Rex Stout_Tecumseh Fox 01 (7 page)

“You can talk through the window, Mr. Kester. I like elbow room. Even though there’s no occasion to use my gun—not to mention the fact that there’s company in my car—”

“Who is it?”

“A man that works for me named Dan Pavey. That’s my affair. Think what Dick Barry
might
have said on the radio.”

A grunt came from Ridley Thorpe. “Does Dick Barry know?”

“No.”

“Who knows besides you?”

“Nobody. But don’t get silly notions. I carry the
gun from force of habit. Dan’s back there and if you try any tricks—”

“We have no intention of trying tricks. How did you know?”

“I didn’t. I played a probability.” Fox’s eyes were adjusted now for the darkness and he could see faces and hands. “Do you know Andrew Grant?”

“No. I’ve read the papers.”

“Of course. Grant said that he looked through the window of the bungalow at ten minutes past eleven and saw you smoking a cigar and listening to the radio play band music. Your son said that was impossible. The most obvious explanation was that Grant was lying, but I had reasons for putting that last. Among other explanations, the one I liked best was that it wasn’t you he saw. It presented difficulties, for instance that your son identified your remains, but I liked it anyway and went fishing with it. I’d call it—”

“I thought so,” came bitterly from Kester’s face at the window. “It was nothing but a bluff.”

“Quiet, Vaughn.” It was his master’s voice. “We didn’t dare risk it.”

“Correct, Mr. Thorpe,” Fox agreed. “If I hadn’t heard from you by noon tomorrow—today—your dentist would have been at White Plains examining teeth and in two minutes—”

“Yes. Just so. Certainly. And what are you—what do you intend to—”

“I’m going to inform the police. I have to, to clear Andrew Grant. Their chief ground of suspicion against him is that they think he’s lying about the radio.”

“You’ll tell the police about our phoning—about our meeting you here—”

“Certainly.”

“Why do you want to clear Grant?”

“I’m working for him. I don’t know whether you happen to know that I’m a private detective—”

“Oh, yes, yes indeed, I’ve heard of you.” Thorpe’s voice came smoothed with oil of compliment. “Of your private life too—your generous hospitality for unfortunate persons—yes, indeed—that seems to be a point of resemblance between us—not that my philanthropies have the charming personal touch that you—and by the way, that’s a coincidence, that only last week I made my annual contribution to the Society for Preserving the Culture of the American Indian—I’ve heard that you are part Indian—of course, your name—”

“I’m not.” Fox was curt. “My elder brother was named William McKinley Fox. I was named William Tecumseh Sherman Fox. Too many Williams. And I graduated from kindergarten, Mr. Thorpe. I am aware that you are an able, shrewd and ruthless manipulator. If the tears were running down your face I wouldn’t lend you my handkerchief. As for telling the police about this meeting—”

“You can’t do that,” said Thorpe with the oil gone.

“Well, I’ll try.”

“I say you can’t. You’ve got me hooked, I admit it. Your silence is worth fifty thousand dollars. Cash.”

Kester put in: “We’d have to have satisfactory—”

“Forget it,” Fox snapped. “Nothing doing.”

“How much do you want?”

“A billion. More than you’ve got, for that. Forget it.”

“Then why—what did you come here for?”

“To establish a fact—you, Kester, watch your
hand. What have you got in your pocket, the gun that shot a man in Thorpe’s bungalow? Don’t try—”

“Nonsense,” Kester said. “Chief, he’ll hang on for life. We should never—”

“Quiet,” said Thorpe testily. “Was there any alternative? Mr. Fox, do you mean that your purpose in—coming here to establish a fact was not to blackmail me?”

“That’s right. Thank you.”

“You’re not demanding money and you don’t intend to?”

“That’s right.”

Kester blurted: “Then why the devil—”

“Quiet, Vaughn—I repeat my offer of fifty thousand dollars, this time to do a job for me. Five thousand in advance and the remainder when the job is successfully completed. Do you want it?”

“Certainly I want it, but it depends on the job.”

“I’ll explain it. It will soon be daylight and day-light will be dangerous. The man who was killed last night—Sunday night—”

“Chief, don’t! You’re putting—”

“Vaughn, get in the front seat with Luke and be quiet. What have we accomplished in twenty-four hours? Nothing. The man who was killed in my bungalow was named Corey Arnold. He was my stand-in.”

Fox grunted. “Oh, you had a stand-in.”

“I did. Three years ago certain activities of mine which I wished to keep secret seemed in danger of being exposed. They were not illegal activities, but for personal reasons I did not care to have them known. I saw pictures in a magazine of the stand-ins of various motion picture actors and that gave me an idea. At the cost of a great deal of time and trouble,
on account of the necessary caution, I found a man who was very nearly my twin. I found others who resembled me, but I needed other qualities too, for instance trustworthiness; this one seemed to meet every requirement. I had already had that bungalow for some time. I arranged for Arnold, impersonating me, to go there weekends with my valet—you see I was thorough. It was a great inconvenience for me to be without Luke, but he had been going to that bungalow with me and so I had him continue to go with Arnold.”

“While you followed certain activities elsewhere?”

“Yes. There had been attempts—but that’s irrelevant. There seemed to be not the slightest chance of discovery. Arnold was well paid and was absolutely reliable. Luke was always there with him. No one except Kester was ever permitted to go there—never had been. When I had spent weekends there I had refused to talk on the telephone; all communications, if any were necessary, were through Kester. There appeared to be no chance whatever of its being known. And now this! Now the front page of every newspaper in America says that I’ve been murdered!”

“But you haven’t,” said Fox dryly. “You can prove that easy enough. Only what about the certain activities you were following?”

“That’s exactly it! They must not be known!”

“But if you suddenly appear and announce: ‘Here I am!’ a great many people, including a lot of newspapers and police who are investigating your murder, will want to know: ‘Where were you?’”

“Yes. They will.”

“They sure will. And I’m afraid you’ll have to tell, for under the peculiar circumstances—even though
you’re Ridley Thorpe—any explanation you give is going to be run through a meat grinder.”

Kester offered from the front seat: “My advice has been to refuse to give any explanation.”

Fox shook his head. “You might try it, but.” Enough dawn had sifted through the leaves so that he could easily have recognized all three faces from the pictures in the newspapers. “Very doubtful. The police are after a murderer. Not to mention such items as the angry clamor of the folks who have dumped Thorpe Control at 30 in the effort to keep a shirt, and the fact that you’ve waited a day and two nights to reveal yourself. If you were going to do that you should have done it immediately.”

“I advised it first thing—”

“Quiet, Vaughn! It wouldn’t have worked! Fox agrees that it wouldn’t have worked! Don’t you?”

“I do. If the police hadn’t traced you, the papers would. Now you’ll have to tell all about it.”

“I can’t do that.”

“I wouldn’t say ‘can’t.’ Like the woman on a horse who said: ‘I can’t get off.’ The horse reared and she fell off. So she was wrong. So are you.”

“No, I’m not wrong.” Thorpe was peering at him. “That’s the job I have for you. I want you to arrange an explanation for me that will stand investigation. I want an alibi that will stand up. Kester and Luke and I have been discussing it all day and got nowhere. We’re handicapped because none of us dares to make an appearance, even on the telephone. That’s the job I’ll pay you fifty thousand dollars for, and it has to be done in a hurry. I want it done before the stock market opens in the morning. Will you do it? Can you do it?”

“I’m working for Andrew Grant.”

“This won’t interfere. You said yourself that Grant will be clear as soon as I reappear.”

“But there will still be a murder. To arrange a false alibi—”

“Not for a murder. I had nothing to do with that. I was … nowhere near the bungalow.”

“That’s good. Where were you?”

“I was in the woods, walking. The pinewoods in New Jersey. I often do that, with a rucksack, alone, and sleep on the needles, under the stars, the summer nights—”

“Don’t waste it.” Fox sounded disgusted. “Where were you?”

“I tell you I was in the woods, walking—”

“No, no. That must be one of the explanations you and Kester invented and discarded; and it sounds like the poorest of the bunch. Don’t forget, Mr. Thorpe, that your activity was one which you were, and are, determined to keep secret. I have to know what it was and you have to satisfy me on it. Don’t waste time like that. Where were you?”

Silence, except for a faint noise the source of which was now visible in the unfolding light. It came from the suction of the gums of the colored man against his teeth as he nervously and monotonously worked his lips. Vaughn Kester’s lips, thin anyway, made a tight straight line as he sat twisted around in the front seat for a level gaze of his pale hostile eyes at Tecumseh Fox. Ridley Thorpe, disheveled and unornamental with a streak of dirt slanting across his unshaven cheek, ground his right palm against his left, as if with that mortar and pestle he expected to pulverize all obstacles.

Fox said impatiently: “You understand it has to be the truth. Depending on how it sounds, I’ll either accept
it for the time being or I won’t. I’ll check up on it as soon as I can, and if it’s phony I’ll turn it loose. I must be satisfied that I’m not establishing an alibi for a man who might be a murderer.”

Thorpe sputtered: “But I tell you—”

“Don’t do that. It will soon be sunup. Tell me where you were.”

“If I do that, Mr. Fox, I’ll be putting myself completely in your power—”

“No more than you are now.” Fox frowned at him. “Must I diagram it for you? I could trace you down. Any competent man could and a lot of them will, if they are given a suspicion to start on. That’s why you have to furnish an alibi that will exclude all suspicion, which is a big order to fill. It is also why I must have the truth and all of it or you can count me out.”

Thorpe gazed at him, and suddenly abandoned the mortar and pestle to make a gesture of decision. “Very well. Quiet, Vaughn. I never supposed—very well. I was in a cottage at Triangle Beach, New Jersey. I arrived there Friday evening and remained continuously. Shortly before midnight Sunday—I was in bed—the phone rang and it was Luke. He said someone had shot through the window and killed Arnold—”

“Did he phone from the bungalow?”

“No. Luke is no fool. He had left in the car and phoned from a booth in Mount Kisco without being observed. He asked what to do and I told him to come to the cottage. He arrived there around two o’clock; it’s over ninety miles. In the meantime Kester had phoned, having been notified of the murder at the Green Meadow Club. I told him also to come to the cottage and he got there about an hour after Luke did. We began a discussion of the situation and we’ve
been discussing it ever since. Luke and Kester are the only people on earth who know of that cottage. Except you. Now.”

“The only ones?”

“Yes.”

Fox shook his head. “It won’t do. It sets up the conclusion that you were alone there and that—”

“I didn’t say I was alone there. I was … I had a companion.”

“What’s her name?”

“I don’t think you need that.” Thorpe was scowling. “This is very embarrassing to me. Very. If my reputation with the American public which I have so scrupulously earned—if I have chosen to safeguard it by maintaining a decent privacy for certain activities which are natural and normal—”

“I’m not the American public, Mr. Thorpe, I’m only a man you want to hire to manufacture an alibi for you. If this lady felt like it, she could make both it and me look silly. What’s her name?”

“Her name … is Dorothy Duke.”

“How long have you known her?”

“Five years.”

“She used to spend weekends at the bungalow with you before you got your stand-in?”

“Yes.”

“How thoroughly do you trust her?”

“I trust no one alive thoroughly except Luke. I trust Kester because it is to his advantage to remain loyal to my interests. With Miss Duke other—ah—considerations are involved, but I rely on her discretion for the same reason that I rely on Kester’s loyalty. Quiet, Vaughn.”

“Is she at the cottage now?”

“No, she’s there only for weekends. She returned
to her New York apartment. I instructed her to stay there in case it was necessary to communicate.”

“Do you ever call at her apartment?”

“Never. I never see her in New York.”

“What’s the address of the cottage at Triangle Beach?”

“It hasn’t any. It’s remote, two miles south of the village, with five hundred yards of private water front. Its name is Sweet Wilderness. My name there is George Byron.”

Fox rubbed his nose to camouflage a grimace. “Where’s the car Luke drove there?”

“In the pinewoods back of the cottage. My property.”

“That’s bad.”

“We had to leave it somewhere.”

“You should—never mind. Where’s the one Kester drove?”

“This is it.”

“What about servants at the cottage?”

“A local woman cleaned during the week. There was no one there weekends. Miss Duke did the cooking. There’s nothing to fear there.” Thorpe pointed. “What’s that—that pink—”

“That’s the sun. Or it soon will be. I’m willing to have a try at your job, Mr. Thorpe, but I’m afraid it’s impossible. I’m afraid the American public is destined to see the name of that cottage in big type. Sweet Wilderness. The requirements are too drastic. It has to be plausible enough to allay suspicion. We can’t say you were alone, anywhere at all, from Friday evening until now; they wouldn’t swallow it. We must have corroboration. So we must find a man who will fill this bill: