Ellery Queen - A Fine and Private Place

“I don’t know, Mr. Importuna. That’s what I have to find out.”

Ellery was taking the opportunity to evaluate the man in the gym tights. Where Nino was squat and powerful, and Julio had been large and soft, the middle brother was slight, weak boned, almost phthisical. His olive skin had a bleached look, as if it had been too long deprived of sun. There were deep anxiety lines around his mouth and bloodshot eyes.

Marco Importunato was evidently a neurotic, with a dependency on his eldest brother that must reach into many areas of his existence. Observing the sallow, sunken face lacerated with grief and fear, yet relieved at his brother’s proximity, Ellery caught himself thinking of a terrified child wrapping his legs about his father. Instant analysis it might be, and consequently suspect, but it was after all the universality of such relationships that made them trite. The next moment he was not so sure. He glanced from clutcher to clutched and thought he detected on the older, heavier face the faintest expression of affectionate contempt. And that would follow, too. Nino Importuna did not seem to him the sort of man who could respect a weakness, especially in one of his own blood. It struck too close to home.

Importuna signaled Ennis, and the secretary sprang forward again to help deposit Marco in the chair. The squat man went behind the bar, poured out most of the contents of the highball glass, and brought his brother the little that remained. Marco took a shaky swallow. Then he nodded at something Importuna said to him in an undertone.

“He can talk now,” the multimillionaire said, and he took the glass away.

“Mr. Importunato,” Inspector Queen said immediately, “do you recall early today being shown a gold button with an anchor-and-rope design and the monogram MI on it?”

Marco muttered something about button, button?

“Assistant Chief Inspector Mackey of Manhattan North showed it to you, Mr. Importunato, and you identified it at that time as your property. Don’t you remember that?”

“Oh. Sure. Sure thing. Came off a yachting jacket of mine. ‘Swhat I told him, all right. Nice old bird. Terrible case of bad breath, though. His best friend ought to tell him.”

“Marco,” the elder brother said.

“Si. Si bene, Nino. ”

“Do you know where your button was found?”

Marco’s head wobbled.

“It was found on the floor of your brother Julio’s library.”

“You don’t say.”

“Can you explain how it got there, Mr. Importunato? And when?”

Marco Importunato blinked through the fog.

Inspector Queen went to the trampoline, pulled it over near the chair, and sat down. He tapped the half-naked man’s hairy knee in a friendly way. “I’m going to break one of the rules of police interrogation, Marco--you don’t mind if I call you Marco?-and tell you just what else we’ve found out about that gold button of yours. Are you paying attention, Marco?”

“Si. I mean yes.”

“At first we thought that you were the man who’d had the battle with Julio, and that in the scrap he yanked the button off your jacket.”

“Uhn-uhn,” Marco said with an almost vigorous shake of his head.

“But on closer examination we saw that the button hadn’t been pulled off your jacket, it was snipped off, most likely by a scissors. So we decided somebody’d tried to frame you for the murder of your brother. Do you understand me, Marco?”

“Sure I understand you,” Marco replied with dignity “And you know what I say to you? Ri… die… u… lous!”

“What do you mean?”

“I can tell you who cut that button off my coat.”

“You can? Who?”

“Me.”

“You?”

“Cut it off, snip-snip, and that’s it. With my bathroom scissors. Was hanging loose and I didn’t want to lose it. Gold, after all. The Importunatos were ever a thrifty clan. Not that the famiglia had a choice. Can’t be a swinger without something to swing with, hey, Nino?” Marco leered at his brother.

Importuna did not smile back.

“When did this happen, Mr. Importunato?” Ellery asked. “When did you cut the button off your jacket?”

“I don’t know. What’s today? Yesterday. That’s it. Didn’t get a chance to tell Tebaldo to sew it back on.”

“Tebaldo?”

“His valet,” Importuna said.

“What did you do with the button, Mr. Importunato?”

“What did I do with it?” the man in the tights said, offended. “I put it in my pocket, that’s what I did with it. Say, who are you again?”

“My name is Queen. The pocket of what? Your yachting jacket?”

“Aye, aye, sir. Si, capitano mio. ”

“Dad, is the jacket downtown? I assume the tech men took it.”

“It’s at the lab.”

“I should have thought to examine it while we were down there. Mr. Importuna, where’s a phone I can use?”

“There’s an extension in my brother’s bedroom.”

“May I, Mr. Importunato?”

“Call Tokyo. Call anyplace.” Marco waved amiably.

Ellery was back in a few minutes. He was pulling his nose as if it were taffy. “This one’s simply overflowing with surprises, dad. I’ve just been informed that an examination of the left pocket-the jacket has patch pockets-shows some of the stitching’s crept out, so there’s a gap, not very noticeable, at the base of the pocket. It’s wide enough, I’m told, for the button to have slipped through.”

The Queens eyed each other.

“That stupido Tebaldo,” Marco said, shaking his head. “I shoulda fired him the day I hired him. Hey, did you hear that? I’m a poet and I don’t know it.”

“Tell me something, Marco,” Inspector Queen said. “You know that shoe of yours we borrowed today? The one with the crepe sole?”

“Keep it,” Marco said grandly. “You can have the other one, too. I’ve got more shoes than Macy’s and Gimbel’s put together.”

“Do you know there’s a deep gash almost half the length of the sole?”

“What d’ye mean do I know? Course I know! Happened-when was it? Well, it isn’t important. Few days ago.”

“Oh?” The Inspector looked puzzled. “Happened how?”

“I was taking a special girl friend o’ mine sailing in Larchmont-keep one of my boats there. She was coming in from upstate and I was at Grand Central to meet her. What do I do but step on a gobboon of chewing gum some slob ‘d spit on the floor. Made me madder ‘n hell. So I went downstairs to the men’s room and I took the shoe off and borrowed a knife from the attendant, and while I was digging the gum out from the ripples the blade slipped and, zippo!-sweetest little gash you ever did see. Practically surgery. Oh, you did see it. That’s right.”

“Why didn’t you tell us before about snipping the button off your jacket and slicing into the sole of your shoe?” the Inspector growled.

“You didn’t ask me,” Marco said, in a huff again. “Nobody asked me. Nino, gimme another drink. I’m getting good and teed off answering all these stupid questions.”

“No,” his brother said.

Something in his voice made Marco blink cautiously. He decided to laugh. “Y’know Nino won’t touch the hard stuff? A little vino once in a while and that’s it with him. That’s my brother. Nobody ‘11 ever catch him crocked. Too smart. Hey, Nino?”

“I think,” Importuna said to the Inspector, “my brother’s answered enough questions.”

“I’m almost through, Mr. Importuna.”

“I don’t want to seem uncooperative, but if you’re going to keep this up, I’ll have to demand that one of our attorneys be present. I should have insisted on it from the start. You can see Marco’s condition, Inspector. This has been a very bad day for us all-”