“Quaint,” I agreed. “Go on.”
“Righto. Now, Gunnar Borgman was a very simple man. I believe you Americans might describe him as a ‘patsy.’ A ‘patsy’ waiting to be plucked.”
“You’re snarling your similes, or mucking up your metaphors, or something,” I observed.
“I beg you pardon?”
“Never mind. Sorry I interrupted. Get back to the story.”
“All rght.” Tarleton shrugged and resumed his tale. “Now, Borgman went to Las Vegas for a spree to celebrate his good fortune. He went on a real bender. Uh— bender? Is that all right?”
“Very graphic.”
“Good. I shouldn’t want the idiom to offend.”
“I’m not offended. But I am getting icicles on my cuticles. Will you please get to the point?”
“I am getting to the point.” Tarleton’s tone said he found my manners lacking. “In any case, Borgman imbibed too much one evening and awoke in the morning to find himself married. His bride was one Brigitte Kelly, a girl fresh from Dublin who had taken employment in the hotel where Borgman was staying. Now, this Brigitte Kelly was no better than she should have been--"
“To coin a phrase,” I couldn’t help murmuring.
Tarleton ignored me and continued. “From what we have been able to learn about her, she was a prostitute in Dublin and had wangled her way to the United States as the mistress of a visiting tourist. She left him—or perhaps it was the other way around—when the boat docked in New York, and hopped from one bed to another until she reached Las Vegas. Here it was all in a night‘s work for her to sleep with Borgman. However, when she learned that he had struck it rich, she took advantage of the opportunity and got him to marry her when he was too drunk to know What he was doing.”
“The evils of drink.” I punctuated the sarcasm with a yawn, hoping that might hurry him up.
But Tarleton was the methodical kind of bloke who refuses to be hurried. He simply kept going at the same measured pace. “Now, the peculiar thing was that once he’d married Brigitte, Borgman proceeded to actually fall in love with her. He built her a house not far from the Gopher Hole, ordered clothes for her from Paris, jewels from Cartier, everything her larcenous little heart might desire. He never gave the expense involved a second thought until one day, about a year after they were married, the Gopher Hole ran dry. The vein of gold just plain ran out. And Brigitte ran out on Borgman just as suddenly.”
“The course of true love . . .” I sighed mockingly.
“Exactly. With the creditors closing in on Borgman, Brigitte packed up her jewels and furs, wrote out a check for what was in their joint bank account, gathered up what spare cash there was around the house, and left without even bothering to say good-bye. As far as Borgrnan was concerned, his bride might as well have been swallowed up by the earth. But he probably didn’t have too much time to dwell on her perfidy. By the time his creditors got through with him, all he had left was the deed to the Gopher Hole, which was then worthless. What with one thing and another, it took him less than five years to drinks himself to death. But what does one man’s death mean, Mr. Victor? Life, after all, goes on. And life is a series of ironies.”
“Spare me the philosophy,” I shivered.
“If you insist. But the irony is inescapable. Some two years ago a surveying team for the United States government took soil samples from the Gopher Hole and had them assayed. No, there was no gold. But there was uranium! The Gopher Hole was rich in uranium. And it made of Gunnar Borgman a far wealthier man dead than he had ever been alive.”
“And I suppose Brigitte Kelly is his heir,” I prompted him.
“His sole heir,” Tarleton amended. “Borgman died intestate. Do you know what that means, Mr. Victor?”
“Without leaving a will.”
“Exactly. And Bergman had no family. Plus the fact that neither he nor Brigitte had ever bothered about a divorce. So she was still his legal wife at the time of his death, and his sole heir. Now, the management of the Borgman estate was turned over to a Nevada bank. This bank hired a detective agency to trace down Brigitte Kelly. They learned that after leaving Borgman she had come for a time to New York. After that, she had gone to London. She settled there. And with the proceeds of her marriage to Borgman, she opened one of the fanciest bordellos which Piccadilly has ever seen.”
“Well, call her Madam,” I interjected.
“Quite accurate. Well, at this point, the American detective agency hired Dombey of Dover to contact Brigitte Kelly. But that was not so easily done.”
“Why not?” Patiently, I played straight man for him.
“Because she was dead. Approximately one year ago she was murdered under what may best be described as very mysterious circumstances.”
“You certainly have a way with words, Albert,” I told him.
“Thank you.” It went over his head. “Now, things really get complicated. But first, you should appreciate the fact that Dombey of Dover has a wealth of background and experience and is quite astute when it comes to coping with the most complicated estates. Thus it was only natural that we should make an arrangement with the deceased Miss-— or Madame, if you prefer—Kelly’s solicitors to handle her bequests."
“Without telling those solicitors anything about the fact that she owned a uranium mine,” I guessed.
“That’s right.” Tarleton smiled smugly. “It would have been vulgar for a firm of our stature to discuss the matter in terms of monetary amounts. Therefore an arrangement was made on a percentage basis.”
“And just what percentage did you agree to take?" I asked.
“The customary thirty-three and a third."
“And how much did you say the Gopher Hole was worth?”
“I didn’t say,” Tarleton reminded me.
“Well, I hate to be vulgar, but suppose you do say?”
He thought about it a moment. “Very well. If you are going to work with us, I suppose you shall have to know. The approximate worth of the estate is four and a half million dollars."
“Wow!” I whistled. “And that means your cut is about a million and a half.”
“More or less. Providing we are successful in locating the legitimate heirs, that is. And that’s where you come in.”
"Not just yet I don’t.” I held up a hand. “Let’s go slow here for a minute. Whatever it is that you want me to do, just how much of this million and a half is Dombey of Dover willing to part with for my services?”
“I told you, Mr. Victor. We never discuss amounts of money. Our arrangements are only in percentages.”
“All right. Then what percentage?"
“Two percent of our fee.”
I did some rapid calculating. That came to $30,000!
“Plus expenses, of course,” Tarleton added. “Are you interested, Mr. Victor?"
It was an effort not to lick my lips. I made the effort. “Yes. I’m interested,” I told him as coolly as I could manage.
“I thought you might be. Now, let us get back to Brigitte Kelly. As I said. she was murdered under very mysterious circumstances. Her nude body was found in the bedroom of her bordello. The only door to the room was locked from the inside. So was the room’s only window. She had been stabbed to death with a dagger.”
“Shades of Agatha Christie,” I mused. “What about suicide?" I added as an afterthought.
“Not likely,” Tarleton told me tartly. “The dagger wound was in the middle of her back.”