving, even his eyelids, Wolfe growled:

  “Why didn’t Mr Driscoll challenge Miss Tormic on the spot, seeing her with his coat?”

  “He was naked. He came from the shower-bath.”

  “Is he too fat to be seen even at the risk of losing diamonds?”

  “He says he is modest. He also says he was too surprised to speak, and she moved rapidly and went away at once. Then his wallet and cigarette-case were there, and he forgot about the diamonds until he was dressed. He is not nearly as fat as you are.”

  “I wouldn’t expect him to be. Do the lockers have keys?”

  “Yes, but there is much carelessness. The keys lie around. That part is very confused.”

  “You say Miss Tormic did not steal the diamonds?”

  “I do say that. Never did she.”

  “Did she take something else from Mr Driscoll’s clothing? Something he fails to mention? Letters, papers, even a piece of candy, perhaps?”

  “Nothing. Nothing at all.”

  “Did she go to the locker-room?”

  “What would she go there for?”

  “I don’t know. Did she?”

  “No.”

  “Fantastic.” Wolfe’s eyes threatened to open. “How long have you known she is my daughter?”

  “All my life. I have been . . . her friend, very close. I knew about you—about your—I knew your name.”

  “About my deplorable intransigence, you would say.” Wolfe’s tone was suddenly savage. “Ha! You juicy girls with your busts swelling with ardour for the heroics of past centuries! Pah! Do the rats still gather crumbs from under the Donevitch table?”

  “We are—” Her chin went up and her eyes showed fire. “They preserve honour! And they will share glory!”

  “They will some day share obloquy. Blind and selfish fools. Are you a Donevitch?”

  “No.” Her bust was swelling, but not apparently with ardour.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Carla Lovchen.”

  “What’s your name at home?”

  “I am not at home now.” She flung out a hand impatiently. “What is all this? All this about me? Do you realize what I have told you about Neya? About your daughter? Does it help for you to sit there and sneer? I tell you, you must do this at once or there will be the police!”

  Wolfe sat up. I was thinking it was about time. The clock on the wall said two minutes past four, and his daily routine, which included an afternoon session in the plant-rooms from four until six, was supposed to be unalterable by fire, flood or murder. I was flabbergasted when, although he glanced at the clock, he merely sat up straight.

  But his tone was brisk. “Archie, please conduct Miss Lovchen to the front room and return for instructions.”

  She started to sputter. “But there’s no—”

  “Please.” He was curt. “If I’m to do this let me do it. Don’t waste time. Go with Mr Goodwin.”

  I was off and she followed. I deposited her in front and shut the door on her, and, returning to the office, shut that one too.

  Wolfe said, “I’m late. This won’t do. There’s no point in getting a line on Mr Driscoll or anyone else until you’ve been there and reported. I shall have to phone Mr Hitchcock in London before I go upstairs. The book with his private number, please.”

  I got it from the safe and gave it to him.

  “Thank you. Go up there with her. You will see Miss Tormic. The assumption, from this document, is that she has the right to bear my name. If so, I reject the possibility that she stole diamonds from a man’s coat. Start from that.”

  “She says she wants the document back.”

  “I’ll keep it for the present. Apparently you will encounter a single yes and a single no in contradiction. Neglect nothing and no one. Nikola Miltan himself is from the peninsula, South Serbia, old Macedonia. Look at Miss Tormic and talk to her. Your first concern is the rumpus about the diamonds. Your second is that paper which Miss Lovchen hid in my book. If you can’t resolve the contradiction about the diamonds and Mr Driscoll insists on the police, bring him here to me.”

  “Oh, sure. How and in how many pieces?”

  “Bring him. You’re good at that.”

  “Much obliged, ever so much. But the fact is I guess you’d better pay me off. I’m resigning as of this moment.”

  “Resigning from what?”

  “You. My job.”

  “Rubbish.”

  “No, boss, really. You told the G-man you have never married. Yet you have a daughter. Well—” I shrugged. “I’m not a prude, but there are limits—”

  “Don’t jabber. Go on up there. She was an orphan and I adopted her.”

  I nodded sceptically. “That’s a good trick, but pretty transparent. What do you think my mother would say—” But I saw his whole face tighten and knew I was getting close to out-of-bounds, so I asked casually, “That all?”

  “That’s all.”

  I got my hat and coat from the hall, and the immigrant princess from the parlour, and went out to the roadster, parked at the kerb. As I shifted into high, headed for Park Avenue, I reflected that Wolfe was prepared to go to almost any length to protect his family, since he was at that moment spending twenty bucks on a transatlantic phone call to London, though I didn’t see how that was going to help things any.

  Chapter Three

  Up to a certain point, the five o’clock gathering at Nikola Miltan’s studio for some old-fashioned fun with the game of diamonds, diamonds, who’s got the diamonds? was a howling farce. Thereafter, I admit, it took on a different aspect.

  The swank of the place was more real than apparent. There was nothing shabby about it, but it didn’t give you an impression of being dolled up to impress the customers. I trailed around after Carla in her effort to locate Neya, and so got a look. It was one of the old four-storey houses. On the ground floor were a reception-room and a large office and a couple of small ones; one flight up, a long hall with a grey carpet, with doors leading into the private rooms for dancing lessons; two flights, the salle d’armes, with two medium-sized rooms, one big one, and the showers and locker rooms; and at the top, living-quarters for Miltan and his wife. Those I didn’t see, then. Neya was finally flushed in the women’s locker room. Carla brought her out to where I was waiting in the hall and introduced me, and we shook hands. Neya Tormic said:

  “Can you do something about this awful thing, Mr Goodwin? The awful lie that man tells? Can you? You must! I was hoping that Nero Wolfe . . . my father . . .”

  Her voice had a foreign purr in it, but she pronounced words a little better than Carla. God knows she didn’t look anything like Nero Wolfe, but of course a girl that looked like him would be something that you would either pass up entirely or pay a dime to look at in a side show. And then—um—he had adopted her. Her eyes were as black as Carla’s and she was about the same height, an inch over medium, but her chin, in fact her whole face, went more to a point, and the whole idea of her, the way she talked and stood and looked at you, was a queer combination of come-hither and don’t-touch-me. Having known her father a long while, I suppose I gave her the preliminary once-over with more interest than any other female I had ever met, and my first verdict was that she had real quality both of mind and of matter, but that a definite judgement would have to wait for further analysis. She noticed me taking in her costume, a green robe, belted and carelessly closed in front, showing underneath a white canvas blouse and slacks, with gym shoes and rolled-up socks.

  “I was giving a lesson,” she said. “Miltan wanted me to. He doesn’t want any fuss. Nobody does but that fool Driscoll. A liar like that—we would know how to deal with him in my country. Carla tells me that he—that my father has been told about me, and of course you have too. I do not wish anyone else to know. Why didn’t he come?”
>
  “Nero Wolfe? Bad case of pernicious inertia. He never goes anywhere any time for anybody.”

  “I am his adopted daughter.”

  “So I understand. And you’ve been here in New York a couple of months and his address is in the phone book.”

  “He abandoned me. I was taught to hate him. I had no wish—”

  “Until you got into trouble. I got the impression that you abandoned him at the age of three. But let’s skip that, I was sent here to keep you out of jail and time’s short. You look intelligent enough to know that I’ve got to have the truth and all of it. What were you doing with Driscoll’s coat?”

  Her chin went up and her eyes withered me. “Nothing. I didn’t touch his coat.”

  “What were you doing in the men’s locker room?”

  “I wasn’t there.”

  “Is there any other girl around that looks like you?”

  “No. Not enough—no.”

  “Not enough for Driscoll to see her and think she was you?”

  “No.”

  “What were you doing yesterday afternoon at the time Driscoll says he saw you with his coat?”

  “I was giving Mr Ludlow a lesson.”

  “Fencing?”

  “Yes, épée.”

  “In the large room?”

  “No, the small one at the end.”

  “Who is Mr Ludlow?”

  “He is a man who comes to take lessons with the épée.”

  “Are you sure you were with him at the time Driscoll says he saw you frisking the coat?”

  “Yes. Mr Driscoll went to Miltan at twenty minutes to five. He said it had taken about fifteen minutes to dress. I began the lesson with Mr Ludlow at four o’clock, and we were still there when Miltan sent for me.”

  “And you didn’t leave that room during that time?”

  “No, I did not.”

  Carla Lovchen put in, “But Neya! Do you forget that Belinda Reade says she saw you outside, in the hall, a little before half past four?”

  “She lies,” Neya said calmly.

  “But the man that was with her saw you too!”

  “He also lies.”

  My God, I thought, it’s a good thing Wolfe isn’t here to see his daughter put on an exhibition like this. It looked very much as if the family reunion would take place in jail.

  “How about Ludlow?” I demanded. “Does he lie too?”

  She hesitated, her brow wrinkling, and before she got her answer ready another voice broke in. It was a male voice, and its owner had appeared from around the corner which led to the stairs. He was about my age and size, with a good pair of light-coloured eyes, and a grey suit of a distinctive weave hung on him in a way that made it obvious the fit had not been managed by waving a piece of chalk at a stock job.

  “I was looking for you.” He came up to us, with a conventional smile. “Miltan wants you in the office. This ridiculous affair.”

  Carla Lovchen said, “Mr Ludlow, this is Mr Goodwin.”

  We shook, and I met his eyes and liked them, not on account of any candour or friendliness, but because they showed sense.

  I inquired, “Ludlow?”

  “Right. Percy Ludlow.”

  “Miss Tormic gave you a fencing lesson yesterday afternoon?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Then you’re the man I want to see. Was she with you continuously from four o’clock till half past?”

  His brow went up and he smiled. “Well, really. All I know about you is that your name is Goodwin.”

  “I represent Miss Tormic. She has engaged Nero Wolfe. I’m his assistant.”

  He glanced at her and caught her nod. “Well! Nero Wolfe? That ought to do it. I was told that Miss Tormic said yesterday that she was with me continuously.”

  “Yeah. What do you say?”

  His brow went up again. “I couldn’t very well call Miss Tormic a liar. Could I? Let’s go down to the office. Driscoll isn’t there yet, but he should be, any minute—”

  “Then she was with you? You realize that in that case she can’t possibly be held on Driscoll’s charge?”

  “Oh, yes, I quite realize that. But unfortunately there are those two people who claim to have seen her in the hall.” He pointed. “Right there, not ten feet from the door of the locker room. And of course Driscoll too.”

  He was moving. I obstructed him. “Look here, Mr Ludlow, if you’ll assure me that you’ll stick to it—”

  “My dear chap! Assure you? This sort of thing must be handled—anyhow, a dozen or more people have been made acquainted with this charge against Miss Tormic, and whatever is said they should hear. To clear it up, you know.”

  They were all moving, for the stairs, and I couldn’t obstruct all of them, so I went with the current. It was so loony that it dazed me. Carla looked worried and Ludlow looked bland. As for Neya, her attitude could have come only from the sublime assurance of innocence, or the sublime asininity of a nincompoop, or mix it yourself. Here she had a witness who might have been wheedled into standing fast with a class A alibi and she wasn’t even bothering to toss him a suggestion. As I trailed them downstairs and entered the office with them, I was trying to figure out a method of enticing Driscoll down to 35th Street, for it certainly seemed likely it would come to that.

  The office was the big room at the rear of the ground floor. There was a large red carpet and a couple of desks, and chairs scattered around. The walls were decorated with pictures of people dancing and fencing, or standing holding a sticker, with a large one of Miltan in some kind of a uniform, and with swords and daggers hanging here and there. I knew the picture was Miltan because Carla Lovchen took me across and introduced me to him and his wife. He was small and thin, next door to a runt, but wiry-looking, and had black eyes and hair and a moustache which pointed due east and west. He looked and acted harassed, and as soon as he shook hands with me darted off somewhere. His wife, in spite of her New York clothes and her 1938 hair-do, looked like one of those coloured pictures in the National Geographic entitled “Peasant Woman of Wczibrrcy Leading a Bear to Church.” At that, she was handsome if you like the type, and she had shrewd eyes.

  I went and stood by a glass cabinet which displayed an assortment of curios and implements, among them a long, thin rapier with no edge and a blunt point which apparently wasn’t a rapier, since a card leaning against it said: “This épée was used by Nikola Miltan at Paris in 1931 in winning the International Championship.” I looked around. He was across the room, chinning with a broad-shouldered six-footer maybe thirty years old, with a slightly pushed-in nose and a vacant look to go with it. I looked further. If by any chance Wolfe’s long-lost daughter hadn’t pinched Driscoll’s diamonds, it was probable that the person who had was among those present. Carla Lovchen’s voice came, beside me:

  “But you . . . you aren’t doing anything.”

  I shrugged. “Nothing I can do. Not right now. What’s Miltan waiting for?”

  “Mr Driscoll isn’t here yet.”

  “Did he say he would be here?”

  “Of course he did. He only agreed to wait until now to go to the police.”

  “Who’s that guy Miltan’s talking to?”

  She looked. “His name is Gill. He’s a dancing client. It was he who was with Belinda Reade yesterday when they saw Neya in the hall. They say they did.”

  “Which one’s Belinda Reade?”

  “Over there standing by a chair. The beautiful one, with hair like yellow amber, talking to the young man.”

  “Check. Baby doll with a new silk dress and pipe earrings. Not to mention the young man. I seem to recognize him from perhaps the movies. Who is he?”

  “Donald Barrett.”

  “The son of John P. Barrett of Barrett & De Russy, who got you girls a job here?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who are those other girls?”

  “Well . . . the three in the corner, and the one sitting by the end of the desk, teach dancing. That one talki
ng now with Mrs Miltan is Zorka.”

  I boosted the brows. “Zorka?”

  “Yes, the famous couturière. She charges four hundred dollars for a dress. That would be over twenty thousand dinars.”

  “She looks like a picture in our Bible at home of the dame that cut off Samson’s hair. I forget her name, but it wasn’t Zorka. Does she sell diamonds at her place?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “She wouldn’t those, anyway. Who’s the chinless wonder with his—hold it. Miltan’s going to make a speech.”

  The épée champion, with Percy Ludlow standing beside him, was in the middle of the room trying to collect eyes. Some of them didn’t get it and he claimed their attention by clapping his hands. Two of them went on talking and his wife shushed them.

  “If you please.” He sounded as harassed as he looked. “Ladies and gentlemen. If you please, Mr Driscoll has not arrived. It is very disagreeable, asking you to wait. He should be here. Mr Ludlow has something to say.”

  Percy Ludlow looked around at the faces with complete aplomb. “Well,” he observed in a conversational tone, “really, I don’t quite see that we should hang around waiting for Driscoll. It’s his row, you know. I’ve an explanation to make that I’d like you all to hear, because all of you know of Driscoll’s absurd accusation regarding Miss Tormic. You’ll understand it better if you’ll observe the clothes I’m wearing. This is the suit I had on yesterday. Didn’t any of you notice anything peculiar about it?”