Death and Letters Read online

  “Shoot them right over, Geegan; it’s not far.” He gave the address. “His office is Eleven G. I’ll be in there with him for a while, and I hope to get out before he does; if not I’ll be with him, of course. The name’s William Cole Venner, he’s some kind of wholesale antique dealer, and I can’t find his home address.”

  “They’ll find it.”

  “I don’t know whether the place has a back entrance.”

  “They’ll find that out too.”

  “All I know is that he’s about forty and supposed to be good-looking. If I don’t have a chance to talk to your men, tell them to stick to him wherever he goes or whatever he does, even if he takes a train. They can report to me until after lunch, and then perhaps they’d better report to you and I’ll call you.”

  “Fine. I get it.”

  “The whole thing may be a false alarm; if so, I’ll try to let them know it. How on earth, Geegan, are they going to know me? I’m wearing a grey suit—”

  “Don’t worry,” said Geegan, laughing, “they’ll know you. I had some experience describing people.”

  “Shoot them over, then.”

  Gamadge went back to the elevators, stepped into another empty one, and was carried to the eleventh floor. He emerged into a cross-corridor, turned a corner, and walked between half-glass doors until he came to one marked G. A small gold inscription in the lower left-hand corner said: William Cole Venner. Walk in.

  Gamadge walked in, directly into a room with big windows. There was thick carpet underfoot, heavy furniture—every piece declaring itself authentic to the most casual eye—and a row of big cabinets containing Sèvres and Saxe—more as decoration, probably, than advertisement of Mr. Venner’s wares. A man sat at a desk under the nearest window—it was a handsome kneehole desk, big and solid like the other furniture. Mr. Venner dealt in no gimcracks.

  The man looked up, rose, and came forward. He was as tall as Gamadge, a little heavier in build but not much; he wore dark London-made clothes and showed them off. He had light-brown hair, light-grey eyes, a long face with a squared chin, handsome features and a reddish, weathered skin. Deep lines ran from nose to mouth, aging him. He looked experienced, competent, tired, and rather dejected.

  He asked: “What can I do for you?” in a pleasant but uninterested voice.

  “I understand,” said Gamadge, “that you buy things.”

  Venner looked a little surprised. “Well, yes, that’s my trade,” he said, politely taking Gamadge in. “I’m always interested in estates and libraries.”

  “You wouldn’t be interested in mine, I’m afraid.”

  “If I come across something important I sometimes do a deal in the retail way,” said Venner, “but very seldom now.”

  “As a matter of fact,” said Gamadge, “what I had in mind was a swap.”

  Venner, more and more surprised, studied him. At last he said: “I never did go in much for that kind of thing.”

  “Too much haggling connected with it? There wouldn’t be in this case. One price,” said Gamadge.

  They were facing each other, their eyes on a level. Venner had his hands in his pockets, and he was rocking gently back and forth on toes and heels. “What did you have in mind?” he asked, not without curiosity.

  “I didn’t bring the thing with me, of course,” answered Gamadge, “but I can describe it in a way to satisfy you or anybody. It’s a square envelope, bluish-white with just a hint of lilac. It has a red Victorian stamp on it, it’s postmarked Shale, Somerset, 1875, and it’s addressed to Mrs. Deane Coldfield, The Maples, Cliffside.”

  Venner had stopped rocking. Motionless, his lower lip caught under his teeth, he was looking at Gamadge without expression. An interval passed before he spoke:

  “I wouldn’t have believed it. I wouldn’t, really.”

  “It must seem very strange,” said Gamadge. “I ought to explain at once that there’s no money involved in the deal.”

  “That makes me feel better, of course,” said Venner, in the same flat voice. “What am I supposed to offer you in exchange for this object, then? I’m afraid I couldn’t undertake—”

  “I don’t want you to sell any stolen goods for me,” said Gamadge. “I only want the name of your principal.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEENNo Deal

  VENNER DIDN’T MOVE or turn his eyes away; but after a short pause he suddenly took a hand out of a pocket; there was a cigarette case in his fingers. He opened it, took out a cigarette, felt in the pocket for a lighter, and bent his head to get a light. When the cigarette was going, he asked casually: “May I ask a question? It’s legitimate when there’s something of this kind offered for sale. Where did the envelope come from?”

  “We know where it came from originally,” said Gamadge. “From the rosewood box in the Coldfield attic. You’ll be rather disgusted, I’m afraid—it seems to have been overlooked when the letters were taken.”

  Venner, his eyes on his cigarette and a faint smile deepening the creases beside his mouth, slowly and slightly moved his head from left to right.

  “Where the other envelopes may be,” continued Gamadge, “I don’t know.”

  “I don’t myself.”

  “So it’s all I have to offer.”

  Venner put his head back to blow smoke. He said, his eyes on the cigarette once more, “Well, I’m afraid it’s no deal.”

  “Don’t be hasty. I should like to—”

  “I’m not much interested. The fact of your coming here with this proposition means of course that you can’t stir a step in any direction without my help. Well, that isn’t at your disposal.”

  Gamadge said: “That’s the proper first answer, of course. Let me try to make the bargain more acceptable to you. There is no threat implied.”

  “No? It isn’t blackmail?” Venner smiled, more broadly.

  “I shouldn’t call it that. I know very well, Mr. Venner, that this wasn’t a commonplace theft—that it was a family affair. I know it wouldn’t be publicized, and that you’re protected too. You must have felt very safe to take on such a thing. Perhaps you still are; I’m not trying to fix blame in the matter, it isn’t directly important to me.”

  “No?”

  “Not at all. I want the name of your principal for a different reason.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Are you sure you can’t guess it?”

  Venner looked him in the eye again. “Can’t imagine.”

  “I’m inclined to believe that you never thought of it before; perhaps now you may. However, my position is this: the name of your principal will save me from the trouble of using that envelope to get the information elsewhere. I must get it, and if I have to use this evidence, of course I will. If I use it there will be an explosion, and you will probably be the first casualty.”

  “That’s neat,” said Venner admiringly.

  “It’s the situation. There’s no trick about it—give me the name, and you get the envelope. It will be of no more use to me. I got it by accident, and I arrived at you as the agent by a clear process of reasoning.”

  Venner was rocking gently back and forth again, and he was still smiling. “You’re not a blackmailer,” he said, “but I’m still a fence—member of the criminal classes. We’re notoriously suspicious. I get that envelope; what makes me think that you haven’t photostatic copies of the incriminating object?”

  “You don’t seem logical, Mr. Venner. All I want is one piece of information, not more and more information. The envelope tells me nothing useful in itself.”

  “Sure enough.” Venner turned on his heel, walked away to the farthest window, and stood there with his hand gripping the old faded brocade of the curtain: looking out at nothing. He swung round suddenly, and he gave an impression of a man elated. He came back to Gamadge, walking confidently, a brightness in his eyes. Gamadge watched him, frowning a little.

  “I want twenty-four hours,” said Venner.

  “No. I must have the information by lunchtime to
day.”

  Venner looked at his watch. “That’s putting the screws on. One o’clock? Less than three hours?” He turned his head away, seeming to calculate. “Can’t be done under three hours, and that’s final. And what do I do when I come to a decision? Leave a note for you in a hollow tree in the park?”

  Gamadge took out his wallet and gave Venner a card: “No, you call me up.”

  Venner read the card, raised his eyebrows, and smiled. “I’m afraid I never heard of you. Is this supposed to convince me that I’ll get the envelope in the mail?”

  “Or you can call for it.”

  Venner burst out laughing. “I’ll trust the mails.”

  Gamadge said abruptly: “Mr. Venner, may I advise you?”

  “What else have you been doing?” The feverish gaiety was still in Venner’s eyes.

  “Don’t consult your principal.”

  “What?” Venner stared. “You must be out of your mind to think I’d do such a thing. Isn’t it the last thing I would do? I’m depending on you to cover up for me—isn’t that the pact?”

  “Then why the three hours?”

  “Surely I ought to be allowed until half past one to wrestle with my conscience.”

  “Mr. Venner,” said Gamadge, “let me earnestly beg you not to try a squeeze play.”

  “Squeeze play! I’m not a blackmailer either, you know,” said Venner, laughing. “I stick to my own line of business.”

  “Your principal is tougher than you think; let me warn you.”

  “My principal and I will probably tell you to take your evidence and go to the devil with it.” Venner was more and more amused. “You won’t get far without us.”

  “Are you the only person who knows that name?”

  Venner paused, looked at Gamadge with knitted brows, and then went off into shouts of laughter. Gamadge left him to it.

  As he went out of the foyer through the revolving door, he was immediately aware of the good-looking, dark young man, well-dressed and slender, who stood just outside the entrance, smoking. The dark young man glanced at him, and then walked away from him into the next vestibule. Gamadge followed.

  “Was it the party?”

  “It was, Mr. Bardo—or is it Mr. Shaff?”

  “Old Shaffsky’s sitting in the car; got a place to park just around the corner, there isn’t much parking just here of a Saturday. If the party comes out, duck into the store behind us and buy yourself a pair of socks.”

  “You can’t miss him. He’s about my height, medium coloring, out-door complexion, long squared-off face, lines from nose to chin. He’s been around, and he’s an educated man.” Gamadge added: “Good clothes, so inconspicuous I hardly noticed them—a dark mixture, brown and something.”

  Bardo’s glance at Gamadge was tolerant. He said: “I won’t miss him.”

  “Have you plenty of money on you? I don’t know whether I made Geegan understand—”

  “Plenty. If he took a plane we’d have to wire ahead anyway.”

  “For God’s sake don’t lose him. I hired you to tail him, but now you’re his bodyguard too.”

  “That so?” Bardo, watching the exit next door, received this news without visible surprise. “You don’t want anything to happen to him?”

  “I warned him myself, but he thinks he knows better.”

  Bardo glanced at him again. “You did?”

  “Yes, but never mind that. Just hang on to him.”

  “Leave it to us. Anybody bothers him, Shaff and I we both carry our guns. Scares people,” said Bardo.

  Gamadge peered out into the street, emerged from his niche, and walked down to the corner. Rounding it, he saw a stocky light-haired young man at the wheel of a small blue car. Shaff gave him a brief smile, and raised one finger in salutation from the wheel.

  Gamadge walked uptown to his garage, got his car out, and drove it home. He went through his office into the laboratory, hunted about there in files and cabinets until he found a leather case, sat down and opened it.

  It was a legacy from Harold Bantz, when that all-around craftsman had retired into research chemistry and family life. Harold had demonstrated the use of the little implements within it, and Gamadge began to practise with them on the older type of lock in the laboratory and the office. He went upstairs and pursued his attempts there, ending with a successful attack on Miss Mullins’s ancient steamer trunk. It bore some foreign labels, which Gamadge was sure she cleaned and varnished whenever they showed signs of wear.

  He locked the trunk, looked around for other fields of conquest, passed over Miss Mullins’s nice new suitcase, and went back downstairs.

  Clara telephoned. Did Theodore understand that Gamadge was to have a nice lunch alone, since the latter wouldn’t join the party at the Guildford?

  Theodore did.

  “Bob Macloud is here already, Henry, and they’re having a wonderful time. I never in my life heard him laugh as much as he did when Sylvia told him about the rescue.”

  “He should have been with us.”

  “He takes it very seriously, Henry. He’s dying to sue them for false arrest or something. Locking her up. We had to convince him that it was all over and done with; that part of it. Henry…”

  “Yes.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “At the moment?”

  “No. About the rest of it.”

  “I don’t quite know. I’m waiting for some information. I’m afraid I won’t get it.”

  “Then what?”

  “I’ll take a little ride.”

  “Henry—”

  “Forget it and have a good time.”

  “I’m terribly worried about your wanting to go and eat peanuts in the park.”

  “It only meant I didn’t think I was going to enjoy my afternoon. Don’t worry about me. Tell Mrs. Coldfield to remember what I said on Thursday night—about people tripping themselves up.”

  “I only hope they will.”

  “Signs point to it.”

  Gamadge had the nice lunch, and soon afterwards the telephone rang. He answered it in the library.

  “You’re punctual, Mr. Venner,” said Gamadge.

  “That’s my reputation.”

  “And you sound happier than you ought to be.”

  “Quite happy. My answer is, publish and be damned. You know who said that?”

  “The Duke of Wellington; to a blackmailer.”

  “I’m not surprised that you know; I’ve been looking you up. You’re working for one of the others, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t much think you’ll explode any bombs, Mr. Gamadge. Too difficult in the circumstances to fix the blame. I might be working for any of them, you know. Well, it was a good try.”

  “You’ve made it harder for me, of course. ‘If I was to deny it, what would it avail me?’ Who said that, Mr. Venner?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Poker.”

  “Poker?”

  “A young man of the name of Poker; a character who never got into the book that was never finished. A detective story.”

  “Well—what of it?”

  “Dickens had to abandon him and try something else.”

  “Oh. Well, I’m afraid this mystery won’t get finished either. I don’t much care.”

  “Mr. Venner, let me warn you again. Don’t let your principal take you for a ride, or make coffee for you in the solitude of the home, or push you out of a window. Beware of precipices, disguised blunt instruments and electrified bath water.”

  Venner laughed. “I’ll be careful.”

  “Mr. Venner, I’m sorry to say it, you’re a fool.”

  Gamadge had hardly replaced the receiver when the telephone rang again: “Mr. Gamadge? Bardo.”

  “Glad to hear from you.”

  “We didn’t have any trouble with him at all. He came out and walked a couple of blocks over and got into his car—nice new one, Cadillac, all shiny.”

  “That c
ould get away from you.”

  “If he was trying to get away. He won’t see the necessity. He drove home—lives in the Francisco, nice old apartment hotel on Central Park West. He came out again a little before one—drove to Delorme’s.”

  “He has good taste in restaurants.”

  “And money in his pockets. He waited in the lobby a few minutes, and along comes his date; good-looking dame, but middle-aged and filling out a little. Lots of make-up, touched-up hair, kind of a gold-brown. She has gland trouble—eyes beginning to bulge, throat thickening up. If I was her I’d watch it.”

  “You don’t touch up your photographs, Bardo.”

  “Recognize her?”

  “Yes,” said Gamadge, “I’m afraid I do.”

  “She likes him, all right. She’s a good dresser; fur jacket, little fancy hat that cost something, gold ball earrings. He had a table engaged. They sat right down to lunch, and in a few minutes he excused himself and went to a telephone booth outside the dining-room. I was in the next booth, still am. He was telephoning quite some time.”

  “Just finished calling me.”

  “That so! Well, he went back in the dining-room.”

  “Have your lunch there if you can get a table, Bardo.”

  “Shaff’s trying for one. Anyway, we can see him from the line.”

  “Keep right at it.”

  “Want another report where you live?”

  “No, I’ll call Geegan. Make your next report to him.”

  Gamadge went downstairs, picked up his hat and topcoat from the chair in the front hall, and left the house. He got into his car and started for the third time on the trip north.

  CHAPTER FIFTEENTen Thousand

  THERE WAS A PEARLY HAZE on the river this afternoon, and a rosy and amethyst light hung over the wooded banks towards Nyack like a premature sunset. The sky above the Coldfield house was filmed with cloud. A pleasant place to live, thought Gamadge as he turned into the driveway, but only if one was moderately happy.

  Agnes greeted him at the door with a broad smile. “Mrs. Glendon’s friend!”

  “Yes, and I’ve come on another errand for her.”