“Progress?”
“In a negative way. I won’t go into my reasoning. I just want to tell you that I’m personally convinced that Ken wasn’t shot by Shennary. Shennary was cleverly framed. I don’t know why Ken was killed. Or by whom. But it wasn’t Shennary and that means there was a good reason, premeditation, a lot of damn careful planning.”
She thought it over. And shuddered. “The way it happened seemed too pat — but maybe I liked that answer better than the way this one makes me feel.”
“I know. It makes the world a larger, darker place. I don’t have to tell you not to repeat this, do I?”
“No. You don’t have to, Gevan.”
“Now this question may seem unrelated. It is — almost. The connection is tenuous. I want your reaction to Curt Dolson.”
She gave a little start and her eyes widened. “What do I think of him? My God, that’s a change of pace! He’s in my hair, but so are a lot of others. He’s just thicker-skinned than most. He’s got an ego like nothing I ever saw before. He can’t get it through his pointy head that I’m not on the verge of falling into his arms. He has propositions. Some of them include South-Sea cruises and emeralds. He gets pretty intent.”
“That one with the emeralds is a pretty good offer for a chicken colonel to make, isn’t it?”
“The boy is pretty well loaded. He owns a business that keeps him solvent enough. He’s so damn smug. And so vain, too. He keeps sticking his chin out so the second chin won’t show. He uses male perfume and goes around smelling like tweed and saddle leather and fire in the heather. Wears a corset, too, if I’m any judge. He’s just a boy at heart.”
“There’s no chance of his hitting the right proposition?”
“That better be a joke, and you better start laughing like hell, or you’re sitting here alone, Mr. D.”
“It was a joke.”
“There isn’t exactly any halo above these flaxen locks, brother, but at least I can say all favors thus far distributed have been gratis.”
“I said it was a joke.”
“Okay, I forgive. Let me give you a briefing.” She changed to an excellent imitation of Dolson’s hearty baritone. “ ‘You can do your singing just for me, my dear. This isn’t the life for you.’ I told him I loved this nasty life, and if I ever gave it up it wouldn’t be for him or anybody remotely like him. Did that stop him? For about a tenth of a second. It took him that long to find my knee under the table. And it took me another tenth of a second to get my cigarette against the back of his hand.”
I looked beyond her. “It seems you have been speaking of the devil.”
She rolled her eyes ceilingward. “No. Oh, no! Give me strength.”
Dolson came parade-grounding up, gave a Prussian bow from the waist, with a cool smile for me and a warm one for Hildy. “Evening, my dear. Hello, Mr. Dean.” He pulled a chair out. “Hope this isn’t taken.”
“It is now,” Hildy said glumly.
“Great little kidder,” Dolson said fondly. He sat with back straight, shoulders squared, eagles shining.
“We were discussing you, Colonel,” I said mildly.
It took him a moment to decide how to react. He showed us his white teeth and said, “Nothing good, I trust.”
“We were wondering why a man of your means happens to be on active duty.”
He shrugged his eagles. “Reserve, you know. Every man who has any training ought to put it at the service of his government. This is a critical era, Mr. Dean. We’re all needed.”
I sensed the criticism. He sat erect, smelling of Scotch and pine. His nails gleamed with some manicurist’s dedication. His face glowed pink and healthy. It was as though Dolson had erected a facade to conceal the man behind it. Unlike Lester of the shifting masks, Dolson had only one acquired character: the brusque, hearty military man, with faint overtones of king and empire and the playing fields of Eton.
I wondered if he had been active in politics in his home town. I wondered how much affability, how much snap and sirring it had cost him to get that Legion of Merit ribbon. I wondered how he looked when he was alone and sat worrying about the money he was making and how he was making it. Was the pink face pouched and old and frightened? Did the plump pink shoulders sag?
I chose the opening instinctively, the opening he had just given me. “Colonel, I’ve been thinking along those lines myself. Patriotic duty and all that. Getting my shoulders to the wheel.”
He beamed. “My boy, you’ll feel better for it, believe me.”
“Mr. Granby says he will withdraw in my favor, and Mr. Karch will back me. At the Monday meeting, I’ll vote my holdings for myself, and take over where Ken left off.” It took three long seconds for the toothy smile to fade away. He goggled at me. He slumped and the padded shoulders of the tunic rode up. He licked his lips. He was suddenly a very worried, very unmilitary, very nervous little man. He forced the smile back, but it had all the humor of a denture ad.
“Uh — commendable of course. I can understand any man wanting to do his bit.” The heartiness was strained. “But let’s not try to move too fast, Mr. Dean. That would be — uh — like my trying to take over an infantry division. A man should be — objective enough to know when a job is too big for him.”
“Too big, Colonel? I’m afraid I don’t understand, I’ve run the company before.”
“I’m afraid this is a different proposition. That was mostly civilian production.” He was getting over shock and warming to his argument. “Stanley Mottling has a national reputation and an astonishing record. It wouldn’t be any service to the company to take over the position he fills so well. And if you don’t mind my mentioning it, a four-year layoff doesn’t sharpen a man’s mind. Stanley Mottling’s last four years have been full of accomplishment.”
I pursed my lips and nodded. “Maybe there’s something in that.”
All the confidence was back. “Tell you what. Why don’t you talk to Stanley about going to work under him? There are places where you could be very valuable. That would ease the load on Stanley.”
“I guess I should reconsider, Colonel.”
“That’s using the old brain,” he said. “Objectivity.” He had brought his drink to the table and he lifted it and took a long drag with a shade too much relief.
“I agree I may be rusty,” I said. “So I’ll put my voting weight behind Walter Granby and let him take over.”
He plunked his glass down. He stared at me. “Granby! Good God!”
“I’d rather back him. I know the man. I’ve got confidence in him. I don’t agree with some of Mottling’s policies.”
“Good God!” he repeated in an empty voice.
I knew it was cruel to get him off balance with one idea and then slap him with the other one before he could get his feet planted. A cruel device — and effective when you need information that can only be given inadvertently.
He tried to use a tone of sweet reason. “Mr. Dean, you can’t look at the world through a peashooter. Granby is entirely unsuitable, old boy.”
I had been mild up to that point. So mild, I knew he had forgotten our chat in Mottling’s office. So I discarded mildness and said, “It seems odd to me, Colonel, that you keep taking an interest in the internal affairs of the company. Didn’t we cover that ground once?”
He murmured something about irreparable damage, critical contracts.
I turned to Hildy and said, “How long are you going to work here?”
“As long as the gross stays healthy in the lounge, I guess. Joe says I can sing here until I look like Whistler’s mother, if the gross doesn’t fade.” She made her voice casual and winked meaningfully at me. I glanced at Dolson.