There it was.
Dr. Fulvio Castorizo, Italy
Dr. John Sloughby Cavell, Great Britain
Dr. Edward Cazalis, United States
Of course he’d be listed.
And that old man? Had he been present?
Ellery turned the page.
Dr. Walther Schoenzweig, Germany
Dr. Andrés Selborán, Spain
Dr. Béla Seligmann, Austria
Someone tapped Ellery on the shoulder.
“Closing time, sir.”
The room was empty.
Why hadn’t they caught it?
He trudged into the hall. A guard directed him to the staircase when he made the wrong turn.
The District Attorney knows his business. His office is topnotch. They’re old hands.
He supposed they had backtracked from Katz, Donald, to Petrucchi, Stella, past Richardson, Lenore, to Willikins, Beatrice, the way growing fainter as they retreated in time until, at the five-months-ago mark, it had disappeared to become impassable. But that wouldn’t have stopped them. They probably had one or two or even three others they hadn’t been able to fix. It would actually not seem necessary to fix each one. Not in so many murders. Not over such a long period in such a peculiar case where the identity of the victim was a detail hardly meriting notice. Six, say, would do the District Attorney nicely. Plus the caught-in-the-act attempt on Celeste-Phillips-thinking-she-was-Marilyn-Soames and the minute-to-minute evidence of his Soames stalk in the days preceding the attempt.
Ellery walked uncertainly up Fifth Avenue. The weather had turned very cold and the slush had frozen in serrated little icehills of dirty gray, rutted and pocked, a relief map of nowhere on which he teetered along.
This will have to be done from home... I’ve got to have a place where I can sit and feel safe.
When the ax falls.
Executions brought to your door.
At no extra charge.
He stopped at a shop window through which a faceless angel with a needlethin torch was trying to fly, and he looked at his watch.
In Vienna it’s the middle of the night.
Then I can’t go home.
Not yet.
Not till it’s time.
He drew back from the thought of facing his father like a turtle rapped on the nose.
Ellery let himself in at a quarter of 4 in the morning.
On the tips of his toes.
The apartment was dark except for a night light in the majolica lamp on the living room table.
He felt refrigerated. The mercury had dropped to five above in the streets and the apartment was only a little less icy.
His father was snoring. Ellery went to the bedroom door and shut it, thievishly.
Then he stole into his study and turned the key. He did not remove his overcoat. Switching on the desk light, he sat down and drew the telephone to him.
He dialed the operator and asked for the Overseas Operator.
There were difficulties.
It was almost 6 o’clock. The steam had just begun to rattle the radiators and he kept his eye apprehensively on the door.
The Inspector was a 6 o’clock riser.
Finally, he got through.
Ellery prayed that his father oversleep as he waited for the Vienna operator to settle matters at her end.
“Here is your party, sir.”
“Professor Seligmann?”
“Ja?”
It was an old, old voice. Its bass cracked and a little peevish.
“My name is Ellery Queen,” said Ellery in German. “You do not know me, Herr Professor—”
“Incorrect,” said the aged voice in English, Oxonian English with a Viennese accent. “You are an author of romans policiers, and out of guilt feelings for the many crimes you commit on paper you also pursue malefactors in life. You may speak English, Mr. Queen. What do you want?”
“I hope I haven’t caught you at an inopportune moment—”
“At my age, Mr. Queen, all moments are inopportune except those devoted to speculations about the nature of God. Yes?”
“Professor Seligmann, I believe you are acquainted with the American psychiatrist, Edward Cazalis.”
“Cazalis? He was my pupil. Yes?” There was nothing in the voice, nothing at all.
Is it possible he doesn’t know?
“Have you seen Dr. Cazalis in recent years?”
“I saw him in Zürich earlier this year. Why do you ask?”
“On which occasion, Herr Professor?”
“At an international convention of psychoanalysis. But you do not tell me why, mein Herr.”
“You don’t know the trouble Dr. Cazalis is in?”
“Trouble? No. What is this trouble?”
“I can’t explain now, Professor Seligmann. But it’s of the greatest importance that you give me exact information.”
The line wheezed and keened and for a moment Ellery thought: Let us pray.
But it was only the mysterious defects of the transoceanic process coming up through Professor Seligmann’s silence.
He heard the old voice again.
Growling this time.
“Are you Cazalis’s friend?”
Am I?
“Yes, I’m Cazalis’s friend,” said Ellery.
“You hesitate. I do not like this.”
“I hesitated, Professor Seligmann,” said Ellery carefully, “because friendship is a word I weigh.”
He thought he had lost, but there was a faint chuckle in his ear and the old man said: “I attended the last few days of the Zürich meeting. Cazalis was present, I heard him read his paper on the night of the last session and I kept him up until long past dawn afterward in my hotel room telling him how absurd I thought it was. Are you answered, Mr. Queen?”
“You have an excellent memory, Herr Professor.”
“You question it.”
“Forgive me.”
“I am reversing the usual process of senescence. My memory is apparently the last to go.” The old voice sharpened. “You may rely on the accuracy of the information.”
“Professor Seligmann—”
There was a word, but it was swallowed up by such a howl of atmospheric expletive that Ellery snatched the receiver from his ear.
“Herr Professor Seligmann?”
“Yes. Yes. Are you—?” But then he faded, bolting into space.
Ellery cursed. Suddenly the line was clear.
“Herr Queen! Yes?”
“I must see you, Professor Seligmann.”
“About Cazalis?”
“About Cazalis. If I fly to Vienna at once, will you see me?”
“You would be coming to Europe for this alone?”
“Yes.”
“Come.”
“Danke schön. Auf Wiedersehen.”
But the old man had already broken the connection.
Ellery hung up.
He’s so damned old. I hope he lasts.
His European flight was a bother from beginning to end. There was trouble about his visa, long talks with the State Department, much questioning and headshaking and form-filling. And passage seemed an impossibility; everyone was flying to Europe, and everyone who flew was a person of terrestrial importance. Ellery began to realize what a very small tuber he was in the vast potato patch of world affairs.
He spent Christmas in New York after all.
The Inspector was magnificent. Not once in those days of pacing did he question the purpose of Ellery’s trip. They merely discussed ways and means and the impediments.