Rex Stout - The Father Hunt

After lunch I did that, taking it to an agency instead of phoning it in, because it was to be a display, not a classified, two columns wide and three inches high. Wolfe had drafted it:

$500

will be paid for any verifiable information regarding the whereabouts

and movements of CARLOTTA VAUGHN

alias

ELINOR DENOVO between April 1,1944 and October 1, 1944 Box

Wolfe had drafted it, but not without an argument. He wanted to make it six inches high, not three, with the bottom half a reproduction of the three-quarters-face photograph. My objection was that that would bring us stacks of answers from people who would grab at any chance to collect five hundred dollars and I would have to spend a week or so following some of them up on a-million-to-one odds, and a good percentage of them would develop into pests. I won. Another objection, from Saul, not me, was that we would be hooked by people who had seen her in circumstances that wouldn't help, for instance, servants who had been at Jarrett's then, but Wolfe overruled that one. It might cost five or ten grand, but there was plenty in the twelve savings banks. Of course another objection was that Raymond Thome wouldn't like it, with its public implication that there was something about the past of

Elinor Denovo that needed to be investigated, but that was just mentioned, not argued.

At the agency, Green and Best, they said four inches high would be better than three, but I won that argument too.

It was 6:08 when Bertram McCray arrived. He looked as if he needed a weekend; his whole face was pinched, not just the corner of an eye, and his feet dragged as he walked down the hall. It's enough to wear a man out, helping to decide what to do with a couple of billion dollars' worth of other people's money. After presenting him to Wolfe and motioning him to the red leather chair, I asked if he would like to have a drink and he said no, he was going to drive eighty miles. He sat and blinked at Wolfe and said he hoped it wouldn't take long. "I don't want to be blunt," he said, "but I've had a hard week and I want some air. I didn't ask you on the phone, but I assume it's about Jarrett."

Wolfe nodded. "We've been balked. It's highly probable that he is not the father of Elinor Denovo's daughter."

"What?" McCray's mouth stayed open. "But… why? He sent those checks."

"Yes, that's established, thanks to Mr. Ballou and you. But the daughter was born on the twelfth of April, nineteen forty-five, so she was conceived the preceding summer, and Mr. Jarrett says he spent it abroad on a mission for the Production Allotments Board. He spent the month of July in an army hospital in Naples. He says."

"My God." McCray looked at me. "Didn't I tell you that?"

I shook my head. "And I didn't ask you. I should have, but I didn't. I apologize. So Mr. Wolfe is asking you now. Jarrett told me that he went to England in late May nineteen forty-four and then to Egypt and Italy and Africa, and came back on September sixth. We're checking it, and maybe you can help. He called me a liar. Can you call him one?"

"I can call him anything, but…" He looked at Wolfe. "Are you sure about the date? The birth?"

"Yes. That can't be challenged. Mr. Goodwin has seen the birth certificate."

"Then I guess we… you… my God. He was out

of the country all that summer. I can check the exact dates he left and returned, but does that matter?"

"No. But we need to know if Elinor Denovo, then Car-lotta Vaughn, was also out of the country that summer, however briefly. Can you help on that?"

"Of course not. I didn't… I only saw her three or four times after she moved out; I barely spoke to her." He sounded peevish and looked peevish. "You could have told me this on the phone." He looked at his watch. "An hour wasted."

"Possibly not." Wolfe cocked his head. "You're vexed, Mr. McCray, and so are we. Mr. Goodwin and I can't be charged with making an unwarranted assumption. The checks, certainly, but other circumstances too, supplied by you-that Carlotta Vaughn left Jarrett's in the spring of nineteen forty-four but did not end their association. It was an acceptable conjecture that he had provided other quarters for her if their relations had taken a course which he preferred not to pursue in his home. We don't have to abandon that conjecture now; we can merely adapt it. You told Mr. Goodwin yesterday that you had once thought it possible that something was developing between Carlotta Vaughn and Mr. Jarrett's son. He was twenty years of age and I presume he was away at college, but not in the summer months, and other quarters for her could have been provided by him. For the only son of a wealthy man that wouldn't have been difficult. I don't need to waste more of your time by expounding the obvious, that the checks sent by Mr. Jarrett, if not for a daughter, might have been for a granddaughter. I invite your opinion."

McCray was frowning. He turned the frown on me and demanded, "Did I say that?"

I nodded. "I can repeat it to the letter if you want it."

"I don't. I must have been babbling."

"No, you weren't babbling. I was asking you about her relations with everybody, including you, that was all. I asked if you remembered anything specific and you didn't."

"Of course I didn't." He turned to Wolfe. "It's ridiculous. He sent her money for twenty4wo years because his son… absolutely ridiculous. Anyway, there's a reason… No. He wouldn't… No." He pursed his lips,

eyed Wolfe, then me, and back at Wolfe. "I want to make one thing plain. Two things. When Mr. Ballou asked me about those checks and I learned they had been charged to Cyrus Jarrett and delivered to him, I had no objection to that information being passed to you. I was perfectly willing to supply routine information-that's all it was, routine-that would make trouble for Cyrus Jarrett. God knows he has made enough trouble for me. But I wouldn't supply information that would make trouble for his son even if I had any, and I haven't. I have high regard for Eugene Jarrett, not only as a brother officer of our bank, but as a friend. I'll tell you this-anybody could tell you this-for ten years Eugene Jarrett and his father haven't been on speaking terms. My opinion of his father is mild compared to his. Of course with him it's more personal, fattier and son; you know how deep that can go. If Cyrus Jarrett continued sending money to that woman-Carlotta Vaughn or Elinor Denovo-for the past ten years, it wasn't on account of his son, that's sure."

He put his palms on the chair arms and levered himself to his feet. "I'm going," he said. "You can forget Eugene Jarrett. But if I had any more information that would help with his father you'd be welcome to it. Frankly, I would like to see him get hurt, really hurt, and so would other people I could name, and he did send those checks for twenty-two years. Was it blackmail? Did she know something that would hurt? If so I hope you dig it up. Frankly, I would help if I could. Do you…" He hesitated. "If it needs any financing…"

"It doesn't. I have a client."

"Well, then…" He turned and started out, so slow, his feet dragging, that I didn't have to hurry to beat him to the hall and on to the front. At the door he thought he had something to say, but decided not to. His car, down at the curb, was a 1965 Imperial.