gresham must have been waiting inside the door; as soon as rand came up onto the porch, he opened it, and motioned the detective inside. beyond a hasty greeting as rand passed the threshold, he did not speak until they were seated in the gunroom upstairs. then he came straight to the point.
"jeff, can you spare the time from this work you're doing at the flemings' to investigate this rivers business?" he asked. "and how much would an investigation cost me? it's got to be a blitz job. i'm not interested in getting anybody convicted in court; i just want the case cleared up in a hurry."
"well—" rand puffed at the cigar gresham had given him, watching the ash form on the end. "i don't work by the day, stephen. i take a lump-sum fee, and, of course, it's to my interest to get a case cleared up as soon as i can. but i can't set any time limit on a job like this. this rivers killing has more angles than nude descending a staircase; i don't know how much work i'll have to do, or even what kind."
"well, it'll have to be fast," gresham told him urgently. "look. i didn't kill arnold rivers. i hated his guts, and i think whoever did it ought to get a medal and a testimonial dinner, but i did not kill him. you believe me?"
"i'm inclined to," rand replied. "in your law practice, you know what a lying client is letting himself in for. as my client, you wouldn't lie to me. you seem to think you may be suspected of purging rivers. but why? is there any reason, aside from that homemade north & cheney he sold you, why anybody would think you'd killed him?"
"great god, yes!" gresham exclaimed. "now look. i'm not worried about being railroaded for this. i didn't do it, and i can beat any case that half-assed ex-ambulance-chaser, farnsworth, could dream up against me. but i can't afford even to be mentioned in connection with this. you know what that would do to me, in town. i just can't get mixed up in this, at all. i want you to see to it that i don't."
"that sounds like a large order." the ash was growing on rand's cigar; he took another heavy drag at it. "but why necessarily you? rivers had plenty of other enemies."
"yes, but, dammit, they weren't all in his shop, last evening. just me. and one other. the one who killed him."
"on your way out from town?" rand inquired.
"yes. i stopped at his place, about a quarter to nine. i was sore as hell about the hooking he gave me on that north & cheney, falsely so-called, and i decided to stop and have it out with him. we had words, most of them unpleasant. i told him, for one thing, that lane fleming's death hadn't pulled his bacon off the fire, that i was going to start the same sort of action against him on my own account. but that isn't the point. the point is that when i was going in, this la-de-da clerk of his, cecil gillis, was coming out. he got into his car and drove away, leaving me alone with rivers. he'll be the first one the police talk to, and he'll tell them all about it."
"that does put you back of the eight ball." rand dropped the ash into a tray and looked at it curiously. it looked like the sort of ash he had seen at rivers's shop, but he couldn't be sure. "but if it can be proved that rivers was alive after nine twenty, when you got here, you'll be in the clear."
"i don't want to have to clear myself," gresham insisted. "i don't want anything to do with it, at all. here; i'll pay you a thousand down, and two more when you have the case completed; i want you to get the murder cleared up before i can be publicly involved in it. i say publicly, because this damned gillis has probably involved me with the police already."
"well, gillis isn't exactly in a state of pure sanctity, himself," rand commented. "as a suspect, the smart handicappers are figuring him to run well inside the money. for instance, you know, there have been stories about him and mrs. rivers."
gresham snapped his fingers. "damned if there haven't, now!" he said. "you talk to adam trehearne. he did business with rivers—there wasn't much in his line rivers and umholtz were able to fake—and different times he's gone to rivers's shop and there'd be nobody around, and then gillis would come in from the house, smelling of chanel number five. mrs. rivers uses chanel number five. maybe you have something there. if cecil thought he could marry the business, with rivers out of the way.... you'll take the case, won't you, jeff?"
"oh, certainly," rand assured him. "now, all they have on you is that there was ill-feeling between you and rivers about that fake north & cheney, and that you were in rivers's shop yesterday evening?"
rand's new client grimaced. "i wish that were all!" he said. "the worst part of it is the way rivers was killed. see, back in kaiser willie's war, before i was assigned a company of my own, i was regimental bayonet-instruction officer. and after we got to france, i always carried a rifle and bayonet at the front; hell, i must have killed close to a dozen krauts just the way rivers was killed. and during schicklgruber's war, i volunteered as bayonet instructor for the local home guard."
"my god!" rand made a wry face. "there must be close to a hundred people around here who'd know that, and all of them are probably convinced that you killed rivers, and are expressing that opinion at the top of their voices to all comers. you don't want a detective, you want a magician!" he took another drag at the cigar, and blew smoke through a circular gun-rack beside him. "what sort of a character is this farnsworth, anyhow?" he asked. "before the war, i had all the d.a.'s in the state typed and estimated, but since i got back—"
gresham slandered the county prosecutor's legitimacy. "god-damn headline-hunting little egotist! he's running for re-election this year, too."
"one way, that could be bad. on the other hand, it might be easy to throw a scare into him.... stephen, when you were at rivers's, were you smoking a cigar?"
gresham shook his head. "no. i threw my cigar away when i got out of the car, and i didn't light another one till i got home. if you remember, i was lighting it when i came in here."
"yes; so you were. well, i don't suppose, in view of the state of relations between you and rivers, that you had a drink with him, either?"
"i wouldn't drink that guy's liquor if i were dying of snakebite, and he wouldn't offer me a drink if he knew i was," gresham declared.
"well, did you notice, back near the fireplace, a low table with a fifth of haig & haig pinchbottle, and a couple of glasses, and a siphon, and so on, on it?"
"i saw the table. there was an ashtray on it, and a book—i think it was gluckman's united states martial pistols and revolvers—but no bottle, or siphon, or glasses."
"all right, then; it was the killer." rand explained about the drinks, and the cigar-ashes. he went on to tell about the destruction of rivers's record-cards.
"i don't get that." gresham was puzzled. "unless it was young gillis, after all. he could have been knocking down on rivers, and rivers caught him at it."
"i'd thought of that," rand admitted. "but i doubt if rivers would sit down and drink with him, while accusing him of theft. and i can't seem to find anything around rivers's place that looks as though it might have been stolen from the fleming collection, either.... oh, and that reminds me: if you have time this afternoon, i wonder if you'd come along with me to the flemings' and see just what's missing. i'll have to know that, in any case, and there's a good possibility that the thefts from the collection and the killing of rivers are related."
"yes, of course," gresham agreed. "and suppose we take pierre jarrett along with us. he knows that collection as well as i do; he'll spot anything i miss. he works at home; i'll call him now. we can pick him up before we go to the flemings'."
they went into gresham's bedroom, where there was a phone, and gresham talked to pierre jarrett. it was arranged that he should pick jarrett up with his car and come to the flemings', while rand went there directly.
then rand used the phone to call his office in new belfast. he talked to dave ritter, explaining the situation to date.
"i'm going to need some help," he continued. "i want you to come here and get a room at the rosemont inn, under your own name. i'll see you there about five thirty. and bring with you a suit of butler's livery, or reasonable facsimile. i believe there will be a vacancy in the fleming household tomorrow or the next day, and i want you ready to take over. and bring a small gun with you; something you can wear under said livery. that .357 colt of yours is a little too conspicuous. you'll find a .380 beretta in the top right-hand drawer of my office desk, with a box of ammunition and a couple of spare clips."
"right. i'll be at rosemont inn at five thirty," ritter promised. "and say, tip was in, this morning, with a lot of dope on the fleming estate. want me to let you have it now, or shall i give it to you when i see you?"
"you have notes? bring them along; i'll be seeing you in a couple of hours."
he parted from gresham, going out and getting in his car. as gresham got his own car out of the garage and drove off toward pierre jarrett's house, rand started in the opposite direction, toward rosemont.
about a half-mile from gresham's he caught an advancing gleam of white on the highway ahead of him and pulled to the side of the road, waiting until the state police car drew up and stopped. in it were mick mckenna, aarvo kavaalen, and a third man, a nordic type, in an untidy brown suit.
"hi, jeff," mckenna greeted him, as rand got out of his car and came across the road. "this is gus olsen, investigator for the d.a.'s office. jeff rand; tri-state agency," he introduced.
"hey!" olsen yelled. "we been lookin' for you! where you been?"
rand raised an eyebrow at mckenna.
"you just came from where we're going," the state police sergeant surmised. "was gresham at home?"
"he was; he's gone now," rand said. "he and another man are going to help me check up on what's missing from the fleming collection."
"hey!" olsen exploded. "what i told you, now; he run ahead of us with a tip-off! gresham's skipped out, now!"
"what is all this?" rand wanted to know. "what's he screaming about, mick?"
"like he don't know!" olsen vociferated. "he tipped off gresham so's he could skip out; i'll bet he's in it with gresham!"
"pay no attention," mckenna advised. "he doesn't know what the score is; hell, he doesn't even know what teams are playing."
"now you look here!" olsen bawled. "we'll see what mr. farnsworth has to say about this. you're supposed to cooperate with us, not go fraternizin' with a lot of suspects. why, it's plain as anything; him and gresham's in it together. i bet that was why he come around, the first thing in the morning, to find the body!"
kavaalen, behind the wheel, turned around and began jabbering at olsen, in the back seat, in something that sounded like swedish. most finns can speak swedish, and rand was wishing he could understand it. the corporal's remarks ran to about a paragraph, and must have been downright incendiary. at least, olsen seemed to catch fire from them. he rose in his seat, waving his arms and howling back in the same language.
"shut up, goddammit, shut up!" mckenna bellowed into his face. "shut up before i sling your ass to hell out of this car! i'm talking, and i don't want any goddam jaw from you, olsen. you either," he barked at kavaalen, winking at him at the same time.
silence fell with a heavy thump in the car.
"well, now that the international crisis seems to have been averted, how's about letting me in on it, too?" rand asked. "for instance, what about gresham? what's he supposed to be a suspect for?"
"ah, olsen suspects him of chopping rivers up," mckenna replied wearily. "see, we questioned this cecil gillis, and he told us that last evening, as he was leaving rivers's, he saw stephen gresham drive up and go into the shop. i wanted to talk to him, myself; i thought he might account for the cigar-ashes, and the drink-fixings on that table. but when farnsworth heard about the killing, he sent olsen around, and when olsen heard that gresham had been there, he tried him and convicted him on the spot."
"oh, obscenity! is that what it's about?" rand exclaimed in disgust. "yes, gresham told me about that. he didn't have the drink, and he wasn't smoking a cigar in the shop, and he left a little after nine. he got home at nine twenty-two. i can testify to that, myself; i was there at the time, and so were seven other people." rand named them. "they dribbled away at different times during the evening, but philip cabot and i stayed till around eleven." he mentioned the approximate time at which the others had left. "what time was rivers killed, or hasn't the time been fixed?"
"the m.e. says around ten to two," mckenna said.
"he could be wrong; them guys only guess, half the time," olsen argued. "and besides, gresham had it in for rivers. and that ain't all, neither; he knew how to use a bayonet, too. i seen him, myself, during the war, showin' the home guard how to do it, just the way rivers was killed!" he produced triumphantly.
mckenna used a dirty word. "so what? anybody who's ever had infantry training knows that butt-stroke-and-lunge," he retorted. "i learned it myself, when i was a kid, in '24 and '25, in c.m.t.c. hell, anybody who's ever seen a war-movie.... if you hadn't lammed out of sweden when you were sixteen, to duck conscription, you'd of known it, too."
"well, maybe olsen, or his boss, can explain why gresham threw those record-cards in the fire," rand contributed. "you know why olsen says gresham had it in for rivers? rivers sold gresham a fake antique, a flint lock navy pistol that had been worked over into something else. gresham was going to subpoena those records, when he brought suit against rivers," rand lied. "but i can explain why cecil gillis might have destroyed them, after killing rivers, if he'd been cheating rivers and rivers caught him at it."
"yeah, and that might explain why gillis was in such a hurry to sic us onto gresham, too," mckenna added. "i thought of something like that. and this high-brown girl that works for rivers says that gillis and mrs. rivers played all kinds of games together, when rivers was away."
"well, who's in charge of the investigation?" rand wanted to know. "i heard, on the radio ..."
"you're liable to hear anything on the radio, including slanders on bing crosby's horses. but for the record, i am in charge of this investigation. and don't anybody forget it, either," he added, in the direction of the rear seat.
"that's what i thought. well, stephen gresham has just retained me to make an independent investigation," rand said. "it is not that he lacks confidence in the state police, or in you; he was afraid that other parties might get into the act and try to make political capital out of it. which appears to have happened."
"well, if gresham retained you, i'm satisfied," mckenna said. "you can take care of that end of it. glad you're in with us."
"well, i ain't satisfied!" olsen began yelling, again. "and mr. farnsworth won't be, neither. why, this here private dick is like as not workin' for the very man that killed rivers!"
mckenna turned slowly in his seat, to face olsen.
"one time, ten years ago," he began, "jeff rand had a client who was guilty of the crime he hired jeff to investigate. it was an arson case; this guy set fire to his own factory, and then got jeff to run down a lot of fake clues he'd planted. i know about that; i was on the case, myself. that's where i first met jeff, and he saved me from making a jackass out of myself. and what happened to this guy who'd hired jeff was something that oughtn't to happen even to molotov, and it happened because jeff fixed it to happen. if anybody hires jeff rand, he's one of two things. he's either innocent, or else he's out of luck.... i don't know why the hell i bother telling you this."
"ten to two, you say," rand considered. "look. a couple of days ago, rivers put out a new price-list to his regular customers. a lot of them, in different parts of the country, order by telephone, and some of them live in the west, where there's a couple of hours' time-difference. one of them, calling at, say, eight o'clock, local time, would get his call in at ten, eastern standard. if you checked the long-distance calls to rivers's number last night, now, you might get something."
"yeah. and if he took a call after nine twenty-two, that would let gresham out. even farnsworth could figure that out. sure. i'll check right away."
"who's at rivers's now?"
"skinner and jameson, of our gang. and farnsworth, and some of his outfit. and the hell's own slew of reporters, of course," mckenna said. "aarvo's going back there, in a little. we're still trying to locate mrs. rivers; we haven't been able to, yet. the maid says she went to new york day before yesterday."
"i'll probably be around at rivers's, later in the day. i want to check on that fleming angle."
"uh-huh; i'll be there, in half an hour," corporal kavaalen said. "be seeing you."
they exchanged so-longs, and kavaalen backed, and made a u-turn, moving off in the direction of rosemont. olsen's voluble protests drifted back as the car receded. rand returned to his own car and followed.
