He swerved abruptly into a cigar store, sought the phone booth and called the MBC studios, and after an inquiry and a short wait heard Diego’s bass rumble in his ear.
“Diego? Tec Fox.”
“Oh. Hello. How are you?”
“I’m fine. Will you have lunch with me?”
“Uh— I’m sorry. Uh— an engagement.”
“Then later, five o’clock, whenever you say, for a drink? And have dinner with me?”
“What do you want?”
“I want to talk with you.”
“About that... thing?”
“Yes. That and other—”
“No.” Diego was curt. “I won’t talk about it, now or any other time. That’s definite and final.”
“But Diego. I don’t think you realize—”
The line was dead.
Fox stared at the soundless receiver in amazed disbelief. Diego the courteous Spaniard, Diego of the quaint and engaging punctilio, had hung up on him! He could almost as soon have believed him capable of putting poison in a man’s whisky... With slow reluctance he replaced the phone, sat there a moment frowning thoughtfully at it, arose abruptly with an air of decision, strode out to the sidewalk, and turned west at the next corner toward Madison Avenue.
On Madison he went half a block downtown, entered the somewhat gaudy lobby of an apartment hotel, crossed to the elevator and stepped within, met the inquiring glance of the operator and told him casually, “Ninth, please.” But it was not as simple as that. The operator asked him politely but pointedly whom he was calling on; and it turned out that his attempt to cut a corner had been unnecessary, for when the young man at the desk phoned Miss Tusar’s apartment that Mr. Fox was calling he was instructed to send him up. Unobtrusively Fox was observing faces, knowing that all members of the staff from the manager down, questioned by the police regarding Miss Tusar, had displayed either a loyal reticence regarding their tenant’s habits and movements and friends, or a surprising ignorance of them.
Similarly he observed the square and stolid countenance of the uniformed maid who admitted him to Suite D on the ninth floor. Her name and address — Frida Jurgens, 909 East 83rd Street — was in a notebook in his pocket, one of several procured the day before from Inspector Damon; and one glimpse of her obdurate geometrical visage was enough to explain the meagerness of her contribution to the dossier. With efficiency, if with no grace, she disposed of Fox’s hat and coat and conducted him within.
Garda, advancing to meet Fox, greeted him with an extended hand, a half smile confined to a corner of her mouth, and the full direct regard of her black eyes, with now no blaze in them.
“It took you a long time to get around to it,” she said with pretended petulance. “That’s a better chair there. You remember you told Mrs. Pomfret you’d try to persuade me to be reasonable? That was more than a week ago.” Sitting, she shivered delicately. “It seems a year. Doesn’t it?”
Fox, taking the recommended chair, said that it did. So she was going to be amiable and charming, which she could do without straining at it. The chair was in fact comfortable, the room was not too hot and had air in it, the décor was tasteful and restrained...
“I don’t know,” Fox said, “about persuading you to be reasonable, but I’d like to persuade you to be frank. Henry Pomfret’s Wan Li vase is back home again.”
A flicker of her lids veiled the black eyes for an instant, then he had them back. “His vase? You mean the one that was stolen?”
“Yep, that one.”
“It’s back home? You mean he got it back? How nice!” She was effusive. “Where did you find it?”
“Thanks for the compliment.” Fox smiled at her. “Undeserved. Mr. Koch returned it to him this morning.”
“What!” Garda looked blank. “Koch! — How did he... my God, Koch? He stole it? He had it all the time?”
“Not according to him,” Fox said dryly. “He got it the way Mrs. Pomfret got the violin back — it came by parcel post. This morning. He spent an hour or so admiring it and then delivered it to its owner. Pomfret is delighted.”
“And Koch doesn’t know who sent it to him?”
“Nope.”
“And no one — then they’ve got it back but they don’t know who took it.”
“That’s right. They don’t. But I think I do. I think you took it.”
Garda’s eyes opened at him. The blaze was there for a fleeting second, then she burst into laughter. It was not an affected ripple or a forced haw-haw, but a real and hearty laugh. She checked it, leaned forward and pursed her lips prettily at Fox, and coaxed him in mock entreaty:
“Tell me another one! Oh, please!”
Fox shook his head. “That’s the only one I know, Miss Tusar. I’d like to enlarge on it. May I?”
“You may if you’ll keep it funny.” Garda had sobered. “That’s the first time I’ve laughed since — for a long time.”
“I doubt if you’ll find it funny. It’s complicated, too. It begins with a question the police have been trying to answer, where your income comes from. Inspector Damon says that you spend more than ten thousand a year, probably a good deal more, that its source is not visible, and that you decline to reveal it.”
“Why should I? It’s none of their business. Nor yours.”
“That may be true. But that’s the trouble with a criminal investigation: it tries every hole in sight until it finds the one its rabbit is in, and that’s often a serious inconvenience to innocent bystanders. I suppose you know that the police have tested the theory that you are being financed by some person— uh—”
“Don’t spare my sensibilities,” Garda snapped. “Of course I know it. They’ve even tried to bully my maid.”
“Sure. What do you expect? You’re one of the central figures in a murder case, and you’re concealing something. They conclude, since you won’t tell the source of your income, that it must be either criminal or disgraceful, or both. The theory I spoke of — they haven’t been able to get evidence of that, so they’re trying another one. That you’re blackmailing someone.”
“They!..” Garda’s eyes flashed. “They wouldn’t dare!”
Fox nodded imperturbably. “That’s what they’re working on now. I doubt if they’ll get anywhere. My own theory is that you’re a bandit. I think you stole Pomfret’s vase.”
“That was funny the first time—”
“I didn’t mean it to be. Please. Just let me sketch it. You are beautiful and clever, probably unscrupulous, and have entrée to places where there are all kinds of small and portable objects of considerable value. It would be no trick at all for you to realize considerably more than ten thousand a year. You took that vase of Pomfret’s, knowing it was worth a lot of money, but had to hang onto it because you found it was impossible to dispose of it safely. Please, Miss Tusar, you might as well let me finish. Diego, who loved you and had been intimate with you, knew how you — made money. He suspected, or even knew, that you had taken the vase, charged you with it, and compelled you to turn it over to him. He may have threatened to expose you, but if he did it was only a bluff, for Diego is too much of a gentleman to expose a lady bandit. Doubtless his intention was to return it to Pomfret, but being a simple soul, wholly devoid of the resources of an intriguer—”
“That’s enough!” Garda’s eyes were snapping. “To expect me to sit and listen to a rigmarole of lies—”
“Not all lies, Miss Tusar. It isn’t a lie that Diego had the vase. I saw it there at his place.”
Garda’s lips parted, and Fox could hear the breath going in. There was no fire in her eyes; instead, they withdrew; the lids half closed, and the slits were dull dead-black. “I don’t—” she began, and stopped.