Then, lifting her demitasse, she spilled a little on the cloth and giggled, and Fox understood. She was simply soaring, and had been ever since the cocktails. He could have kicked himself. He looked her in the eye and demanded:
“About Phil’s big contribution. How much was it?”
“Ten thousand dollars.”
“When did he make it?”
“Today is—” She frowned in concentration.
“Wednesday,” said Fox.
“Yes. Wednesday. Yesterday was—”
“Tuesday.”
“Yes. Tuesday. Monday. He made it Monday.”
“Was it a check, or cash?”
“Cash. It was all in—” She stopped abruptly. “Now wait a minute. Don’t ask me about that.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’re not supposed to — I mean I’m not supposed to—”
“All right, forget it.” Fox turned and caught an eye. “Waiter! My check, please.”
It was in fact desirable that Miss Adams should forget it, so he tried to get her spouting again, but she was silent. She said nothing until, out on the sidewalk, he attempted to get her into a taxi and she refused point-blank. With her heavy volume under her arm, she marched off in the direction of Grand Central. Fox watched her for ten paces, then turned and made for Sixth Avenue.
But he didn’t find Philip Tingley at the Womon office. The man who ate too fast was there, and two others fussing around with literature, but no Phil. Fox stated that he would like to meet Mr. Tingley because he had been informed by Miss Adams that Tingley could polish off his understanding of Womon, but was told that Tingley hadn’t been there and nothing had been heard from him. Fox left, found a phone booth, called the residence of Arthur Tingley, deceased, and was told by the housekeeper that Philip Tingley wasn’t there and she knew nothing of his whereabouts. He walked to 41st Street, maneuvered his car out of its niche, and drove to Nine-fourteen East 29th Street.
That dreary edifice was enough to convince anyone that a new world economy was needed there, even if nowhere else. Four flights up in the rear, Phil had said, and Fox climbed the smelly shaft, having found the vestibule door unlatched. The door in the rear on the fifth floor had no bell push, so he knocked, but got no response. After a couple of minutes he gave it up and returned to the street, sat in his car a moment considering alternatives, voted for home, and headed for the West Side Highway. At 10:20 he was winding along his private lane and crossing the little bridge he had built over the brook, toward the white house among trees on the knoll which was known in the neighboring countryside as The Zoo. In the house, he blew a kiss at Mrs. Trimble, asked Sam about the spraying, settled a bet for Pokorny and Al Crocker regarding the body temperature of a hibernating woodchuck, went to the cellar to see if Cassandra’s kittens had opened their eyes, played guitar duets with Joe Sorrento for an hour, and went upstairs and to bed.
At 9:30 the next morning, Thursday, he was back in New York, in a phone booth in a barber shop on 42nd Street. He had already made four calls. To Nat Collins at his office: nothing new. To Amy Duncan at her apartment: the same. To the Tingley residence: the funeral would be at ten o’clock as scheduled, therefore Philip Tingley would not be available for conversation until afternoon. To the P. & B. Corporation: Mr. Cliff was in conference and could not be seen until later in the morning. Fox was now, his notebook open in his hand, talking to someone whom he had called Ray.
“I call that real service. All right, I’ll hold the wire.” He did so for a wait of several minutes. Finally, he spoke again, listened a while, and then said, “Let me call them back to make sure. GJ11, GJ22, GJ33, GJ44, GJ55, GJ66, GJ77, and GJ88 are all Guthrie Judd. Eight cars, huh? Must save him a lot of shoe leather. Much obliged, Ray. Come up and look at my new tractor some time.”
He left the booth and shop, walked to the Grand Central subway station, and took an express to Wall Street.
The Metropolitan Trust Building was a microcosm, a fortress, a battlefield, a pirate’s corvette — depending on the point of view. The building had forty elevators and the company had thirty-eight vice-presidents, almost a tie. Fox, however, was aiming even higher than the highest vice-president. He got out at the elevator’s zenith and opened his attack on the Maginot Line that defended the approaches to his prey, his only artillery being a sealed envelope. Inside the envelope was one of his business cards on which he had written, “Urgent. Regarding Mr. Brown’s visit to Mr. T. at ten o’clock Tuesday morning.”
The difficulty was hitting the target with the envelope. A receptionist condescended to phone someone. A suave young man appeared and wanted the envelope but didn’t get it, and vanished. An older and tougher man arrived and conducted Fox along a wide carpeted corridor to a room where a skinny middle-aged man sat at a desk with a stenographer on each side of him. To him Fox surrendered the envelope and he departed with it, the tough man standing by. In five minutes the skinny man reappeared, beckoned to Fox, and escorted him through a door, a room, and another door, into a spacious chamber of authentic, though a bit spectacular, elegance.
A man of threescore, seated stiff-backed behind an enormous flat-topped desk of amargoso wood with nothing on it but a newspaper, said, “All right, Aiken, thanks.”
The skinny man went. Fox moved toward the desk. “Mr. Judd?”
“Yes.” The voice struck Fox as a new and remarkable synthesis, an amalgam of silk and steeclass="underline" “Tell me what you want, please.”
Chapter 10
Fox claimed a tenth of the desk’s area for his coat and hat, and a chair for himself. His accustomed smile was absent.
“Well,” he said, “I’m a detective.”
“I know who you are. What do you want?”
“I was going to on to say. A detective forms a lot of funny habits connected with his trade, like anyone else. For instance, when I parked my car in front of Tingley’s Titbits Tuesday morning, a big Sackett town car was there at the curb, with a liveried chauffeur. I noticed its license number, GJ88, and upstairs in the anteroom a little later, when a well-dressed gentleman passed through on his way out, I jotted it down in my notebook. The next day, when my interest — and a lot of other people’s — in Tingley’s affairs had become acute on account of his death Tuesday evening, I was told that the tall well-dressed man who had called Tuesday morning was named Brown. There are so many Browns. I asked the Motor Vehicle Bureau which one has GJ88, and learned that this Brown must have been using a car which belongs to Guthrie Judd. I wished to ask you if he was doing so with your knowledge and consent, but seeing you, I recognize you as the man who called on Tingley Tuesday morning. Doubtless the secretary, and others there, would do the same. So now I would appreciate it if you will tell me what you talked about with Tingley when you went to see him day before yesterday under the name of Brown.”
Aside from his eyes, Guthrie Judd’s face betrayed no reaction whatever to that careful and lucid narrative. The gleam in his eyes was more steel than silk. He asked, with no change of tone, “What else do you want me to tell you?”
“That’s all for now, but of course where it might lead—”
“It won’t lead anywhere. Go out by that other door, please.” Judd moved a finger to indicate it.
Fox didn’t move. “I ask you to consider, Mr. Judd, that it will be more annoying to answer police questions about it than to tell me. Would you prefer to have me give my information to the police?”
“I would prefer not to be bothered about it at all.” A faint curl of the lip might have been either irritation or derision. “Should the police ask a question I would of course answer it. Please leave by the other door?”