Rex Stout - The Mountain Cat

“Uh, Baker. I can go up to Judge Hamilton. But maybe you’d like it better informally. As a favor to you. We have a witness you ought to hear.”

Baker’s lower lip was upthrust. “A witness to what? Who is he?”

Anson pointed a thumb at the young man with wavy blond hair. “Ask him. He’ll tell you about it.”

Baker’s sharp glance took in the witness from head to foot. “We can take him upstairs to my office.”

“Oh, no, that won’t be necessary. He’ll enjoy the audience. We all will.”

The audience, for its part, was already engrossed. In the silence, the impact was plainly audible when the sheriff of Silverside County spat. One of the cops nudged the young man forward.

Baker faced him. “You’ve got something to say?”

“I have.” The young man’s voice was a little squeaky, but not with timidity or uncertainty. “Shall I go on and say it?”

“Just a minute. What’s your name and who are you?”

“My name is Clement Ardyce Cooper and I’m a student at the university. I live at Comstock Hall.”

Baker grunted. “Shoot.”

“Tuesday afternoon about four o’clock I was standing at the curb on Halley Street, not far from The Haven, studying types—”

“Types of what?”

“People. Do you want me to explain everything carefully as I go along?”

“I want you to say what you were brought here to say.”

“Then please don’t interrupt me. I was standing at the curb and I saw a man pass by, among many others, and decided he was an extrovert, unstable, philotype B. He walked close to the curb and looked into several parked cars in a peculiar manner, taking precautions against observation, but I am accustomed to observing people without making them aware of it. I am a psychologist. I saw him open the door of a car and take something out — a leather handbag. He was about thirty feet from me. A moment later another man approached and accosted him. The first man said something in reply, thrust the handbag into the other man’s hands and walked away. The other man stared after him a few seconds, then he walked off too, in the opposite direction, carrying the handbag. His name was Quinby Pellett.”

“You mean you knew him?”

“Oh, no, not then. I had never seen him before. But this morning I saw his picture on the front page of the newspaper, in an advertisement. I read the advertisement and at two o’clock, after my classes were over, I went to the police station to reply to it. They sent for Quinby Pellett and when he came naturally I recognized him.”

“Naturally. From his picture in the paper.”

“Oh, no. From having seen him on Tuesday.” The young man looked amused. “You’re so transparent, really. Almost infantile. I’d love to give you a test.”

“Much obliged. If there’s any testing, I’ll do it myself.” Baker was gazing at him resentfully, but the resentment was not for him. It was like Harvey Anson to spring a thing like that, informally he called it, before a bunch of rubbernecks, without any warning...

“Anything else?” the psychologist inquired.

“Yes,” Baker snapped. “Plenty. First about the man who took the bag from the car. Has he been described to you?”

“Described? By whom?”

“By anyone. Anyone who is now in this room, or out of it either. Or have you been shown a photograph of him?”

“Oh, I get you.” The young man looked more amused than ever. “I’ll tell you about that. I know I’m a little skinny, but I’m all right. I’m the second best in tennis up at the campus. If you’ll have this room cleared, or if you’ll come out in the alley with me, I’ll beat some of that out of you.”

Baker looked a little startled. “There’s no occasion—”

“There’s plenty of occasion.” The student’s voice got more of a squeak in it, but otherwise he maintained his calm. “I come here to tell you something I saw because I saw it and right away you start trying cheap insulting tricks. If you want to ask me if I’m lying and give me a chance to say no, I’m not, that’s all right, but instead of that you start making cowardly insinuations. What’s wrong with you is a fundamental lack of intelligence, to suppose that if I undertook, or had been persuaded, to invent a story, I wouldn’t have sense enough to defend it against any attack you could possibly be capable of. I’m not surprised you’re a lawyer. You probably couldn’t make a living at much of anything else.”

“I should have warned you, Baker.” A cackle came from Harvey Anson’s lips, which was a rare occurrence. “He’s pretty hot. That’s about the identical thing he said to me. Why don’t you look into his connections? To see how we might have suborned him.”

“Thanks, I will.” Baker glared at the witness. “What does your father do?”

“He’s a geodesist.”

“A what?”

The youth smiled tolerantly. “A sectional director of the United States Geodetic Survey.”

“Is he a friend of the chief of police? Or of Quinby Pellett or the Brand family? Or of Mr. Anson or Mr. Sammis?”

“No.”

“Are you?”

“No. I wouldn’t be. I have nothing but contempt for lawyers, financiers and politicians.”

Another cackle came from Anson. Baker disregarded it. “Would you recognize that man if you saw him again? The one who took the bag from the car?”

“Certainly. Didn’t I say I studied him?”

Frank Phelan broke in, “Why don’t you try him on it, Ed? I’d like to see it myself. We can line Rowley up with a dozen or so—”

“Yeah, sure, I’ll bet you’d like it, Frank.” The county attorney appeared to be talking through his teeth. He eyed the psychologist. “You say the second man was Pellett and he walked off carrying the bag. What did he do with it?”

“I don’t know. He went on down the sidewalk. A young woman came along, Mongoloid, with a typical—”

Quinby Pellett blurted, “I’ve told you what I did! First I went to the corner and had a beer—”

“I wasn’t asking you. I know what you told me.” To the witness: “Did anybody see you on Halley Street Tuesday afternoon? Did you see or speak to anyone you know?”

“Certainly. I spoke, intermittently, with my companion, Miss Griselda Ames, the daughter of a professor in the School of Mines.”

Baker gawked. “You mean she was with you all the time?”

“She was.”

“And she saw everything you saw?”

“She did.”

Baker flung up his hands. “In the name of God, why didn’t you say so?”

“I have said so.” The witness was unperturbed. “As a matter of fact, it was only at Miss Ames’s insistence that I replied to the advertisement. It seemed to me a bit quixotic. If you would like verification of my story, though it appears to me quite unnecessary, she would be glad to furnish it. Not that I regret having come.” His head slowly pivoted for an interested survey of the throng. “The faces of excited people, under a strain of one sort or another, are unusually revealing.”

Harvey Anson cackled again. The county attorney whirled on him and demanded, “Well?”

Anson shrugged. “Well, Baker, it looks as if the only question is whether you want me to go to the trouble of entering a writ. Fact is, I’ve got one in my pocket. I was going to argue it on the basis of Quin Pellett’s testimony and then this came along.”

“Yeah. And instead of letting me have this with decent professional courtesy, you have to grandstand it in front of a mass meeting!”

“That’s right. Lem Sammis and I didn’t much care for certain tendencies you seemed to be displaying. Shall I go on up to Judge Hamilton with the writ?”

“No,” Baker snapped. He turned to the sheriff. “Bill, go and get Delia Brand and bring her in here. I’m going upstairs and move to dismiss and get an order. Keep her here till I get back; it’ll only take a few minutes — you coming along, Anson?”