The Judge Is Reversed

by Frances Lockridge

  “John was a partner here, you know,” Notson said, speaking to a man who hadn’t known at all. “Cameron, Notson and Blanchard, it was. Left us about fifteen years ago, and we kept the style for a while and then Abe came in. And poor Joe Cameron died—This hasn’t anything to do with what you want, has it?”

  Anything might have. Bill Weigand couldn’t know in advance. Had Blanchard, since, been practicing law? On his own? With another firm?

  He had not. Oh—now and then something came along. He was, for example—had been until the day before, anyway—the court-appointed administrator of the estate of an old friend of his. “Of mine, too. And that’s a funny thing. You’d think—”

  What Bill Weigand would think was that a man like Alex Somers, who had had brains enough to earn himself a fortune, would have had sense enough, too, to leave his affairs in order when he died. Which had been about two years ago. “Particularly when he spent most of his time flying around in company planes,” Stuart Notson said. He shook his rather distinguished head. “Didn’t even make a will,” he said, in despondent disbelief. “Trouble for everybody. And some relative he’d probably never heard of—” The big man shrugged heavy shoulders. He looked sharply at Bill Weigand. “You made your will, captain?”

  “Yes,” Bill said. Something tugged at his memory. Nothing in his memory gave.

  “Good,” Notson said. “Aside from things like that—the surrogate’s a friend of his, but everything was according to Hoyle—John didn’t work at the law. Didn’t need to, obviously. Spent a lot of time on tennis committees, things like that. Played a bit of bridge. Wrote a bit, just for the fun of it. Crazy about cats. Funny thing for a man to be crazy about, isn’t it?”

  “I don’t know,” Bill said. “A good many men are, apparently. A friend of mine—”

  He found he was in danger of being diverted. He put himself back on the track. He said Mr. Notson had mentioned bridge.

  “Very good at it, John was,” Notson said. “Tournament caliber. Could have been top flight if—I suppose if the cats, and tennis, hadn’t taken so much of his time.”

  Notson had played with John Blanchard frequently. Usually at Blanchard’s apartment, sometimes elsewhere. Often with Graham Latham as one of the four. Latham was good, too. If he had as much savvy about other things as he had about bridge, poor old Graham would be a lot better off.

  “Tell me about Graham,” Bill said. “I gather you know him fairly well?”

  “Classmates,” Notson said. “He and poor old John and I—all the same class at Princeton. After that, John went to Columbia Law and I went to Virginia and Graham—well, Graham began to make those investments of his. Poor guy.”

  “Poor?” Bill repeated. “Is he?”

  “Comparatively,” Notson said. “I feel as if I were gossiping over the back fence, captain. Not supposed to blab in my trade.” He paused. “Of course,” he said, “Graham isn’t one of our clients.”

  “Mr. Notson,” Bill said, “in my trade we listen to a lot of gossip. If it hasn’t any bearing—”

  The captain was not to think that Stuart Notson didn’t realize what he was driving at. So—all right—

  Graham Latham had been born to a lot of it—and to a big house in Southampton and things that went with a lot of it, and big houses anywhere. If he had been brighter, or more indolent, he would have let it go at that. But—

  His father had been a—call it a financier. He had made most of what he left Graham Latham in the market. “Easier in those days,” Notson said. “Before SEC. Easier to lose it too, of course.” Graham Latham had decided to show everybody—“to show himself, I guess”—that he was as good a man as his father had been.

  “And,” Notson said, “he wasn’t. A thoroughly good Joe. But didn’t have the knack. And wouldn’t admit it. So now—well, now he’s got a big house and a lot of grounds and—you live in the city, captain?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you don’t know what it runs to, keeping a place up,” Notson said. “We’ve got a place up in Connecticut. Not a patch on Graham’s. Keeps us broke keeping the grass cut.” He paused. “In a manner of speaking,” he added.

  As to what, in detail, Graham Latham had left of what he once had had, Notson didn’t know. It wasn’t one of the things, obviously, you asked about. And people could be “poor” on a variety of incomes. He didn’t for a moment suppose that the Grahams went hungry. But—

  “It’s very relative, of course,” he said, and now seemed more thoughtful than before. The legal mind was there, Bill decided. “And to a degree it’s—well, the entire shape of a man’s life. If you’re brought up one way—the way I was. Perhaps the way you were, captain—it’s one thing. If you grow up as Latham did, it’s quite another. And—you get saddled with things. Like that place of his. Theoretically, it’s worth a lot of money. But—to whom? That’s the question. Hundred thousand. Hundred and fifty thousand. Hell, I don’t know. Cut the land up in one-acre plots—fine. The money rolls in. And the zoning board lands on you. Offer it whole, as an estate—I suspect Graham has, although he’s never said so to me—and—” He shrugged. “Like having a yacht for sale,” he said. “When all anybody wants to buy is a cabin cruiser. Meanwhile—taxes and keeping the grass cut. We’re getting a long way from John Blanchard, aren’t we? And who killed him?”

  “Miss Latham is—close to her parents? Would want to help? If, by the standards she’s been brought up with, she thought help was needed?”

  He was, Stuart Notson said, being asked to be a mind-reader.

  “Not,” he said, “that I can’t read yours, captain. On this point, anyway. About the girl—she’s a nice girl, captain. From all I’ve ever seen. Probably, a responsible girl. As I said, I can’t picture her marrying anybody—I know what you’re getting at—just for the money. But, John was quite a guy. I said that, too. Good looking, vigorous—hell. A good many women have found it easy enough to fall for John.”

  “Oh?”

  “His wife died a good many years ago. Just before he left the firm, as a matter of fact. What would you expect, captain? John was no plaster saint.”

  “Right,” Bill said. “I get your point. A very understandable—compromise—it might have been. All around. Only—”

  “Only,” Stuart Notson said, “John got killed.”

  “Right,” Bill said. “However, I was thinking more of something else, Mr. Notson.”

  This time Notson said, “Oh?”

  “I’m afraid,” Bill Weigand said, “that Miss Latham fell in love.”

  Notson said “oh” again. He said it flatly, this time. He said, “Afraid, captain?”

  “As you said,” Bill said, “Mr. Blanchard probably wasn’t a saint. It would be very generous of him, wouldn’t it, to leave half a million dollars to a girl who’d dropped him to marry somebody else? Saintly, you could almost call it, couldn’t you?”

  11

  Sergeant Mullins drove the police car, which was not marked as such, along a narrow blacktop road, as he had been told to by a man at a filling station, and kept his eyes open. The sign was of wrought iron and read “Graham Latham.” He turned on the driveway, through the gap in the stone wall. Iron gates which might have stopped him stood open. The drive wound through lawns, among trees. The drive, Mullins thought, could use a few loads of gravel. The grass could stand cutting. Nevertheless, all very plush.

  When the drive made its last turn but one, Mullins could see the house. A large house—in fact, a tremendous house. A brown shingle house, in front of which the drive circled. There was a porte-cochère and Mullins stopped the car in it, and walked up two wooden steps—which could have done with a coat of paint—to a white door. He pressed the button and, distantly, inside, a bell rang. He waited, briefly, and a man answered the door. The man said, “Morning?”

  He was a wiry man of medium height, with gray hair in a brush cut and a crisp gray mustache. He was deeply tanned. He had unexpectedly full red lips and the faint, conce
ivably encouraging, smile behind which he waited showed very even, very white, teeth.

  “Miss Latham?” Mullins said. “If she’s in? My name is Mullins. Called earlier—”

  “Right you are,” the wiry man said, and pushed the screen door toward Mullins. “Anything we can do.” He shuttered the faint smile. “About poor Johnny, of course.” He shook his head slowly. “Bad thing,” he said. “Damn bad thing. Come along in, eh?”

  Sergeant Mullins went along in—went into a large, square hall, walked on a worn carpet.

  “I’m Latham,” the wiry man said. “Hilda’s father, y’know. Tells me you and some captain gave her a bit of a going over.”

  His tone made light of this.

  “Walked into a bit, didn’t she?” he said. “Not that I mean into it, of course. In here, if you don’t mind. She’ll be along any minute.”

  They went into a room off the hall. It was a large room, with a large fireplace at the far end, with french doors along one side. Two of the doors were open, behind screens; they opened onto a terrace. A rather weedy terrace.

  “Too early to offer you anything, I expect,” Graham Latham said and then, his voice raised, “Hildy? Your visitor’s here.” He directed this information through the open french doors. Apparently from some distance, a girl said, “Coming.”

  “Cigar?” Latham said, and Mullins said “No thanks.” Latham moved—moved well, moved quickly—to a table and opened a box and took a cigar out of it, bit off the end, lighted the cigar. The cigar was appropriate to his face, Mullins thought. Cigars aren’t to many faces. Latham wore a blue polo shirt and walking shorts and blue stockings which stopped just below his knees, and the clothes, too, were appropriate, although the man probably was nearing sixty. He didn’t look it, Mullins thought. He’d kept himself in good shape.

  Hilda Graham came from the terrace into the room. Yellow gladioli trailed from her left hand. She wore slacks and a loosely fitting sweater, and was a girl who could wear slacks. She said, “Good morning, sergeant. With you in a minute,” and to her father, “Last of them, I’m afraid,” and then she went on across the room and out of it on the other side, into the hall. She came back quickly, without flowers. “Had to put them in water,” she said. “Now, sergeant?”

  Mullins looked at Graham Latham, briefly. “Don’t mind if I sit in,” Latham told him, did not ask him. But he was pleasant about it. “Watching brief,” he said, and added, “as they call it. Eh?”

  “Why not?” Mullins said, assuming there was nothing, in any case, to be done about it. Mullins had worn a blue business suit. It felt a little stiff on him. “Won’t take long,” Mullins said.

  “Sit down, sergeant,” Hilda Latham said, and herself moved to a chair. The deep red hair swayed as she moved. Quite something, she is, Mullins thought. And knows it. And why not? She sat down and leaned a little forward in the deep chair. The chair’s dark slip cover was somewhat worn. “That’s right,” Latham said. “Take your choice, sergeant.” Mullins took his choice. He chose a straight chair, and sat squarely in it.

  “One or two points,” Mullins said. “Captain Weigand thought you could clear up, maybe.”

  “Like,” Mullins said, “did you know Mr. Blanchard left you half a million dollars, Miss Latham?”

  The girl’s eyes widened; she looked startled. She looked at her father, who sat up straight in the chair he had been comfortable in and said, “My God!” He looked at his daughter for some seconds. He said, again, “My God,” and there seemed to be wonder—conceivably admiration—in his voice.

  “No,” Hilda Latham said. “I—are you sure?”

  “Yeah,” Mullins said. “That’s what the will says. You didn’t know?”

  She shook her head, the dark hair swaying.

  “Good old Johnny,” Graham Latham said. “My God.”

  But, as he looked at Sergeant Mullins, waiting, his eyes narrowed somewhat. The crinkles at the corners of his eyes were the crinkles many smiles leave behind them. He was not, now, smiling. He was, Mullins decided, considering.

  “It seemed,” Mullins said, “like a good deal. To the captain, that is. He sort of wondered whether you had expected anything like that. Seems you hadn’t.”

  “Not like that,” the girl said. “Certainly not—half a million dollars?”

  “Uh-huh,” Mullins said.

  “Of course,” Latham said, “poor old Johnny hadn’t kith or kin. There’s that, sergeant. And he’s always been fond of Hildy. Avuncular, y’know.” He looked at Mullins. “Like an uncle,” he said.

  “Sure,” Mullins said. “And he never said anything about leaving you money, Miss Latham? Didn’t even sort of hint?”

  “No,” the girl said. “Oh—I wouldn’t have been surprised to get something. He was generous. And, as daddy says, there wasn’t—wasn’t anybody really close. But—as much as that!” She shook her head again.

  “That’s the point,” Latham said. “Something—yes. But—My God!”

  And then, as if involuntarily, he looked around the big room. He surveyed it, Mullins thought, as a householder; as a householder who saw blemishes. And who, now, could look at them without pangs.

  “What would you have expected?” Mullins said. “Just at a guess, Miss Latham? Under the circumstances?”

  They both looked at him. There was a rather long pause. It occurred to Mullins that they did not want to rush into anything. Or even to edge into anything.

  “What do you mean, circumstances?” Hilda asked, and her father looked at her quickly. Sharply? Because, in her voice, there had been a note of wariness, of defense.

  “Why,” Mullins said, “like you said—both said. The circumstance of feeling toward you like an uncle.” He paused and looked at them slowly. He managed to look surprised. He also looked formidable. “What did you think I meant?” he said, slowly.

  “That’s right,” the man said, and was quick. “That’s all we—”

  “Not,” Mullins said, “the way a man would feel toward a young woman who meant a lot more to him than—than a niece? A girl as pretty as you are, Miss Latham? A girl who had a key—”

  Latham stood up, the movement abrupt.

  “I don’t like that,” he said. “Don’t like any part of it.”

  “Well,” Mullins said, and did not move. “Sorry about that, Mr. Latham. What don’t you like?”

  “The implication. That Hildy would—” He did not finish that. “You’d better get out of here, sergeant.”

  “Sure,” Mullins said, and did not move. “I could do that. Will if you want to make a point of it. Come back with some of the local boys. Then we can all go into town and have a nice cozy little—”

  “Daddy,” the girl said. “You’re giving the sergeant—” She hesitated. “The wrong idea,” she said. “That we’ve got anything to hide. That—”

  The wiry man looked down at her. Something, Mullins thought, passed between them. Almost as abruptly as he had stood up, Latham sat down again. He said, “Sorry. Got the notion you—” And shrugged.

  “O.K.,” Mullins said. “Maybe I put it the wrong way. Miss Latham—did Mr. Blanchard want you to marry him? And did you say, maybe, that you would, maybe? And then did you meet this Mears fellow and—”

  Latham moved as if to stand up again, and the girl took charge. She said, “No, daddy,” and then, “there isn’t anything—wrong about it. Nothing to be—ashamed of.”

  She turned to Mullins, then.

  “I suppose,” she said, “there are dozens of ways you could have found out. How doesn’t matter. Yes—Johnny did ask me to marry him. And—I was fond of him. There wasn’t anybody else. Then. Nobody he didn’t make look like—like a small boy. And—”

  “Hilda!”

  Graham Latham leaned forward in his chair as he spoke his daughter’s name, stopping her. He repeated the name, as sharply as before.

  “You’re talking too much,” he said, when she looked at him and waited. “The sergeant here isn’t—it’s
not any of his concern.”

  “I—” the girl said, and at the same time Mullins, in a much heavier voice, said, “We-ll—”

  “Well,” Mullins said, “I wouldn’t say that, Mr. Latham. We’re interested in all sorts of things. You’d be surprised what interests us. And then, Miss Latham, this fellow Mears came along? The one you said yesterday was—whadja say? A kid, wasn’t it?”

  “Hilda!” her father said again, again with command in his tone. But this time it did not stop her.

  “All right,” she said. “All right, Sergeant Mullins. Doug came along. This kid came along.”

  “Yeah,” Mullins said. “And so you told Mr. Blanchard all bets were off? And he said—what did he say, Miss Latham? That it was O.K. with him?”

  “Of course,” she said.

  “Sure,” Mullins said. “Said for you to go right ahead and that he thought you were doing the right thing and all like that. Didn’t make any—pitch?”

  “He understood.”

  “Sure,” Mullins said. “An understanding man. When did you break it to him, Miss Latham? Yesterday, maybe?”

  “I—” she said, and hesitated. “Yes, yesterday. But—I think he knew before. Things like that—I think he knew before. Or guessed.” She looked at Mullins, then, with her head raised. “I’d never told John that I loved him,” she said. “He—he didn’t ask me to.”

  “He didn’t try to talk you out of it? Not any?”

  Scepticism was in Mullins’s voice. It was put there with care.

  “No,” she said. “Oh—he said I must be sure it wasn’t—wasn’t just something I’d get over. But as to talking me out of it—” She shook her head, and the deep red hair swirled.

  “Sergeant,” Latham said, “are you a gossip columnist? On the side?”

  “No,” Mullins said. “Just a cop, Mr. Latham. A cop wondering about things. Whether, maybe, Mr. Blanchard would have been quite so generous if your daughter, after she’d had time to think it over, had said, finally, that she was sorry and it was no soap. Might have cut half a million down to—oh, his grandmother’s ring. The one with a topaz in it.” Mullins looked at the tanned man who didn’t look his age. He looked steadily. “Dead men can’t do any will changing,” he said. “Where were you yesterday morning, Mr. Latham? Here with your daughter—you were here yesterday morning, Miss Latham?”