Rex Stout - The Mountain Cat

“Naturally.” Ty attempted a grin. “I’m her lawyer.”

“Don’t try to achieve flippancy, it just makes you look sick. I know you’re gone on the young sister. Sunk you are. That’s why I don’t waste effort on you. She’s a nice kid. When you phoned I thought possibly you wanted finances for the defense. I’d be glad to.”

Ty shook his head. “Not now, thanks, but I’ll bear it in mind. All I need at the moment is a little information about something that happened two years ago.”

“That’s a long time for a memory like mine. Is it going to require a feat of memory?”

“Not much of one. One day you took a sheet of white paper and wrote on it ‘mountain cat ready for prey.’ ‘Mountain cat’ was on the first line and ‘ready for prey’ on the second. Beneath that you wrote the figures, 450. At the bottom you signed it with your initials, WD. You wrote it in black ink. Your name was Wynne Durocher then.”

“So it was. O Time in thy flight... Here we are.” She pushed at books to make room on the table for the Chinese to put the tray down, stirred the tinkling ice, handed a glass to him, and took hers. “So I wrote ‘mountain cat’ on a piece of paper. It was two years ago that I was given that lovely name, Mountain Cat. By the way, I owe your girl friend a bottle of wine. If you’ll take it to her she’ll probably accept it. She thinks I’m hooked on a life contract with the devil.”

Ty sipped his highball. “You remember writing that?”

“Now do I?” Her brow wrinkled. “So many things are apt to interfere with my memory, and one of the worst is curiosity. I’m as curious as a mountain cat. If I did write that on a piece of paper two years ago, how the dickens do you happen to know it? And if you do happen to know it, why is it worth driving out here thirty miles to ask me about it?”

Ty waved a hand. “I’m a lawyer, I know everything. As for asking you about it, that may be only an excuse to have a highball with my most attractive client.”

“Baloney. I’ve seen your eyes on Delia Brand. How’s the drink, all right? Too thin?”

“No, thanks, it’s fine. You know you’re attractive.”

“I certainly do.” She smiled. “I also know whether you’re candid or not. About my writing things on white paper with black ink. What a grasp of details! I’ll tell you what — refresh my memory by showing me the paper.”

“I’d like to, but I can’t.”

“Why, haven’t you got it?”

“No.”

“Who has?”

“I don’t know.”

“Where did you see it?”

“I’ve never seen it.”

“Oh.” She looked disappointed. “From the way you described it, I was sure you had been keeping it under your pillow.” She drank, and licked her lips with a quick red tongue. “I call that a good highball.”

“So do I.” He put his glass down. “Look here, Mrs. Cowles. You’re playing with me, you’re having fun, and ordinarily I wouldn’t object to that, but this is important. You do remember writing that, don’t you?”

She shook her head. “Not yet. Quit shoving. As soon as I remember it and tell you about it, you’re going to gallop off to court or prison or somewhere, and I need you for another drink.” She rang the bell. “I’m scared to death of lawyers. I always think they’re trying to trap me.”

“Yes, I can see you tremble.”

“Of course you can— More ice, John— Anyhow, you can’t blame me if I’m curious. You say you’ve never seen this paper, you don’t know where it is or who has it, and yet you describe it as if you had seen me write it. After all...” She shrugged.

“It was described to me by someone who saw it.”

“Who?”

“A prospector named Squint Hurley.”

“Where did he see it?”

Ty tried not to scowl. “He saw it lots of times. He carried it around with him for two years.”

“Where did he get it?”

“He found it.”

“Where?”

Ty surveyed her a moment without further attempt to hide the scowl, then said abruptly, “All right. You’ll either help us or you won’t. He found it under the dead body of Charlie Brand in the cabin where he was murdered.”

“Oh.” Her lashes flickered. “Indeed. A paper I wrote found under a dead body. You don’t suppose I did the murder and have forgotten about that, too?”

“No. If I had I wouldn’t have come to ask you about it.”

“But you did come to ask me, trying to keep it casual, without telling me what I would be letting myself in for.” Her pupils were contracted, though she was not facing the sunlight, and her voice had an edge. “I was under the impression that I’m a client of your firm? That I’ve paid you a satisfactory retainer?”

“You wouldn’t be letting yourself in—”

“No? Really, Mr. Dillon. It sounds as if the least I could expect would be the witness chair in a murder case, which would be — shall I say inconvenient?”

“But I’m only asking — confidentially—”

“Oh, no. You’re cheating. If I admitted I had written such a paper, and its being found under the body of a murdered man made my testimony vital as to whom I had given it to, would you still keep it confidential?”

“In that case I’d ask you—”

“Of course. You’d ask me to testify, and I’d refuse, and I’d get a subpoena to appear written on white paper with black ink. Here’s the ice. Have another highball.” She poured and mixed. “It’ll brighten you up. You’ve only partly satisfied my curiosity. For instance, how did the prospector know the writing on the paper was mine?”

“He didn’t.”

“Then who else saw the paper?”

“No one that I know of.”

Her brows lifted. “Did you do it with mirrors?”

“I showed Hurley an envelope you addressed to me and he said the writing was identical. The word ‘mountain.’ ”

“Ah! Then you already suspected me by intuition? Whose? Not yours?”

“It was an accident. I happened to have that envelope in my pocket with others.” Ty hadn’t picked up his second highball. “You are wrong, Mrs. Cowles, if you think there was the slightest intention of causing you any trouble—”

“Oh, I don’t! No trouble at all. Just the key witness in a notorious murder case.” She shivered delicately. “This prospector must be quite a handwriting expert. I’d love to see the paper. What happened to it?”

“Hurley gave it to Dan Jackson Tuesday morning. That night Jackson was killed and the paper taken from him.”

Wynne Cowles’s glass had been started toward her mouth, but was halted midway on its course. Then it went on to its contact with her warm firm lips, and she drank. She put it on the table. “Well!” she said. “Not just one murder. Two murders. Thank you so much!”

“You’re welcome.” Ty leaned forward to her. “I’m a first class boob. I’ve messed this all up. I had brains enough to know you wouldn’t want to be mixed up in a murder trial, no one does, but I should have gone on from there and considered what kind of an appeal would be effective with you. I should have told you the whole thing to begin with and then put it to you: we need your help. The Brand girls need it. You say Delia is a nice kid. That’s putting it mildly. I heard you at the courthouse, day before yesterday, offering Clara your assistance up to any amount. I know you meant money, but money isn’t what they need. Your information, who you gave that paper to, is absolutely vital. It’s the only trail we have—”

“You’re assuming as a fact that I wrote such a paper.”

“Well, you did. Didn’t you?”

“No.”

“You didn’t write that on a piece of paper and put your initials on it, WD?”

“No.”