“But look,” he said. “If Barry was here—”
“I wasn’t,” Barry Gould said. “I stopped in about five to nine to see if Gail—you know, Gail Roberts—wanted to catch the second show at—”
“Gail!” Professor Andrada’s face darkened and he digressed violently. “She must have been out with that Roger Carroll loafer. I tell her he is a no-good. She knows it is him or me.… All right, this is the finish. She can go tomorrow whether her place downtown is ready or not.”
He shook his fist at the ceiling and would have elaborated on the subject if Louise had not touched his shoulder.
“Please,” she said. “You’ll start your head bleeding again.” And over his protests she dabbed something from the bottle onto the cloth and held it on a spot near the back of Andrada’s head. When he subsided somewhat she smiled at Murdock. “If you have any influence with him, Captain, perhaps you could persuade him to see a doctor.”
“Nonsense,” Andrada said. “It is nothing. I do not even feel it.”
Barry Gould cleared his throat and continued to Murdock. “As I was saying. I’d only been here a couple of minutes when the professor staggered out from the studio with blood trickling down his neck and—”
“He was too quick for me,” Andrada said. “I know he is an impostor and because I do not understand I want to see what it is he wants.”
“Not the collection from Venatra?” Murdock said.
“No. That went to the museum this afternoon.”
Murdock held his breath. He said, quietly, “All of it?”
“Certainly. That is—everything of value. Everything except three abominations of paintings that some fool has included in the cases, three miserable specimens of oil on canvas.”
Murdock was still holding his breath. Louise was watching him now and so was Carl Watrous, as though held by something in his manner they did not understand. He had a feeling that everyone was waiting for him to say something else so he asked the next question.
“Did he take them?”
“One of them. A frightful abstraction. A nightmare of color surrounding the figure of Venus. Imagine if you can a jade-green Venus …”
Murdock did not hear the rest of it. He made an effort to appear unconcerned, to show the right amount of bewilderment but no more. He let his breath out and the stiffness went from him and he felt tired and beaten and hopeless. He went to the divan and sat down, rubbing his damp palms on his knees. He heard Barry Gould say:
“Damn funny, if it’s as bad as you say, Professor. What would he want with that?”
“I have no idea.”
“Do you know if it had any special value, Murdock?”
“I never saw those three,” Murdock said; then lied convincingly. “I was sent here to check over the original collection. If that’s safe—”
“It is safe,” Andrada said. “This other had no real value.”
“Then is that guy going to be surprised,” Gould said. He looked at Andrada and then at Murdock; then he shrugged and stood up. “Well, I still think you ought to notify the police.… And how did this fellow know enough about Murdock’s plans to come at just the right time?”
Andrada said he didn’t know, but in any case there would be no police. Later perhaps, but not now. It was an affair that he himself would handle. There would be no police. “And,” he added pointedly to Gould, “no story, if you please.”
Gould grinned and said okay. He said good night to Louise and Andrada.
Carl Watrous cleared his throat. “If you’ve got room for me, Gould,” he said, “I could use a lift as far as the Raleigh.”
Barry Gould said fine. Louise pouted a little and asked if Watrous had to go. He said he thought he should. “Good night, Professor,” he said. “And about those two moderns that are left—I’m still willing to buy them if—”
“No,” Andrada said. “They are worthless.”
“Possibly to a connoisseur. For my purpose I could have used all three.”
Andrada shook his head and his mouth got stubborn. He said, “No, no,” and shook his head some more.
Watrous shrugged and turned away. He nodded to Murdock and started out with Louise. Gould came over and said he’d see Murdock at the paper, wouldn’t he? And meanwhile if Murdock found out what this was all about to let him know.
Murdock watched him go. He could tell from Gould’s expression that he had not been fooled much. Gould was too good a newspaperman to believe completely the explanations he had heard and he would certainly know that there was more to the theft of the Jade Venus than was apparent. The trouble was that for now there was nothing Murdock could add. What little he did know he could not reveal and what he did not know was downright discouraging.
When Louise came back Andrada rose and began to pace the room. He was a small man, wiry except for a thickness at the waist, with thick gray-black hair and a small but bristling mustache. Pince-nez on a black ribbon dangled as he walked and there was a bloodstain behind one ear and other stains on the collar of his shirt.
Murdock watched him, not knowing what to say, knowing only that he must put things together in his mind and then speak calmly and reasonably so that he could get all the details of what had happened here tonight. He was still thinking how to start when Andrada stopped in front of him. Andrada leaned down and his black eyes were keen and steady.
“That man who came tonight was well prepared,” he said. “I know he is not you. I ask for his identification card.” He measured the next three words. “He has yours.”
Murdock nodded. A muscle hardened in the angle of his jaw and was still. “Yes,” he said and told what had happened. “It was my fault. They had me cold. I might have delayed them a few minutes but—”
Andrada listened until the end, nothing moving in his face but his fierce black eyes. “It was not your fault,” he said. “Come. We will go in the studio a minute and I will show you.” He bowed to Louise. “You will excuse us, please, Louise— Oh, I am sorry. You have not met. This is Kent Murdock—Louise Andrada, the widow of my late nephew, Donoto Andrada.”
The studio, a large, one-storied room with bars across the high windows and skylight, and a heavy barred door at the rear, joined the hall, and here Andrada told Murdock what had happened, changing his tenses whenever it suited him as he always did.
Again it had been a question of an amateur against a professional. Andrada had a gun in his desk and he had intended to use it if necessary, but first he decided to see what Erloff wanted. As he recalled it, there had been no disappointment shown when he told Erloff that the main collection had been taken to the museum that afternoon. Instead Erloff stated that he was only interested in the three more modern pictures that had come with the collection.
“Because they were such miserable specimens, I had them turned to the wall.” Andrada walked to a large rack along one wall and pulled out two medium-sized framed canvases. “There,” he said dramatically. “See for yourself.”
Murdock silently agreed. One was a picture of some fantastic machine with innumerable little figures pushing the cogs around; the other could have been the artist’s idea of Dante’s Inferno. While not exactly surrealist, the word seemed to describe them better than any other Murdock could think of.
“The Jade Venus was the same style?” he asked. “The same artist, you think?”
“The same. And for this impostor I took all three out as I do now for you. This man glances at them and says it is the one with the Jade Venus that he wants.”
Andrada paused and his face darkened. He was staring beyond the paintings now at something only his mind could see and whatever it was must have been unpleasant, for he seemed to have forgotten Murdock or what he had been saying. Murdock prompted him.
“Did he say why?”
Andrada’s glance focused once more. “He said he would expose it to infra-red film. He said his bureau in Washington had reason to be suspicious of it.” Andrada shrugged. “I am close to the desk
now. I think I will use my gun to hold this impostor until the police can arrive. I open a drawer but before I can take out my gun he has his own in his hand. I can only stand there helpless while he advances. Then I decide to try. I grab for him and I am spun to one side. That is all I remember until I come to and find the back door unbarred and my head with one great ache.”
There was nothing excitable or explosive about Professor Andrada now. Only the brightness of his narrowed black eyes and the tight line of his mouth suggested that something burned hotly inside him, and seeing that look now, Murdock knew there was something else Andrada had not told.
“Why should he want that particular painting?”
Andrada spread his hands. “I do not know,” he said. “But perhaps I will find out. Come.” He stepped to the door, a sudden briskness in his manner. “I must change my shirt,” he said. “You will excuse me now?”
Murdock watched with puzzled eyes while Andrada hurried ahead and climbed the stairs; then he moved slowly along the hall to the drawing-room doorway. Louise Andrada was curled up on the divan with a book which she quickly put aside when she saw him.
“Do come in,” she said in her low, husky voice. “Has Uncle Albert gone to bed? Oh,” she said when Murdock told her about changing the shirt. “Well, would you like a drink? I’m sure I could use one.”
Murdock said that would be fine and could he help? She said she could manage and presently came back with a tray, a bottle of Scotch, glasses, ice, and soda. Then, for a little while as she mixed the drinks, Murdock forgot his troubles and found it rather pleasant merely to watch her.
He had been aware from the first that she was unusually attractive. Now, in her dark green dress with the low-cut rounded neckline, he saw that she had lovely legs and a ripe, full-blown body, sleekly rounded. Her hair, medium blond with a touch of gold, was artfully feathered and waved, and her eyes when she handed him his drink were greenish and subtly shadowed.
“Now,” she said, and drank deeply. “I needed that,” she said and smiled at him, inspecting his face with apparent approval.
He smiled back at her. He offered cigarettes and held a light, and when she leaned back against the cushions and crossed her knees he said:
“Who could have seen the telegram?”
Her eyes opened wide. “Telegram?”
“The one I sent this morning.”
He explained its contents. When she said she didn’t even know he was expected he asked where Professor Andrada would leave the telegram after he opened it.
“Why, on his desk, I suppose,” Louise said. “If he had I might have seen it—though I didn’t. Or Gail—do you know her? Well, Gail or Mrs. Higgins, the housekeeper, or even Arlene. You know, the maid who let you in.”
Mrs. Higgins, she said in answer to his next question, had worked here for years, but Arlene was new. About a month, she thought. She frowned at her glass.
“But I see what you mean,” she said. “To do what those two men did to you, they would have to know about that telegram some way, wouldn’t they?”
Instead of answering, Murdock listened to someone come down the stairs. There were steps in the hall but when they did not come to the doorway he got up and moved toward it. As he stepped out with Louise at his heels, Professor Andrada was just putting on his coat.
“Oh, now.” Louise sounded shocked. “You’re not going out?”
“Certainly I’m going out,” Andrada said.
“But your head—”
“My head is quite all right.”
“I’ll go along with you,” Murdock said.
Andrada picked up his hat. “This is something I shall handle in my own way.”
“Sure,” Murdock said. “But I’m in this too, you know. I mean if you’ve got any ideas—”
“Please.”
Andrada’s voice was stiff. He drew himself up to his full height and one glance at the set jaw and the black unwavering gaze was enough to tell Murdock it would do no good to persist.
“What I wish to do must be done now,” Andrada said, “and by me alone. Later—tomorrow perhaps—we will discuss further the picture of the jade-green Venus. Yes, tomorrow we shall see what we shall see. For now I must ask you to excuse me.”
He put on his black felt hat gingerly, adjusted the brim, bowed, and went out.
Murdock blew out his breath. “Oh, fine,” he said disgustedly. “He knows something but because somebody socked him he’s got to handle it himself.”
In the drawing-room, Louise insisted on freshening his drink. “I’m worried,” she said. “He may even have a concussion. And he’s so excitable, so violent about some things.”
Murdock began to pace the floor, his lean face grim and worry riding his thoughts. He didn’t realize he was pacing until Louise said, “Must you?”
He stopped and found her smiling up at him. “Oh, sorry,” he said and sat down beside her. Then, abruptly: “Who is Carl Watrous?”
“Carl Watrous?” Louise’s tone said she was surprised at his ignorance. “Haven’t you heard of The Gay Buccaneer? And Thursday Nights Off?”
“Oh, him? The producer?” Murdock remembered now. Thursday Nights Off had been running for nearly three years—not to mention its road companies which had been all over the country—and The Gay Buccaneer was one of those spectacle musicals that had been grossing thirty to forty thousand a week for more than a year. “What’s he doing here? Isn’t he from New York?”
Louise arched a brow at him. “He might have come to see me, mightn’t he?”
Murdock looked at her; then he grinned. Louise’s archness went away, leaving her voice amused as she spoke.
“Actually I’m only part of the reason—so he says. You see, he’s made a tremendous amount of money the past three or four years and he’s been buying paintings right and left—not that he knows anything about Art. But it’s the smart thing to do and he read about the collection from Venatra and came up to see if he could buy something. Also he wanted to talk to me about a part in a new musical he’s putting on.”
She hesitated, smiling at Murdock’s questioning look. “He used to be my agent years ago. That’s how I happened to get to Europe in the first place. And when I came back a month or so ago I stopped off in New York a few days and looked him up.”
Murdock thought it over and he wasn’t smiling any more because he found something that bothered him.
“What,” he asked, “would he want of those three modern paintings that came with the Venatra collection? How did he know about them?”
“I told him.”
“Oh?”
“That is, he came up from New York last night and we went out together and I told him about these three silly pictures when I described the collection to him. I told him I’d ask Uncle Albert to let Carl see the whole thing. And he did. This morning. Only when Carl asked about the three modern ones Uncle Albert wouldn’t show them to him. He said they disgraced the house and he would not advertise such a disgrace. So this afternoon, while Uncle Albert was at the museum, I showed those three to Carl. He came tonight to see if he could buy them.”
She lifted one rounded shoulder, let it fall. “Of course Uncle Albert was furious with me for showing them to Carl. He wouldn’t hear of selling them even though Carl offered him a thousand for the three of them.”
Murdock started to say something, thought better of it, and went on to something else that he remembered. “Who is Roger Carroll?” he asked. “Why was Andrada screaming about him?”
“He’s an artist. He’s a friend of Gail’s. Mine too, actually, but mostly Gail’s now. He used to be in some of Uncle Albert’s classes before the war and later he was in Italy. I met him in Rome—we were living there at the time— Don and I. Roger got in some trouble.”
She clasped her hands about one knee. “We were—sort of repatriated together after the Allies took Naples. That was after Don was killed. Roger and I came back on the same boat early last month.”
�
��He’s running around with Gail and Andrada is sore about it,” Murdock said. “Because Carroll got in trouble in Italy?”
“And also, I think, because he wasted his talent. So Uncle Albert says.”
“Is Gail still Professor Andrada’s girl Friday?”
“Oh, yes.” Louise hesitated. “That is, until a few days ago. They quarreled rather violently. I don’t know just what happens now.”
“She’s still his ward though?” Murdock said.
“I really couldn’t say.”
When he glanced around, Louise was watching him with a half-smile in her eyes and he said, “You married Donoto Andrada in Italy. But you’re an American.”
“I’m an American.”
She made no effort to elaborate and he did not press her but sat with his legs stretched out, studying the tips of his oxfords and thinking about Professor Andrada and what had happened. Louise sat quietly beside him until the front door opened. When he rose she went past him to the hall.
“Oh, hello, darling,” she said. “Barry stopped by around nine to see if you wanted to see a movie. And there’s a friend of yours here. You remember Mr. Murdock?”
Gail Roberts had tossed her coat across a hall chair and was shaking out her hair when she saw Murdock. “Murdock,” she said. “Why, Kent Murdock. Of course.”
She came toward him with her hand outstretched and when he took it she held on and drew him into the room. “Hi, Gail,” he said. “Grown a little prettier, haven’t you?”
She grinned mischievously. “I was pretty two years ago,” she said, “and you know it. Let me see.” She touched the ribbons on his chest. “Oh—that’s the Purple Heart,” she said, her eyes quickly concerned. “Are you all right now?”
“Mostly,” he said.
Louise stifled a yawn, apologized, and said if they would excuse her she thought she’d go to bed. She offered Murdock her hand and said why didn’t he tell Gail about the excitement.
Jade Venus Page 2
