“Yes, but—”
“If you please, Mr. Milner,” Wolfe said, turning over a hand. “Let me continue. The most expeditious way to get through the evening is by humoring me. First — did you kill Milan Stevens?”
Milner sighed and looked up. “I can’t begin to tell you how many times I’ve been asked that by the police,” he said in a tired voice. “Sometimes they phrased it as a question, other times they made it sound like an outright statement and dared me to contradict them. But my answer was always the same: No, I didn’t kill him. I couldn’t have; I probably respected him more than just about any man I’ve ever known.”
“I realize I’m trailing the herd, Mr. Milner, and I must of necessity trample some of the same grass it did. Your forbearance, please, if the questions are ones you’ve heard before.” Wolfe shifted again and reached for the buzzer to ring for beer before remembering that Fritz wasn’t in the kitchen. He scowled and went on. “It has been established that you were in the Stevens apartment the night of the murder. Why?”
Another sigh. “I suppose it doesn’t matter how often I tell it,” Milner said, “it still sounds strange. But here’s what happened: On Wednesday — my God, that’s just yesterday — a note in a sealed envelope was left for me in the musicians’ lounge at Symphony Hall after rehearsal. It was from Mr. Stevens, asking me to come to his apartment that night at eight-fifteen. The note said it was very important that I be there.”
“How did you know it was from Mr. Stevens?” Wolfe asked.
“The note was on his paper — one of those small sheets with ‘From the desk of Milan Stevens’ printed at the top.”
“Was it handwritten?”
“No, typed,” Milner said, running a hand through his already ruffled hair.
“I suppose the police have the note?”
“Nobody has it,” Milner said glumly. “I threw it away, I think right there in the lounge wastebasket.”
“Do you recall the wording?” Wolfe asked. “Be as precise as you can.”
Milner hunched his shoulders. “It was a short note — only a few sentences. It started with my name at the top, and then said something like ‘Please be at my apartment tonight at eight-fifteen. I have a matter of extreme importance to discuss with you.’ I think that was all.”
“Was the note signed?”
“No, his name was typed at the bottom. There was no writing on the sheet at all — I’m sure of that,” Milner said.
“Was Mr. Stevens in the habit of communicating with you this way?” Wolfe asked.
“No, that was the first note I ever got from him.”
“Didn’t you think it strange to receive such a message from your conductor?”
“Maybe a little,” Milner conceded, “but under the circumstances, there were... at least two reasons why he might have wanted to see me.”
“Go on,” Wolfe commanded.
“I haven’t seen much of Maria the last few days, so I don’t know whether she told you about...” He trailed off and looked glumly at Wolfe.
“About your asking Milan Stevens’s blessing to marry his niece?” Wolfe asked, finishing his sentence.
Milner nodded. “I thought he either wanted to talk to me about that or...” Again he halted, but this time he managed to find his tongue: “... maybe he was going to ask me to resign from the orchestra.”
“Indeed? Because you had asked for his niece’s hand, or because of your performance as a musician?”
Milner colored slightly. “I suppose you’d have to ask others about my ability, but I feel I’ve been doing well. I’m one of the newer members, though; this is only my second season with the Symphony.”
“And before that?”
“I was with the Indianapolis Symphony for four years; previously, I had taught music for two years, right after getting a graduate degree.”
“Mr. Milner, did you tell anyone you were going to Stevens’s apartment?”
“No, nobody. I live alone, and my family are all in the Midwest. I have no really close friends, so there would have been no one to tell except Maria, and I thought it best not to say anything at all to her about it.”
“I’d like to go back,” Wolfe said, “to the day you told Stevens you wanted to marry Miss Radovich. Can you recall precisely when that was?”
“The police asked the same question, and I had to think about it for a while; it was the day we were rehearsing Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony, which would have been three weeks ago yesterday.”
“As I understand it, his reaction was violent.”
“That’s putting it mildly, Mr. Wolfe,” Milner said, combing his hair with his fingers again. “I stopped him in the corridor that leads back to his dressing room which was a mistake. He was in a hurry to begin with, and became irritated when I asked if I could speak to him. But that was nothing compared to what followed.” Milner shifted in his chair and looked at Wolfe, who nodded his head an eighth of an inch.
“I blurted out right there in the hallway that Maria and I wanted to get married. He started shouting and telling me that under no circumstances would he allow his niece to become the wife of a musician, let alone one of what he called ‘my caliber.’ People who were walking by turned to stare at us. It was terrible.”
“Had Mr. Stevens criticized your work before?” Wolfe asked.
“No more than other members’. You must remember that he was very hard to please, and frequently became impatient with individuals or whole sections of the orchestra. But he had never indicated to me in any way that I wasn’t competent.”
“Did you respond to him after his tirade?”
“No, I was so taken aback I couldn’t think of anything to say. Besides, after he got done, he turned away and went straight to his dressing room. I just stood there feeling foolish and watching him.”
“How did he behave toward you after that?”
Milner bit his lip. “A few times in rehearsals lately — since that day in the hall — he’s made sarcastic comments about me, even though they weren’t called for. Things like ‘If we can have Mr. Milner’s attention, maybe we can continue now.’ Even though I was paying attention all the time. Others noticed it too. One of the other players stopped me in the hall after a rehearsal and asked, “What’s up? Why’s the Old Man got it in for you?’ The situation was getting very uncomfortable.”
“Had you ever encountered Mr. Stevens when you picked Miss Radovich up at their apartment?” Wolfe asked.
“Oh, no!” Milner said in a tone that suggested Wolfe had no understanding of the situation. “Until that day in the hall, he didn’t know we were seeing each other — Maria wanted it that way. I only went to the apartment to get her when he wasn’t there. Otherwise, we would just meet somewhere.”
“Knowing something about Stevens’s personality and his proprietary feeling about his niece, should you have been surprised at his reaction?” Wolfe asked.
Milner shrugged. “I suppose not; it was a stupid thing to do. I should have listened to Maria and let her break it to him, but I felt it was my responsibility.”
“Pride of the male,” Wolfe said. “Let us get to the fateful night. Am I correct that you didn’t call the Stevens apartment before going there?”
“No — that is, yes, I didn’t call. I stayed in Manhattan all day after rehearsals, rather than going home — I live out in Queens. Maria had rehearsals of her own, so we didn’t see each other, which was just as well. I was terribly nervous about that night, and I hardly had anything to eat for lunch or dinner.”
“I repeat an earlier question: Did you tell anyone where you were going?”
“No, nobody. The police asked me what I did all day, and I guess you want to know too. I stopped in several bookstores to browse. That usually takes my mind off my troubles, but it didn’t help, so I went up to Central Park and walked a lot and sat on benches. I tried to do some thinking, mostly about Maria and what I’d do if I lost my job with the orchestra. It was cold, but I hardly noticed it. I must have been in the park three hours or more.”