McNally's Puzzle

by Lawrence Sanders

  “My ex,” she said darkly. “A real stinker. He’s a week late on the alimony check. That’s why I’m looking for him. I’ll clean his clock. It’s not he ain’t got the bucks.”

  “Ah,” I said. “He’s gainfully employed?”

  “Sure he is. A good job. He’s a naval architect.”

  “He designs navels?”

  She looked at me. “Boats,” she said. “He designs boats.”

  “Oh,” I said.

  “Listen, Archy, I’ve got a great idea. Why don’t you buy us a bottle of something somewhere and we’ll go back to my place, let down our hair, and tell each other the stories of our lives. Then we’ll see what happens. Okay?”

  “Oh, I don’t think I could do that,” I said hastily.

  “It doesn’t have to be a big bottle,” she told me. “A pint will do.”

  Our conversation was beginning to take on a surreal quality, and if this tootsiesque young lady had suddenly launched into a dance routine from a Busby Berkeley musical I wouldn’t have been a bit surprised.

  “Sonia,” I said earnestly, “I do thank you for your kind invitation but I’m afraid it’s impossible tonight.”

  “You don’t like me? I don’t turn you on?”

  “I do like you,” I declared, “and you do turn me on. But I have an important errand of mercy to perform tonight. My dear old grandmother is in the hospital and she’s depending on me to stop by to read the latest financial report on her investment in pork belly futures.”

  Look, I wasn’t going to let her outgoof me. I could be just as mentally anorexic as she.

  “What’s wrong with your grandmother?”

  “I’m afraid it’s a terminal case of flagrante delicto.”

  “Oh lordy, that sounds awful.”

  “It is. Endless suffering.”

  “But listen, couldn’t you come over to my place after you visit your grandmother? I mean it’s just the shank of the evening. I’ll wait for you.”

  She was being awfully persistent and I think it was at that moment I realized this was quite possibly more than a casual pickup. Despite her fey conversation she was intent on her purpose: to lure me to her lair.

  “Sonia, I’d love to,” I said with what I hoped sounded like a sigh of ineffable regret. “But after I visit grandmama I’m so wrung out emotionally I’m not capable of fun and games. You understand, don’t you?”

  “I guess,” she said.

  “But I want to see you again,” I said eagerly. “Perhaps we could make it another night. May I ask for your telephone number?”

  That seemed to enthuse her. “You betcha,” she said, fished in the pocket of her leather jacket, and came out with a tube of lipstick.

  Before I was fully aware of what was happening she had grasped my left hand, turned it over, and scrawled her telephone number on my palm in virulent red lip gloss.

  “There!” she said triumphantly. “How’s that? I have an answering machine. If I’m not in, leave a message.”

  “I certainly shall,” I said feebly.

  “Soon?”

  “As possible,” I said, looking at the number smeared on my palm with loathing. I prayed Brillo and Ajax might do the trick.

  She finished her margarita and leaned forward to give me a kiss and a wink. Then she was gone with a creaking of leather. I gulped my brandy hurriedly, fearing she might return.

  “Mr. Chrisling has taken care of the bill, sir,” the mustachioed bartender said gravely.

  I thanked him and handed over a sawbuck gratuity. He gave me a grateful smile I prayed was sincere. At the moment I was desperately in need of unambiguity.

  I drove home slowly, thoughts awhirl as usual, and pulled into my slot in our three-car garage. I switched off engine, lights, and just sat there in the darkness. After a moment I heard a gentle scratching, leaned to open the door, and Hobo leaped into the passenger bucket. I think he wanted to lick my schnozz but I wouldn’t let him; I’d had enough unsolicited affection for one night. But I did pet him, stroking his head and back. A few minutes later he curled up on the leather seat and closed his eyes. Lucky dog.

  I wished I could sleep as easily and instantly as he, but I could not. All the rusty McNally neurons were in overdrive and the ferment was almost painful as I tried to figure out exactly what had happened that night. I strove to think logically—which you may feel is similar to my attempting a fifty-foot pole vault.

  I started by assuming Ricardo Chrisling’s invitation to dinner was not simply to have a sociable get-together; the man had an ulterior motive. And it had appeared in red leather. I refused to believe Sonia’s intrusion was merely a chance encounter. He had arranged it.

  Perhaps it was one of those macho things. Here’s a willing chick you should meet and you’ll have a great time. But I did not think Ricardo capable of such crassness. He was wilier than that.

  Putting aside his scheming for the nonce, I concentrated on the conduct of Sonia.

  It would be understandable if she, a not so gay divorcée, was lonely and yearned for companionship, even if it lasted no more than one night. Possible but not probable.

  Or was she engaged in Murphy’s game, one of the oldest cons in the history of scams. A chippie, real or faux, entices a john to her digs with the promise of instant gratification. Once inside her door the victim is confronted by her alleged husband, boyfriend, pimp, or perhaps an armed plug-ugly hired for the occasion. The mark is robbed and forcibly ejected from the premises. Was that Sonia’s script? Possible but not probable.

  Which brought me back to Ricardo’s role in this farrago. If he had written the scenario, planned I was to meet the available lady with the bees’ knees, what in the name of Jehoshaphat could be his reason?

  I left Hobo snoozing in the Miata and went into the house, up to my hideaway, still puzzled by Ricardo’s behavior and wondering if I was not being paranoid. The man had really done nothing suspicious. He had invited me to a splendid dinner. An acquaintance had unexpectedly appeared. So why was I impugning his motives, searching for any evidence of deception?

  I was disrobing, preparing to spend an hour or two bringing my journal up to date, when I stopped suddenly. I think I may have grinned. Because a short memory loss was restored and I recalled something Ricardo had said during the evening. I shall not dignify it by calling it a “clue,” but I thought it significant.

  Surely you know what I’m writing about, don’t you? You picked up on it before I did—not so? If not, you must be patient and be assured your temporarily prideful scribe will reveal Ricardo’s slip at the proper time.

  Stay in touch.

  CHAPTER 30

  BEFORE I RETIRED ON THURSDAY night I laboriously expunged Sonia’s lipsticked telephone number from my palm. A bit of scouring powder helped. But first I copied the number into my daybook. As an amateur sleuth I had learned God is in the details. Or is it the Devil who is in the details? I can never remember which.

  Regarding the next morning...

  There is an anecdote about W. C. Fields—or perhaps it was Jimmy Durante—who was called upon to make a daybreak appearance at his movie studio. As he staggered through the dawn’s early light he came upon a lofty tree laden with sleeping and nesting birds. Immediately he began kicking the tree and whacking it with his walking stick.

  “When I’m up,” he shouted, “everybody up!”

  I recalled the story after Sgt. Al Rogoff shattered my deep slumber with a phone call at eight o’clock on Friday morning. Ungodly hour.

  “When you’re up,” I grumbled, “everybody up. Have you no mercy?”

  “Not me,” he said curtly. “I’m working my tail off and I expect the same from you. Listen, I showed a color photo of a white Ford Explorer to the gooney lady who claims she saw Tony Sutcliffe and Emma Gompertz being hustled away. She says yes, she thinks that was the vehicle used. She thinks it was but she isn’t certain. A defense attorney could easily demolish her testimony but it’s good enough for me. Like I told y
ou, I got nothing else. So what was Ricardo Chrisling’s car doing there when the ex-employees of Parrots Unlimited were abducted?”

  It staggered me for a sec. “I didn’t tell you it belonged to Chrisling.”

  He was indignant. “You think I’m a mutt? After the loopy dame made a tentative identification I checked the cars of everyone connected with this mishmash and came up with Chrisling. You think he’s our hero?”

  “I just don’t know,” I said truthfully. “But I’m happy my tip yielded results. Now you owe me one—right?”

  “Oh-oh,” he said resignedly. “All right, what do you want?”

  “I have a telephone number and a woman’s first name. I’d like to know if she’s got a sheet.”

  “This is personal? You’re looking to romance the lady?”

  “Don’t get cute, Al. She’s a friend of Chrisling.”

  “In that case I’ll go along.”

  I told him her name was Sonia and, after a moment, I found her number in my professional diary and repeated it to Rogoff.

  “I’ll let you know,” he said.

  “When?”

  “ASAP. I think the ice is beginning to break.”

  He hung up and I went back to bed for another thirty minutes of sweet somnolence. I finally did get to work that morning—late but in an energetic mood. I decided Sgt. Rogoff had been correct; the ice pack was cracking. I hadn’t grasped the infamous plot earlier because I underestimated the villainy of the people involved. It’s a constant fault; I can never acknowledge the power of sheer evil.

  I had two phone calls to make. The first was to the Gottschalk home. I was finally put through to one of the twins. Don’t ask me which one although she claimed to be Judith. I inquired as to the condition of her brother.

  “Oh, Peter’s been released from the hospital,” she said breezily. “Right now he’s on his way to visit some quack. What a twerp he is!”

  I thanked her hurriedly and hung up. I had no desire for an extended conversation. I might get suckered into hosting a champagne brunch.

  Before I could make my second call I received one—from Yvonne Chrisling. “You naughty boy,” she said reprovingly. “You promised to phone and you didn’t.”

  “Yvonne, we spoke only a day or so ago. I really intended to contact you.” Liar, liar, pants on fire.

  “No matter,” she said, suddenly brisk. “I must see you at once. It’s very important.”

  “Lunch?”

  “No,” she said authoritatively. “Not in public. And not in my home.”

  “My home”: I loved it. A few weeks ago it had been Hiram Gottschalk’s home. Sic transit... and so forth.

  “Would you care to come to the office?” I suggested.

  “No.” She was quite decisive. “I might be seen.”

  I wanted to ask, “By whom?” but didn’t.

  “If this is to be a confidential meeting,” I said, “as you apparently wish, perhaps we might get together at the McNally residence. We can talk inside or during a walk on the beach—whichever you prefer.”

  She didn’t hesitate a mo. “Yes,” she said, “that will do. In an hour. You will be there?”

  “I shall. You have my address?”

  “Of course,” she said. “I’m so looking forward to seeing you again, darling.”

  I am hypersensitive to tones of voice and I thought her last declaration had a wheedling inflection. Curious for a woman of her resolution.

  I had time to make my second call before leaving for a tête-à-tête with the Spider Woman. So I phoned Binky Watrous and found him at home in an excitable mood.

  “Do you know anything about yellow-shafted flickers?” he demanded.

  “Of course,” I said. “Some of my best friends are yellow-shafted flickers, several of whom have been incarcerated for exhibiting their proclivity in public.”

  “Archy,” he protested, “they’re birds! Woodpeckers. And they attack anything even resembling a tree. They hammer at it with their beaks. I bought a recording of their hammering and I’ve been practicing imitating it. It’s great, even better than calls. Bridget says with her tambourine and my hammering of the yellow-shafted flicker we’ll have a classic. A classic, Archy!”

  I should have replied, “A classic what?” But I couldn’t rain on his parade; he was so up.

  “Binky,” I said, “the reason I called was to ask you about Martin and Felice, the recently hired employees of Parrots Unlimited.”

  “I already told you. Definitely below the salt.”

  “Useless, are they?”

  “Well, they’re not bird mavens, for sure, for sure.”

  “Then what do they do?” I persisted. “The man, Martin, for instance. He does feedings, cleans cages, and similar scut work?”

  “Never saw him lift a hand. Sold a bird occasionally but he spent most of his time in the boss’s office fiddling with the computer.”

  My heart leaped like an intoxicated gazelle. “Thank you, my son,” I said huskily. “Your skinny may prove of inestimable value. Now go back to your hammering and don’t blunt your beak.”

  I hung up in such an ebullient mood I wanted to chortle—if only I knew how to chortle. Things were coming together, wouldn’t you agree? But there were surprises to come I hadn’t anticipated. The picture puzzle was not quite complete. Stick with me, kid, and you’ll be wearing diamonds.

  I drove home hastily and waited only ten minutes on our graveled turnaround before Yvonne Chrisling appeared in a new Cadillac DeVille. And I mean spanking new. It was a forest green, a color much in vogue at the time, and had such a gleam it looked as if it had just been driven from the showroom. As the Mad. Ave. pundits advise: If you’ve got it, flaunt it.

  She emerged from the yacht wearing stonewashed jeans and a white canvas bush jacket. I realized I had never before seen her dressed so informally. I liked it; she seemed softer, more vulnerable.

  But my impression was quickly dispelled. She gave me a dim smile and then looked about at the McNally estate: our ersatz-Tudor main house feathered in ivy, garage, greenhouse, potting shed, and Hobo’s abode.

  “Very antique, isn’t it?” she said sniffishly.

  “True,” I said, refusing to be riled. “We planned it so.”

  “Not to my taste,” she pronounced, and it was then I became fully aware of what a snarky mood she was in. “Is there anyone about?” she asked abruptly.

  “Probably my mother and the staff.”

  “Then let’s go down to the beach.”

  “Would you care for a drink of something first?”

  “No,” she said tersely, and I had a premonition this meeting was going to be as much fun as the extraction of an impacted molar.

  I conducted her across Ocean Boulevard, down the rickety wooden staircase to the sand. She took up a firmly planted station in the shade of some palms and showed no inclination to move farther.

  “A walk?” I suggested. “Perhaps a wade in the water?”

  “I don’t think so,” she said. “I hate the beach and the ocean.”

  It was too much. “Then what on earth are you doing in South Florida?”

  “Circumstances,” she said, which told me nothing. “Archy,” she went on determinedly, “I need legal advice.”

  “Whoa!” I said, holding up a palm. “I am not an attorney. I do not have a law degree or license to practice. I think you better consult my father or another qualified lawyer.”

  “But you know a lot about the law, don’t you?”

  “Some,” I admitted, cautiously forbearing to tell her the story of why I was booted out of Yale Law.

  “This isn’t for me,” she said. “It’s for a friend who has a problem.”

  She looked at me so wide-eyed and sincere I knew she was lying. Besides, everyone in the legal profession has heard the old wheeze from a client: “I have a friend with a legal problem.” Hogwash. The attorney knows immediately it’s the client’s problem.

  “What is it, Yvonne?”<
br />
  “My friend, a woman, has knowledge of a crime. She wasn’t involved in any way, shape, or form but she knows who did it. What should she do?”

  “Immediately report what she knows to a law enforcement agency,” I said promptly. “She is obliged to do so. If not she may find herself in deep, deep trouble. Concealing knowledge of criminal behavior is not a charge to be taken lightly.”

  Yvonne showed no indication of surprise or shock. I reckoned she already knew what I had told her.

  “But it’s not so simple,” she said, turning her gaze out to sea: a true thousand-yard stare. “First of all, the individual who committed the crime is close to her. Very close. It would pain her to be an informer.”

  I shook my head. “She has no choice.”

  “Another factor...” Yvonne continued, looking at me directly again. “My friend is afraid of what the reaction might be of the person she accuses.”

  “Afraid? Of physical retaliation?”

  “Yes.”

  “She can ask for police protection. She can move, change her phone number, take on a new identity. Whatever will ensure her safety.”

  “But she must tell what she knows?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “She is entirely innocent, you understand, and now she is trapped in this terrible dilemma and she is frightened. You can sympathize with that, can you not?”

  “Of course I can, Yvonne.”

  I had said the right thing, because her manner was suddenly transformed. She melted, became almost flirtatious.

  “How happy I am to have asked for your advice, Archy,” she said in a lilting voice. “I knew I could depend on you. We are so compatible. We must see more of each other. You agree?”

  “Oh yes.”

  “Much more,” she chortled. She knew how to do it. “And I shall tell my friend everything you have said. Thank you, sweetheart.”

  She took my hand as I led her back to the parked Cadillac. She couldn’t have been more affectionate. Well, she could have been but I resisted, fearing Hobo might be observing us from his kennel. “Thank you again, darling,” she caroled just before she drove away. “What a treasure you are!”

  I watched her wheeled castle depart, thinking, There goes one very brainy lady. But more of that later. At the moment I was famished and hustled into the kitchen. First things first.