Ed McBain - The House That Jack Built

Abbott clucks his tongue sympathetically.

Sophie’s eyes meet his. Murder hangs electrically on the air between them. Abbott suddenly wonders if he’s made a mistake coming to the mother. Perhaps the father would have been safer.

The Brechtmanns are Catholic; abortion is out of the question, even though surgeons’ scalpels are available for a price in Denmark or the Virgin Islands. But even if they were willing to compromise their faith, there would be the danger of a leak, the original scandal escalating geometrically, the Brechtmann family taking their pregnant Golden Girl outside of the United States for an abortion that is illegal here. No. Abortion is not a viable option.

Elise must have the baby.

Can a suitable marriage be arranged with someone?

Elise has only just turned seventeen. Announce a sudden marriage and tongues would wag, and again there would be the danger of a greater scandal that could wreck the image of Golden Girl Beer. Taint the beer’s image and the company will suffer tremendously. It is as simple as that.

Abbott is the easiest part of all this.

Merely pay him off and kiss him off.

Unless…

Mmmm.

Pay him enough and perhaps…

Why not?

Pay him for giving the baby a name. Pay him for taking the baby with him and disappearing from their lives forever.

“Tell me, Mr. Abbott, would that be worth half a million dollars to you?”

Half a million dollars is more than Abbott has ever dreamed of in his entire life. He does not even argue the price, fool that he is, fearful that Sophie will rescind the offer if he attempts to bargain with her.

In that same month of February 1969, Sophie tells her husband that she is taking Elise to Europe for the school break in March — “Some spring skiing in Zürs and Lecht, a little shopping in Paris and London.” She prays her husband will not decide to join them. But she knows he will be occupied for the next several months with the construction of yet another brewery, his ninth, in Denver.

The European trip becomes an extended one.

In April, Sophie cables St. Mark’s in Calusa to tell them that a tutor is helping Elise with her studies. The school is appalled. An absentee student? What kind of nonsense is this? But the Brechtmanns are rich and powerful, and nice customs curtsy to great kings, hmmm?

At the beginning of May, in a telephone conversation with her husband, Sophie tells him that they will probably stay abroad throughout the spring and summer; it gets so beastly hot in Florida, and anyway Franz is thoroughly occupied with the new brewery. When Franz says he thinks he may be able to get away for a week or so around the middle of the month, she almost panics. “Why, darling,” she says, “that would be wonderful!” And is relieved beyond measure when he calls the following week to say there are problems in Denver and he won’t be able to come over after all.

She gives a great deal of thought to logistics.

Should the baby be born in Europe or in the States?

If in Europe, the disappearing act will be complete.

But Abbott adamantly refuses to leave America. Sophie suspects there is a European past he has fled and is still fleeing, and she pursues the matter no further.

In June. Abbott meets the now visibly pregnant Elise in New-York and takes her to an obstetrician-gynecologist highly recommended by a vague friend in London. Abbott tells him that he and his wife have just come from England, in fact, and need someone to look after Elise and to deliver her baby when the time comes. Abbott says he has no medical insurance in America as yet. but he’ll pay the doctor in cash, in advance if the doctor so wishes. The doctor says, “No. no, don’t be ridiculous, a personal check will do.”

Two months later, Helen Abbott is born at Lenox Hill Hospital, on Seventy-seventh Street and Park Avenue.

“August of 1969,” Abbott said. “Two days after Woodstock.”

“Which would have made it…?”

“The nineteenth.”

“Were you there when she was born?” Matthew asked.

“Yes.”

“Was Sophie Brechtmann?”

“No.”

“You’re saying Sophie was not present when her daughter gave…?”

“She was in New York, yes. but she never came to the hospital. The seventeen-year-old girl I checked into Lenox Hill wasn’t Elise Brechtmann , you see. She was Elise Abbott . My wife. Mrs. Charles Abbott.”

“Then you’re saying…”

“No.”

“You’re not saying…?”

“I’m not saying Elise is or ever was my wife. Do you have any children, Mr. Hope?”

“I do.”

“When your wife gave birth, did anyone ask to see your marriage certificate?”

“Well, no. But my wife’s gynecologist knew she was…”

“Did she show him a marriage certificate?”

“No, I don’t think so. I guess not.”

“Well, the doctor we went to in New York never asked for one, either. We presented ourselves as married, and that was that. Mr. and Mrs. Charles Abbott. Period. Sophie had set up a checking account for us in New York. We paid all the doctor’s fees from that account, all the hospital costs as well. The names printed on our checks were Charles Abbott/Elise Abbott. And when my daughter was born, the hospital records listed her as Helen Abbott.”

“No trace of Elise Brechtmann anywhere along the line. How did you expect to prove…?”

“I wasn’t thinking of proving anything back then, Mr. Hope. I was doing what I’d been paid to do. See Elise through the birth, take the baby off her hands, move out of her life. That’s just what I did. Went back to California. Raised Helen to be a fine young woman.”

Matthew said nothing.

“And then it occurred to me that they’d cheated me all those years ago. That the secret was worth more than they’d paid me.”

“So you came back to Calusa.”

“Right you are. Just before Christmas. Showed up on Sophie’s doorstep…”

“And asked her for a million bucks.”

“And ended up in the hospital for my trouble. Because Elise must’ve got worried, you see. Must’ve thought Oh Cod, here he is, back again after all these years, here comes the same threat to the company. So she had me taken care of, sent a goon squad after me to help me change my tune.”

He nodded bitterly.

“But I’m going to get that money, Mr. Hope, you mark my words. Art Hurley went up to Lenox Hill looking for proof. And he found a nurse there who was working on the maternity ward when Helen was born. And now we have all the proof we need.”

“What sort of proof?”

“Photographs. Lucy was there when they were taken.”

“Lucy?”

“The nurse.”

“Lucy what?”

“Strong. Lucy Strong.”

“Photographs of what?”

“Elise and the baby. The baby lying on Elise’s breast. Elise nursing the baby. The baby’s hand on Elise’s breast.”

“Has Sophie Brechtmann seen these photographs?”

“Not yet.”

“Why haven’t you shown them to her?”

“Because we haven’t got them yet.”

“Who has them?”

“The man who took them.”

“And who was that?”

“Someone named Jonathan Parrish,” Abbott said.

Leona got out of the green Jag, locked the car behind her, and walked toward the front door of the shop. The plate-glass window was lettered with the words:

BOBBY’S GUN EXCHANGE

Guns Bought — Sold — Traded

All Shooting Accessories

She took a deep breath, reached for the doorknob, turned it, and entered the shop. A bell over the door tinkled. A man standing at the rear of the shop turned toward her. He did not look at all like the sort of person one would expect to find in a store selling guns. This was not your macho, suntanned gunslinger, oh, no. This was, instead, a chubby little man wearing chinos and a short-sleeved sports shirt, a wide toothy grin on his face as he turned toward the door.