“I do not dispute that,” Wolfe replied. “Have you unearthed any other information pertinent to Mr. Swartz’s death?”
“If I had, would I be here?” One thing about Cramer—he never pussyfoots around or shovels manure, which was particularly refreshing for me after having spent an hour with Harlowe Conn.
“I know you both have been talking to people at M/L/R. Do you have any idea who might have been seeing Swartz?” the inspector pressed.
Wolfe threw a look my way that told me to go ahead and answer. “Afraid I can’t help,” I said. “Other than Annie Burkett, none of the folks I talked to there, male or female, admitted to knowing Swartz.”
“And you believed them?”
I turned my palms up. “Look, I wasn’t exactly conducting in-depth interviews. After all, the place has more than fifty employees, and slightly more than half are women.”
“Mr. Cramer, let me pose a question,” Wolfe said. “Do you believe Mr. Swartz’s death was a direct result of the thievery of ideas from Mills/Lake/Ryman?”
“I dunno,” Cramer said, studying his fingernails. He isn’t used to having Wolfe ask his opinion. “It’s as good a place to start as any. As far as we’ve been able to determine, the guy didn’t have any enemies. And robbery clearly wasn’t the motive, you know that. Nothing appeared to be missing from the apartment and he had money in his wallet. Obviously, he must have known whoever dispatched him—there was no sign either of a break-in or a struggle, and he was hit from behind, so he knew his killer well enough to turn his back on him—or her. And we didn’t pick up any clean prints around the place other than Swartz’s own, plus those of a cleaning woman who came in once a week.”
“I assume the neighbors didn’t see anyone coming or going, or at least claim they didn’t,” I said.
“Hell, they were damn near worthless,” Cramer spat. “None of them knew Swartz, except maybe to say hello to in the corridor, even though he’d lived in the building for four years. But then, that’s New York for you; nobody knows their next-door neighbors anymore, and they don’t particularly want to. Of course most of them may not have been home from work yet; time of death was between about four and six. There was no question but that the blows to the head killed him—at least three of them, according to the M.E.”
Wolfe ran his hand along the spine of the book he was reading. “Did Mr. Swartz’s two male friends have any enlightening observations, other than the comment about the woman at a competing advertising agency?”
“Not really. They both said he dated quite a bit, but never seemed to go out with any one woman for very long. With him, work—or at least making money—apparently was the big passion. And the women whose names were in the address book corroborated this, to varying degrees. They and his drinking buddies also said he was a hard-driver who was determined to make it big in advertising. Apparently he hadn’t made any secret of that. Quite the contrary. One of the guys—Morrow again—told us Swartz had said more than once he wanted to be a nickel millionaire by the time he was forty.”
“In the current jargon, that means five mil,” I translated for Wolfe, whose face had registered puzzlement.
“Which gave him ten more years to get there,” the inspector added unnecessarily. “According to Harlowe Conn, his boss, Swartz had a pretty good start. He was making somewhere near two hundred a year, but more important, he was in line for a partnership, which would have meant really big bucks … ” Cramer let it trail off, glowering at Wolfe, me, and his cigar, in that order. He suddenly realized that what he planned as a fact-finding mission to the brownstone had become fact-divulging instead.
“Dammit, I’m just wasting my time here. You sure you didn’t run into any women at the Mills agency who played footsie with Swartz somewhere along the way?” Cramer snarled at me. “Word has it that you have a way of getting women to tell you things.”
“Inspector, I’m flattered that you think so, but as I mentioned before, Annie Burkett is the only person of either gender at the agency who told me she knew Swartz.”
“Mr. Cramer,” Wolfe said impatiently, “you have an army of interrogators at your disposal, yet you persist in seeking to wring information out of Archie, who must spread himself across the entire battlefront.”
“Yeah, but we both know that some of my interrogators, as you like to call them, aren’t so hot. Not that you’re the living end yourself,” Cramer said, pointing a thick finger in my general direction, “especially when it comes to playing straight with me.”
“But Inspector, I am playing … ”
This time I was the one who let the words trail off, because Cramer had risen, flung his cigar at the wastebasket—missing by a foot—and was off down the hall. I followed, but he yanked the door open and was out by the time I got to the foyer, from which I watched him climb into an unmarked car waiting at the curb.
“Well, he left in a huff yet again,” I said when I got back to the office. “Did I offend him?”
“Bah. He’s been in a perpetual huff for thirty years,” Wolfe sniffed. “Get your notebook. I have instructions.”
FOURTEEN
WOLFE’S INSTRUCTIONS, AS YOU PROBABLY have figured out, centered on my making another visit to the Mills/Lake/Ryman offices, preferably before day’s end. I started things off with a call to Rod Mills.
“What have you learned?” he snapped before I could spit out anything other than my name.
“Nothing concrete,” I responded. “I’d like to stop by this afternoon and chat with you and your partners, separately, and also with Annie Burkett.”
“Why? What don’t you know that you and/or the police haven’t already asked each of us at least a dozen times?” I had apparently caught Mills in mid-funk.
“I promise I won’t take long with anyone. I know how busy all of you are, but I just need to fill in a few blanks here and there.”
“Oh, hell, all right; what about two-thirty? Everybody’s in today, although we’re still a long way from settling down to normal, if there ever is such a thing as normal in this stupid business. No more visits from the cops this morning, but we’re having problems with one of our clients—not Foreman this time. As if we didn’t have enough headaches, for God’s sake. All we need now is more TV crews tramping around here.”
“Is the trouble you’re having with this other client a result of the publicity you’ve been getting?”
“Nah, it’s a creative problem—been percolating for several days. But the timing couldn’t be worse.”
I sympathized and vowed to be in and out quickly. “Our Mr. Mills is a tad grumpy today,” I told Wolfe after I’d hung up. He grunted from behind his book, which was the only sound out of him before we went in to a lunch of sweetbreads with truffles and chervil.
Fritz’s sweetbreads were magnificent as usual, and my only regret was that I couldn’t go back to the office with Wolfe and bask in the afterglow of the meal while leisurely sipping coffee. But duty called, and at two-twenty-seven I walked into Mills/Lake/Ryman’s orange-and-tan lobby, my presence actually eliciting a spontaneous glimmer of recognition from Butterscotch-Hair. “Mr. Mills is expecting you.” She said it with some enthusiasm this time, giving me a thorough once-over with baby blues that had been visited by an overly energetic eyeliner pencil. Maybe she thought I was yet another TV reporter, scouting not only news but also beautiful young receptionists with the potential to become tomorrow’s television anchors.
The route upstairs was familiar now, and as I moved noiselessly along the carpeted second-floor corridor, everything seemed to be calm. So much for appearances. Mills’s secretary, the one who had smiled so warmly on my earlier visit, was a long way from smiling as I approached her desk. Exhaustion showed on her well-formed face—probably from having to deal with the twin scourges of the media and the police. She numbly nodded me into her boss’s office.
He seemed every bit as happy to see me as his secretary had, gesturing me absently toward a chair while continuing to s
can a sheaf of papers. After about half a minute, he looked up and sighed loudly. “You know, these pushy jackasses just barged in here with their cameras and their lights and their barnyard manners. Never mind the fact that we’ve got work to do, never mind that there’s not a hell of a lot any of us here can tell them about the Swartz business, never mind that their disruption resulted in all of fifteen seconds on the eleven o’clock news, in which we’re referred to as ‘the agency whose ideas got stolen.’ Which of course is just great for our clients to hear. What a goddamn shambles.”
“Uh-huh. Have any of your clients, other than Foreman, griped about all this?”
Mills leaned back and snapped his suspenders nervously. “Actually, no, they’ve all been sympathetic, at least on the surface. Two of them called to commiserate and say they were with us all the way. At least that’s the story they’re telling us now. My guess is they’ll begin falling away a few months down the road, after all this cherry drink crap has died down. When the calls finally come, they’ll be warm and friendly. And the message basically will be ‘You’ve done a terrific job for us, but—and God, this has been painful—we think it’s time for a whole new approach to our product and its position in the marketplace’ or some such bull. But none of ’em will ever even hint at the real reason they’re dropping us—that they’re afraid their advertising will get leaked to a competitor.”
“But if the spy gets unmasked, presumably everything will be okay, right?”
“That’s one big if. In the first place, once an agency’s reputation gets tainted, it’s hell trying to erase that black mark. I remember what happened to a shop not much bigger than us a few years back. They had a spy in the house who leaked a campaign to a competitor, and they were ruined—out of business within nine months. Second, there doesn’t seem to be much progress on the ‘unmasking,’ to use your term. You said yourself on the phone that you and Wolfe haven’t come up with anything concrete.”
“True, but we’re working,” I said. “I told you I wouldn’t waste anybody’s time here today, and I won’t. Before I move on to your partners and Annie, though, one question: Where were you between four and six P.M. on Tuesday?”
Mills detached his thumbs from his suspenders and slowly got erect in his chair, eyeing me suspiciously all the while. “Hey, I’m your client, remember?” He spaced the words, and the tone wasn’t friendly.
“True, but when you hire Nero Wolfe—and me, I’m part of the package—among the things you’re paying all those simoleons for is thoroughness.”
“My God, I’d hardly hire you if I were the guilty one, now, would I?” The tone had gotten even less friendly.
“Stranger things have occurred. Do you have a problem with my question?”
He leaned back again, stretching his arms. “Problem? No, let me think … Late Tuesday afternoon, I was over at the offices of our soap account on Park Avenue. Just a routine meeting to review expenditures, and I’m happy to tell you that everything went smoothly. I left them at, oh, five-thirty or so, and met Dawn for drinks at the Churchill at about six or maybe a little after. Want to check that with her?” The tone had gone from garden variety unfriendly to downright hostile.
“Hey, don’t get your back up. I’m only a lackey for a genius.”
Mills allowed himself a weary smile as his shoulders sagged. “Oh, hell, delete that last comment of mine. I’m afraid I’ve gotten more than a little paranoid the last few days. I’ve got to snap out of that. Anyway, yeah, I said good-bye to the soap folks and walked over to the Churchill. Dawn was waiting in the bar for me, and then we went to dinner.”
“Not to worry,” I said. “I’d be surprised if you weren’t a little edgy by now, what with all that’s been happening. Mind if I drop in on the others now?”
“Go ahead. They know you’re coming, of course. Boyd said he’d prefer to see you first. He’s got a meeting at three-thirty; he’s up to his eyeballs with a client problem.”
“The one you mentioned on the phone?”
“Yeah. A new fast-food chain. Maybe you’ve heard of them—Graffiti’s. We think they’ve got great growth potential—as in maybe being the next McDonald’s. But we’re having trouble coming up with a campaign that makes them happy. It’s Boyd’s baby, and to further stir things up, Sara’s been damn critical of the creative work herself. And you can imagine how Boyd reacts to that.”
“The chain doesn’t sound familiar, but the rest does—the part about Lake and Sara Ryman going at each other.”
The adman shook his head and looked at the ceiling. “You’ll never hear me say this a boring place to work. Insane, maybe, boring, no.”
I did some more commiserating, and then Mills called Lake, telling him I was coming his way, which happened to be all of two doors down the hall. Lake’s office, which was about the same size as Mills’s, left no room for doubt as to his origins. A British flag at least two feet by three hung on one wall, along with a poster of the London skyline with a quote, credited to Samuel Johnson: “ … when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life.” It sounded good, and I made a mental note to suggest to Lily that on our next vacation we visit Big Ben.
“Ah, Mr. Goodwin.” Lake greeted me with a heartiness that seemed forced, popping up from behind a littered desk and reaching across it to pump my hand. “Terrible times, these. Pardon this clutter, but I seem to function best amid disarray.”
I assured him that I was used to disarray and planted myself in one of three upholstered guest chairs. “God, you’re a friendly face,” he said. “It was madness here yesterday—police poking their noses in every ten minutes, although they weren’t the worst. It was the damned television crews, lights, noise, pretty people poking microphones in everybody’s face and asking the most inane bloody questions. Cheeky bastards, all of ’em. I was fearing we’d see more of the same today, but I guess now we’re old news, eh?”
“I wouldn’t get too confident. You may still see police and media around here before it’s over. Mr. Lake, I know you’ve got a tight schedule, and I promise I’ll take only a few minutes. First, I’d like to know—”
Lake held up a hand. “I will be more than happy to answer whatever questions you have, but before that, I want you to see something; I’d like your opinion.” He swiveled to the table behind him and latched onto a videocassette. “We can play this down the hall,” he said, getting up and gesturing me to follow him, which I did. Color me cooperative.
The conference room was done in executive-suite modern, with tan carpeting, the requisite dark Scandinavian table fifteen feet long, a dozen matching upholstered-but-sleek chairs on wheels, and indirect lighting. There were framed corkboards on the long walls, and a screen at one end of the room. The other end of course contained a projection booth, which Lake ducked into for a few seconds, reemerging and sitting on one side of the table. At his prompting, I took a chair opposite him.
“Mr. Goodwin, if I seem distracted today, it is for two reasons,” he told me soberly, pressing his palms together as though he were about to confer a blessing. “One of course is all this upheaval with Cherr-o-key, and the second is because of problems with another client of ours. Have you heard of the Graffiti’s fast-food chain?”
“Very recently.”
He nodded, pleased. “And I think it’s safe to say you’ll be hearing more about them—soon. At the moment, they have only a few outlets—mainly in Virginia and the Carolinas. But they have ambitious expansion plans, and we here feel their growth potential is staggering. Although they are not a very big client right now, that growth potential could get us away from being so dependent upon Cherr-o-key.”
“But there are problems?”
“Indeed,” he said, stroking his beard and frowning. “Graffiti’s has built its image around the 1950s—the Eisenhower years, if you will. We have used that motif as the central theme of our proposed campaign for them, a campaign that is to all intents and purposes an introductory one, which can be used in new markets as
the chain expands across the country.”
“That would seem to make sense. So where’s the rub?” I asked.
“The rub is that the client isn’t satisfied with what we’ve come up with. And neither are some people here,” he added darkly. “I’d like to show you rough cuts of a TV spot we’ve developed.”
“And this is what the client doesn’t like?”
He nodded, pursing his lips. “Correct. At least, not everyone representing the client likes it. I do think we have at least a little support for this in the Graffiti advertising department.”
“I’ll be happy to look at it, but I don’t see where I can be much help,” I told him. “I’m hardly an expert on advertising.”
“Ah, but I sense you are a man of uncommon discernment. I would be most interested in your reactions.”
“Okay, shoot.”
Lake fiddled with some controls built into the table where he was sitting. “Just remember, this is what we call a rough cut,” he cautioned. “It hasn’t been smoothed out, and it may seem a little jerky and uneven to you, but it’s meant to give a client a good idea of what the final result will be before we spend all the money necessary to polish the spot for airing.”
The lights in the room dimmed and the screen came alive with the image of an aqua-and-white Chevy Bel-Air convertible, circa mid-’50s, cruising along a suburban street with a grinning crewcut guy in a V-neck sweater behind the wheel and two young lovelies in skirts and fuzzy sweaters sitting up on the boot in back. The camera closed in on the pair, who began singing, to the tune of “Moments to Remember.” The lyrics started something like “When we drive out to take a break/for burgers, chicken, or a shake/we will always head straight/for Graf-FI-ti’s!” The song continued as black-and-white shots of Eisenhower, James Dean, Lucille Ball, Willie Mays, Elvis, Marilyn Monroe, a Ford Victoria sunroof, kids with hula hoops, and a split-level house with picture window flashed across the screen in dizzying succession. The commercial ended with the same two smiling singers going into a Graffiti’s, where burgers, chicken, and shakes were shown in living color, along with a giant jukebox—apparently a standard feature in all their restaurants. The closing line, a voiceover, was “The way life used to be—and still IS … at Graffiti’s!”
Fade to Black (The Nero Wolfe Mysteries Book 5) Page 12
