Рекс Стаут - The Mother Hunt

A longer pause. “I could come at noon.”

“That will be fine. Speaking for myself, Miss Mardus, I look forward to seeing you.”

As I hung up and returned to the corn fritters I was thinking, I certainly do. Long time no find.

When I had finished the second cup of coffee and gone to the office and done the chores, I buzzed the plant rooms on the house phone. If he didn’t hear from me, Wolfe would be expecting to see her in the red leather chair when he came down, since he had told me to have her there at eleven o’clock, and he would appreciate knowing he would have an extra hour before he would have to dig in and work. He did. When I told him she had saved him a dime by calling herself and she would arrive at noon, he said, “Satisfactory.”

I could use the extra hour too. Telling Fritz I was leaving on an errand, I went to Eleventh Street, told Lucy the Washington Square caper had been suspended and I would report at length later, removed the cameras from the baby carriage, took them to Al Posner, and told him to send a bill.

When the doorbell rang at ten minutes past noon and I went to the front, and at long last saw the mother in the flesh, my first impression was what the hell, if Richard Valdon played marbles with this when he had Lucy he was cuckoo. If she had been twenty years older it wouldn’t have been stretching it much to call her a hag. But when I went to my desk and sat after steering her to the office and the red leather chair, I stared at her. It was a different face entirely that was turned to Wolfe. It had sugar and spice and everything nice — only “nice” may not be the right word exactly. She merely hadn’t bothered to turn it on for the guy who opened the door. Also it wasn’t exactly sugar in her voice as she told Wolfe how much she enjoyed being in his house and meeting him. Obviously the “I dare you” in both her voice and her eyes wasn’t rigged; it had been built in, or born in.

Wolfe was leaning back, regarding her. “I can return that compliment, madam,” he told her. “It gratifies me to meet you. I have been seeking you for six weeks.”

“Seeking me? I’m in the phone book. I’m on the masthead of Distaff.” The voice and eyes implied that she would have loved to hear from him.

Wolfe nodded. “But I didn’t know that. I knew only that you had borne a baby and disposed of it. I had to—”

“You didn’t know I had borne a baby. You couldn’t have.”

“I do now. While you were carrying it, the last four months, you were a guest at the home of Mrs. Arthur P. Jordan in Sarasota, Florida. You entered the Sarasota General Hospital on January sixteenth, as Clara Waldron, and the baby was born that night. When you boarded an airplane at Tampa, for New York, on February fifth, still as Clara Waldron, the baby was with you. What did you do with it and where is it now?”

It took her a moment to find her voice, but it was the same voice — almost. “I didn’t come here to answer questions,” she said. “I came to ask some. You’ve had a man making inquiries about me here in New York and then in Florida. Why?”

Wolfe pursed his lips. “There’s no reason to withhold that,” he conceded. He turned. “The picture, Archie?”

I got one of the prints from a drawer and went and handed it to her. She looked at it, at me, at the print again, and at Wolfe. “I’ve never seen this before. Where did you get it?”

“There were cameras attached to the baby carriage in Washington Square.”

That fazed her. Her mouth opened, hung open a long moment, and closed. She looked at the print again, got its edge between thumbs and forefingers, tore it across, tore again, and put the pieces on the stand at her elbow.

“We have more,” Wolfe said, “if you want one for a memento.”

Her mouth opened and closed again, but no sound came.

“Altogether,” Wolfe said, “the cameras took pictures of more than a hundred people, but yours was of special interest because you arrived at the square in a cab, expressly for the purpose of looking at the baby in that particular vehicle, having seen a picture of it, and the nurse, in a newspaper. You said—”

“My God,” she blurted. “That’s why she did that. You did it.”

“I suggested it. You said you didn’t come to answer questions, but it will simplify matters if you oblige me. Do you know Mr. Leo Bingham?”

“You know I do. Since you’ve made inquiries about me.”

“Do you know Mr. Julian Haft?”

“Yes.”

“And you know Mr. Willis Krug, since you were married to him. All of the pictures taken by the cameras were shown to those three men. Is one of them the father of your baby?”

“No!”

“Was Richard Valdon the father?”

No reply.

“Will you answer me, madam?”

“No.”

“You won’t answer, or he wasn’t the father?”

“I won’t answer.”

“I advise you to. It is known that you were formerly intimate with Richard Valdon. Further inquiry will disclose if you renewed the intimacy in the spring of last year.”

No comment.

“Will you answer?”

“No.”

“When you arrived in New York with the baby on February fifth what did you do with it?”

No reply.

“Will you answer?”

“No.”

“Did you at a later date leave the baby in the vestibule of Mrs. Valdon’s house on Eleventh Street?”

No reply.

“Will you answer?”

“No.”

“Did you print the message that was pinned to the baby’s blanket when it was left in Mrs. Valdon’s vestibule? Will you answer?”

“No.”

“I strongly advise you, madam, to answer this question. How did you know that the baby Mrs. Valdon had in her house, as reported in the newspaper article, was your baby?”

No reply.

“Will you answer that?”

“No.”

“Where were you in the evening of Sunday, May twentieth? Will you answer?”

“No.”

“Where were you the night of Friday, June eighth? Will you answer?”

She got up and walked out, and I have to hand it to her, she walked straight and smooth. I would have had to double-quick to beat her to the front door, so I merely stepped to the hall. When she was out and the door was shut I stepped back in, returned to my desk, sat, and looked at Wolfe, and he looked back at me.

“Grrrr,” he said.

“That last question,” I said.

“What about it?”

“It may have been a little — uh — previous. It’s barely possible, just barely, that she doesn’t know about Ellen Tenzer. If the idea was to start her poking, shouldn’t we have had Saul standing by? Or all three?”

“Pfui. Is she a nincompoop?”

“No.”

“Then could even Saul shadow her?”

“Probably not. Then why ask her about June eighth?”

“She came here to find out how much we know. It was as well to inform her that our interest is not restricted to the baby and its parentage, that we are also concerned, even if only incidentally, with the death of Ellen Tenzer.”

“Okay.” I doubted if it was okay, but there was no point in pecking at it. “What comes next?”

“I don’t know.” He glowered at me. “Confound it, I am not lightning. I’ll consider it. I shall probably want to see Mr. Bingham, Mr. Haft, and Mr. Krug, to ask why they failed to recognize her picture, though that may be inconsequential. I’ll consider it. Will she approach Mrs. Valdon? Is she on her way there now?”

“No. Any odds you name.”

“Is Mrs. Valdon in danger? Or the baby?”

I took five seconds and shook my head. “I can’t see it.”

“Nor can I. Report to her and tell her to return to the beach. Escort her. Return this evening. If you’re anchored here you’ll badger me and we’ll squabble. Tomorrow we’ll do something, I don’t know what.”