Cliff stopped and turned his head at the sound of footsteps and the opening of the door. The others looked with him, making Tecumseh Fox the focus of seven pairs of eyes as he entered, took in the situation with a sharp glance as he approached, saluted the group with a nod, and spoke directly to Philip Tingley:
“I’m sorry, I guess I’m a little late.”
The tactic was absurdly simple, but none the less effective. To the policemen it established him as an expected addition to the meeting. To the three trustees it established him as expected by Phil, whom they did not desire to aggravate. And, as Fox had rightly concluded from the expression of cynical contempt on Phil’s face, that young man was in no mood to challenge an interruption to a gathering which he obviously regarded as asinine.
“Excuse me,” Fox murmured politely and self-effacingly. “Go ahead.”
Eyes returned to Leonard Cliff. “I was saying,” he resumed, “that I knew of the adulteration, and I had my own suspicions as to who was responsible for it, though I admit I had nothing to support them except my knowledge of the methods that have been pursued on other occasions by a man whose banking interests have recently gained control of a certain corporation. I knew that he wanted to buy the Tingley business. I have reasons to suppose that he was personally in touch with Tingley — uh — quite recently. I know that no considerations of propriety would deter him from any course he is determined to follow. I am aware that my appearance here at this moment is unseemly and you may even think it offensive, but I came to forestall the man I have spoken of.”
“What man?” Austin, not mollified, demanded.
Cliff shook his head. “My description names him, or it doesn’t. You people know as well as I do the honorable and enviable reputation of the Tingley business and product, started before any of us here was born. It would be a shame and a crime to let it get into the clutches of that man. My company offered Arthur Tingley three hundred thousand dollars for it. We want to buy it. We offer cash. I want to discuss it with you — if not now, then at your convenience, and before you make any other commitment. That’s the request I came to make.”
There was a moment’s silence. Austin spoke: “All right, we’ve heard you. You’ll hear from us when we have anything to say.”
Sol Fry rumbled aggressively, “He can hear from me right now. I think it’s a good proposition. This building is apt to cave in any minute, and for that matter so am I. I’m old and out of date, and I’ve got sense enough to know it.” He glared meaningly at G. Yates.
Phil Tingley let out a hoot.
“We are a board, Mr. Fry,” said Austin reprovingly. “We act as a board, not as individuals. But since you have spoken — have you anything to say, Miss Yates?”
“Yes.” Miss Yates’s soft and quiet soprano had yet a quality of unyielding determination. “I am resolutely opposed to the sale of the business to anyone whatever, at any price. I’ll never consent to it this side of my grave. It was born here and it belongs here.”
“I thought so.” Austin compressed his lips. “That puts the whole thing up to me.” He looked at Cliff. “Please draw up your proposal in triplicate and submit it to me as chairman of this board. I think you need fear no prior commitments.”
“Thank you,” Cliff said, and turned and marched out.
The plump detective shifted his position on the window sill, and the husky one, standing by the safe, yawned. Sol Fry and G. Yates regarded each other with open antagonism. Austin glanced inquiringly at Phil Tingley and then at Tecumseh Fox.
“I’m not trying to buy the business,” Fox said reassuringly. He moved his eyes to embrace the group. “You folks probably have confidential matters to discuss, so if you’ll just let me put a question — Miss Yates, what is your opinion of the likelihood that it was Philip Tingley who put the quinine in?”
Phil made a noise, stared up at him, and muttered in a tone of contemptuous disgust, “For God’s sake.” Charles R. Austin looked startled, Sol Fry incredulous, and Miss Yates imperturbable.
“I really want to know,” Fox insisted mildly.
“Then ask me.” Phil was sarcastic. “Sure I put it in. I injected it into the jars with a hypodermic needle I invented that goes through glass.”
Fox ignored him. “May I have your opinion, Miss Yates?”
“I have no opinion.” She spoke to his eyes. “As I told you on Tuesday, and as I have told the police, the quinine could have been introduced in the mixing vats, or on the filling bench, or later in individual jars. If in the vats, it must have been done by Mr. Fry, by one of the forewomen, Carrie Murphy or Edna Schultz, or by me. If on the filling bench, by one or more of the fillers. Philip Tingley had no access to the vats or the bench. But as I told you, it could have been done in the packing room downstairs by dumping the contents from the jars, stirring in the quinine, and filling the jars again. That wouldn’t have been possible during working hours, but anyone with a key to either entrance of the building could have taken all night for it.”
“Does Philip Tingley have a key?”
Phil growled, “I had a duplicate made at Tiffany’s.” He upraised his hands. “Here, search me. All I have at this place is a name that doesn’t belong to me.”
“I don’t know,” said Miss Yates. “Philip is Mr. Tingley’s adopted son, and it wasn’t my business to inquire what he had or didn’t have, keys or anything else.”
“It seems to me,” Austin put in crisply, “that this inquiry, at this time and place, is impertinent and unnecessary. You are interrupting a meeting which, I may observe, is not open to the public—”
“I know I am.” Fox smiled at him. “I apologize. What I really came for, I have been wanting all day to discuss a matter with Mr. Philip Tingley.” His eyes moved to Phil. “It’s private and fairly urgent, so as soon as you’re through here—”
“I’m through now.” Phil got to his feet. “Why they ever dragged me into this is more than I know. Come on down to the packing room and I’ll show you how my needle works—”
“Philip!” Austin’s voice trembled with indignation. “I have tried to control myself, but your conduct and your tone, in this very room where your father was murdered less than forty-eight hours ago—”
“He wasn’t my father. You can go to hell.” Phil tramped from the room and on out.
Fox followed him. The rooms were all empty, as Fox had discovered when entering. Apparently an item of the Tingley tradition had dictated the shutting down of the factory and office on funeral day, since there had been no cessation of activity on Tuesday afternoon, with the Tingley blood barely congealed. From a chair in the anteroom Phil got his coat and hat, then turned and surveyed Fox with no amity in the gleam of his deep-set eyes.
“Would you mind telling me,” he inquired evenly, “the reason for the horseplay about my putting quinine in the damned titbits?”
“No particular reason. Just something to say.” Fox looked around. “I did, and do, want to ask you something. Since there seems to be no one here to overhear — unless you’d rather go somewhere else—”
“Oh, no, I’m at home here. I own all this, you know. About as much as you own the White House. Go ahead and ask.”
“I wondered if you’d care to tell me where you got the ten thousand dollars in cash that you contributed to Womon on Monday. Only three days ago.”
The effect was considerable, but was in fact somewhat less than Fox had expected. Phil did not blanch or tremble, or even completely lose countenance, but the surprise of it made his mouth sag open, and his self-assurance abruptly retreated from his eyes to some inner line of defense.
“Ten thousand dollars is a lot of money,” Fox declared. “I thought maybe someone gave it to you for injecting quinine into the jars with that needle you invented. That was really why I asked Miss Yates about it. I’m talking to give you a chance to collect yourself.”