“That is a matter for the police, Mr. Griscom. Not you. I’m perfectly satisfied to let them handle any question in connection with myself.”
He said, with regret:
“Of course. My only purpose in calling you, at all, was the wish I could be of some help, in view of your coming campaign for our agency, and particularly in handling those other witnesses. They tend to corroborate some rather reckless statements Mrs. Hepworth has been heard making since that night, and for all I know, may be making now.”
He stopped, and the silence held. I had told her that Vincent and myself had been mistaken about Stanley, and she was free, of course, to mention the misunderstanding to anyone, not realizing it put a beautiful scratch in my fender. Still, there was no real harm done. But even so, my mouth felt dry and my voice rasped.
Statements about what?”
He gave an easy laugh, as he said:
“They’re fantastic. But I gather from those people in the park, particularly Michael Anders, and from other sources, there was some hasty talk for a moment that the driver of the other car, If one existed, was known to you. In fact, Stanley Thornhill was mentioned. That’s in flat contradiction to the statements all three of you gave the police at the time, and I know it’s pretty wild.” He stopped, again sounding a small, indulgent laugh, prepared and perhaps hoping to hear either my astonishment or my indignation. He heard nothing. If a lot of nerve ends passing through an invisible wringer could have made any sound, that is what he would have heard. But they did not. Presently, in near disappointment, he went on, “It’s crazy, because I live in Englewood, myself, and that evening we had a lot of people in for bridge. I’d been discussing our campaign with Stanley, and I happened to bring him home with me.”
“Yes,” I said. “I know.”
“Well, apart from that contradictory gossip, there are some other factors that don’t add up. More tangible.” He slowed down, speaking with increased reluctance. “Are you sure you can’t get up here some time today, or would you prefer that I go ahead right now?”
I spoke without any expression:
“Go ahead.”
“Well, all right It’s known, Mr. Ravoc, that you brought Mrs. Hepworth home that evening. A building employee was there.” Big news, I thought, while he briefly hesitated. Good for a special radio bulletin, any day. “You left her at the door of the elevator in the main-floor lobby. A number of people got off, when it came down, and as they passed around you, they heard you quarreling violently. It made a deep impression on them, apparently, because they all remember the incident, very clearly.” As though a lot of veils and curtains were inexorably parting, so did I recall that little tableau, forgotten until this moment, but now suddenly floodlit in a score of magnified details. “She was overheard by the attendant, and the others, accusing you of being a fool for having stopped at all, and you are quoted as replying it had to look good, and besides, it might have been your bad luck to hit some park bum, instead of Stephen Barna.” Griscom’s voice came to a patient stop, and in the long pause these jagged fragments silently hurtled as though from everywhere, and cut and ripped and smashed, again and again. Some of the phrases were familiar enough, spoken in sarcasm, while others were not. But this new combination of them, tearing crosswise through the fabric of that vanished moment, showed cancer. Finally, then, Griscom spoke again. “Of course, this may be a complete misinterpretation, and it’s not conclusive enough to warrant my laying it before the police. That was the last thing I wanted to do, anyway, if I could possibly avoid it. It might be damn embarrassing to our agency, to say the least, that this thing happened right in the middle of negotiating a contract with Campaign Consultants. But according to you, Mr. Ravoc, no actual agreement was ever reached. I’m surprised, because I was informed otherwise. But you certainly ought to know.”
“I know of none, and there won’t be one.” This, at least, was one cheerful certainty. At this moment, working with Generous Heart had all the appeal of stepping on a third rail.
“Who told you there ever was one?”
“Why, your partner Vincent Beechwood, among others. He spoke to me yesterday about some copy he’s already preparing for the drive. The directors here all seemed to think the deal was on. I thought it was general knowledge.”
“You are mistaken,” I told him, flatly.
He sounded regretful, but unruffled.
Tm sorry, in a way,” he said. “Campaign Consultants seemed just right for us, in this first drive our agency is making for popular support. But I hope it won’t lessen the very active concern Mrs. Hepworth has been taking in our work.”
Shana again. And again Griscom’s easy assumption that he was our well-intentioned, though blundering confidant.
“I wasn’t aware she had any.”
“Well, I’ve never met her, personally, of course, but I understand she’s recently shown a surprising interest in the problems we handle here. She has a genuine flair for publicity. In fact, she’d make the best possible kind of publicity for us, in her own right.”
The voice was genial and smooth, but as it died away, it filled the lengthening interval with afterthoughts and question marks that had hooks, teeth, claws. Publicity for Shana’s salon and Generous Heart publicity, these hardly made a logical combination. This thing spelled danger.
But for whom? Shana? Myself? For both of us? Or was this whole sequence in fact a series of harmless coincidences? No. There were too many of them. I said, brusquely, but with nothing in my tone:
“I’m sure she would. I’ll phone and ask her about it.”
“Perhaps you ought to check with Mr. Beechwood, too, though of course it’s none of my business. I wouldn’t have phoned at all, except I took it for granted we were a client agency, and when I turned up this new development in the death of Barna, it seemed best all around to let you know about it, first.”
First? And then I tugged at one of the hooks.
“Barna told you somebody was out to get Mm. Who?”
“I’m afraid I can’t discuss that. For one thing it may all have been part of his mild delusions, just as our psychiatrist reported.”
This was too compliant. The question still drifted there, neither answered nor refused. I struck at something that dangled from another line.
“You spoke of some previous connection Mrs. Hep-worth had with Barna. What was that connection?”
No, I think you got the wrong impression, there.” He spoke reflectively. “I had to consider the chance that one of the three of you in that car may have had one. So I had to make a purely routine inquiry.”
“What did you find?”
His voice was conciliatory, and filled with encouragement.
“Look, Mr. Ravoc, since you were driving, and you certainly know better than I do that Barna had no special meaning to you, as you say, then you have nothing to worry about. That leaves you in the clear.”
“Then who Isn’t in the clear?”
Vincent? Not very likely. Shana?
He said, with great patience:
“You’re jumping to conclusions, Mr. Ravoc. For all I know, when I finish this routine investigation, none of you may have any connection with the case. The original statements made by the people in your party, that there was another car, that you didn’t get the license, and that you knew nothing about the occupants, may prove to be the exact truth.” The reasonable voice came to a logical pause, awaiting my sensible reply. But there were two others, my friend and not very brilliant partner, and Shana, an accidental spectator already shocked by the scene itself, still more so by the decision to keep silent prompted and perhaps Imposed upon her by myself, largely for what seemed mercenary reasons, at that. Now each of them would decide again, this time alone. Whatever they said, it could not amount to a calamity. But it might hurt. It would hurt. And I could give no reply. Then Griscom said, “Naturally, in this field I have to make allowances for all sorts of obsessions and morbid outbursts, particularly from women. But at
the same time, it’s just regular procedure to make a thorough check of everything. My files already have the accounts that Barna gave me, in great detail, about those attempts to maim or mutilate him. According to the police report, you had taken Mrs. Hepworth to a function of Inner Light, an organization for the disfigured, and you had just left it on the evening when his death occurred. That’s an odd place to bring somebody with her professional Interests, almost the opposite, they’re so far removed. Still, that could be plain coincidence. But now there are these unquestioned, deliberate, further efforts at disfigurement, and quite apart from lurid accusations made in a state obviously close to panic, the acts speak for themselves. It looks like much more than pure chance.”
I was getting very sick indeed of Mr. Griscom.
“What happened?” I asked. “Did somebody dig up Barna and run over him again?”
There was no immediate answer, and this soundless wait at his end of the wire seemed to gather tangible force. When he did speak, his voice was toneless, very remote, a little puzzled, tinged with impersonal sympathy.
“No,” he said. “Apparently you don’t realize how far this has already gone.”
“How far what’s gone?”
Again there was an instant’s stillness, as though of indecision. Then he ventured a tentative, guarded question.
“May I ask you to keep this in the strictest confidence, Mr. Ravoc?” I stopped, by the narrowest margin, a reflex impulse of agreement, another impulse to damn him, still another to make a blunt demand that he go on with whatever he had to say. But none of these normal reactions seemed right, now, there was no leverage in these thin tendrils of vapor that lengthened everywhere with stifling weight. I made no reply, at all, and as though he understood, accepting this as a mute, partial bargain, he quickly resumed, “You must realize we come across information here that simply can’t be divulged, not to anyone. But since Mrs. Hepworth already figures so actively in our plans for the coming drive, and I feel you will be brought around too, I hope you can reconcile your differences, and iron out these fantastic suspicions before any official charge is made.”
Mechanically, though feeling it would lead to nothing, at least to nothing with a measurable size and shape, I said:
“What differences? What suspicions?”
Only the faint hum made by the receiver of an open wire held through the suspended words, the silken whisper growing charged and alive as the interval lengthened.
“You’ll have to work that out yourself, Mr. Ravoc,” he told me, at last, and with finality. “I think I’ve already spoken more freely than I would, under any other circumstances. But when you do return to the city, and you’ve talked to your associates, I think you’ll see this in a different light. We feel our agency is ready to stage this popular appeal, and Campaign Consultants can do a better job of it than almost any other firm. Also, it’s possible we can be of some assistance to you, personally. If so, don’t hesitate to let me know. I’ll be glad to do what I can.”
Already thinking ahead, I gave a dry, distant, automatic response.
“Thank you.”
He was talking some more, though I caught nothing of it except the reasonable tone, as I broke the connection, still holding the phone in my hand. My watch showed a few minutes before ten, Shana ought to be somewhere between her apartment and the salon. Haley Robbins would be at the office, and so might Stanley, but I wanted to talk to Vincent before either of these. And Vincent, if I knew him, would be late, as always, but perhaps a little later than usual, not quite human at this hour but awake and just possibly still at home. I called his number through the hotel switchboard. There was an answer almost at once, and the raw voice was Vincent’s.
“This is Jay, Vincent.”
“Jay?” The tone abruptly sharpened in more than surprise, as though not really surprised but startled, and now swiftly extemporizing, to recover. a How’re things down there? I hear you and Merriman are doing all right. I also hear Polyclinic wants to name their new maternity ward the Newell Gibbs Pavilion. Anything to it?”
I said, clearly, and to the point:
“Vincent, what do you know about the Generous Heart?”
This closed him up without a sound. When he did speak again, his voice was coagulated and normal.
“I thought you might be calling about that. Well, all I know about our new client is, they don’t seem to care what kind of copy I give them. They like everything.”
I tried to keep an edge out of my voice, as I asked:
“But you’re sure they are a client? No doubt about it that we’re supposed to be handling a drive of theirs?”
He brushed over this very lightly, but with confidence.
“Why, I thought that was all worked out, Jay.”
“Has anyone gone through the little formality of signing a contract?”
“Yes. We all have, and I thought you had, too, by this time. Haven’t you?”
“No. And I don’t intend to. Furthermore, no deal is worth a damn unless I do sign. So now you can forget their copy, and everything else about them.”
Vincent held a deep, uncomfortable silence, and when he broke it, there was urgency in the words, “Jay, you’d better sign.”
“Why?” I asked. “Now we’re right back where we started. What do you know about that outfit?”
He said, hedging:
“Well, if you want, I’ll send down their regular literature, together with my own outline for publicity. We have a lot of their stuff at the office, pamphlets and letters of solicitation, and so on.”
I had already seen much of it, in the course of maintaining touch with the field in general. He knew that I had. And he knew that was not my question.
“Not their official display stuff. Keep it, and shove it. Why should we take them on, and who’s Fenner Gris-com?”
He seemed to have some trouble understanding this. After a while he said, with reluctance:
“Well, it’s got a big potential, for one thing. About Griscom, all I know is he’s one of their regular investigators. He’s a friend of Stanley’s. As a matter of fact, if you remember, Stanley was out there at his home, with a lot of other people, the night that thing happened in the park.”
He stopped, as though that summed up everything.
“Yes, I remember,” I said. “But all that still doesn’t explain why it’s so important for CC to handle their drive, so important, in fact, that three of my partners have already signed a contract without even mentioning it to me. Why?”
Vincent sounded shaken.
“I thought you’d already seen It, and probably signed it by now. Haley or Stanley was supposed to send it down.”
“Well, they haven’t. They haven’t even mentioned it.
What’s in it, anyway? Something they know I won’t like and won’t stand for, without a build-up, I suppose.” Vincent said nothing, and I prodded at him. “Well? What?”
“I don’t know about them. As a matter of fact, I don’t remember the exact terms. They’re just the usual. But when you do see it, there’s one item you won’t like. The treasurer of their agency. Charles Talcott.” He added, quickly, forestalling me, “And I don’t like it either, Jay. But we’ll have to take him. This once, anyway.”
Talcott? I couldn’t believe it.
“That musical comedy con man? He’s their treasurer, and the three of you still want this deal to go through?”
Vincent’s voice was cautious, but stubborn.
“I don’t like it, personally. But it’s one of those things. We’ll have to put up with it. This once. For one drive only.”
“Not me,” I said. “He’s Stanley’s friend, and for all I know, he may be his long-lost twin brother. But he’s not mine.”
Vincent’s tone dropped, softly meaningful, guarded, terse.
“I think that’s it, Jay. He’s no friend of Stanley’s. Stanley’s afraid of him, I think.”
“Well, that’s too bad. I’m not afraid of him, than
k God, and neither are you. If that two-bit Dracula thinks he’s got Stanley where he wants him, or anybody else in the firm, that’s all the more reason we don’t want any part of him. How about Haley? How does he feel?”
“All Haley sees is, Generous Heart is going places. It’s bound to be a money-maker.”
He would. But Haley could be brought to recognize a booby trap planted in the narrow limit of a day’s procedure, if he saw it close enough, and somebody showed him the trigger.
“I hope that contract turns up today,” I told Vincent. “So I can have the pleasure of mailing it back to Generous Heart in a bag of confetti. It’s got nothing for us, or anyone else. Nothing but a compound headache.”
“I don’t agree, Jay. It’s a solid outfit. It’s coming.”
“Listen, Vincent. I just had a phone call from Fenner Griscom.” I held down my irritation, and put it to him with patience. “He said he was calling as an investigator for the Generous Heart, regarding the death of a man who had been one of their cases. Stephen Barna.”
In a single breath Vincent passed from shock to realization.
“Who?”
“Barna, the man in the park.”
“Oh, God. What now?”
“This. Barna was both suicidal and had delusions somebody was out to wreck him, if not kill him. Griscom, giving the case a follow-up, says neither the police report nor any of the people close to the scene confirm that there actually had been any hit-and-run car. There may have been no such car, he strongly implied. That leaves ours, and only ours.” I stopped, waiting for Vincent’s reaction as this implication reached him. There was none. At least, he said nothing, and I went on, “Now, I don’t know how much of this load of garbage Griscom accepts as fact, how much he dreamed up himself, or what he’s getting at. But you get the idea, don’t you? Under the circumstances, there’s only one thing we can do about that organization. We simply can’t afford to touch it.”
There was a hush at Vincent’s end of the line. It grew even longer, ending finally in a different voice, one changed to something muted, withdrawn, a little sick.
“Yes, I get the idea. But I think what we’d better do about it is sign. You had, to be exact.”
The Generous Heart Page 12
