Murder in the Ball Park

by Robert Goldsborough

  “Which, of course, raises a question that an intrepid private investigator is forced to ask: Could your husband have been behind the shooting?”

  This time, Mona’s laugh was hearty. “Oh God, no, Archie. Never. Charles growls, but, like a lot of yipping dogs, he has no bite. He can be mean and petty and insulting, no question, but deep down he’s spineless and downright cowardly. Years ago, I got fooled by his looks and what then seemed like charm. And he also was a very good dancer, which always has impressed me—far too much in this case. Anyway, to finish answering your question, he could be called a lot of things that a newspaper can’t print, but he is no killer. However,” she said with what I would term an impish grin, “you’ve given me an idea. I’m going to have a little fun at Mr. Charles Fentress’s expense over this situation.”

  “I am not sure I like the sound of that, Mona.”

  “Oh, don’t be an old stick-in-the-mud, Archie,” she said, waving a well-manicured hand in a dismissive gesture. “Charles can be so bloody pompous, and sometimes I just can’t resist getting under his skin.”

  “Given the way the two of you seem to feel about each other, I’m curious as to why you didn’t get divorced long ago.”

  “To be honest, the subject has come up between us several times, but Charles always fights the idea. He seems terrified that I’ll take him for everything he’s got, which is ridiculous, and I’ve told him so more than once. For one thing, we have no children, so there would be no payments in that regard. For another, although my family is definitely not anywhere near as wealthy as the Fentresses, my own father, rest his dear soul, did okay on Wall Street once he survived the Depression, and he left me fairly well fixed. So there would not be an issue of alimony. I would be able to get along fine without Charles’s money.”

  “Your husband’s fortune comes from the advertising business, I understand.”

  “Yes, Darryl Fentress was considered a Madison Avenue creative genius, and after he died, Charles got willed half the agency, Powell and Fentress, even though he isn’t anywhere near the advertising man his father was. I’m not even sure what he does there, other than glad-hand clients at long, martini-laced lunches at the priciest restaurants in Manhattan on his fat expense account. I’m sure that he’s very good at that, anyway.”

  “So the plan is for the two of you to just keep going on the way you are indefinitely?”

  A shrug and a sniff. “I guess so. Lately, I haven’t done much thinking about the future. Anything else you need to ask, Archie?”

  “No, I think that does it, at least for now, Mona. I appreciate the time you’ve given me.”

  “You are a good man, Archie,” she said, hugging me as we stood to leave. “And like the song says, ‘A Good Man Is Hard to Find.’ ”

  As I paid the check and Mona walked out of the little café with a glance over her shoulder and a wave, I wondered if she would someday find herself that elusive good man.

  Chapter 8

  I got back to the brownstone just in time to sit down to lunch—veal cutlets along with Fritz’s mixed salad with Devil’s Rain dressing and capped off with a cherry tart. As we ate, I listened to Wolfe’s monologue on why broadcast news is so shallow and superficial and waited until we were in the office with coffee to fill him in on my session with Mona Fentress.

  After I finished reporting, Wolfe made no comment, turning instead to an orchid catalog that had arrived in the morning mail. “So . . . do you have any thoughts on Mrs. Fentress?” I asked.

  “None whatever,” he said as he leafed through the catalog.

  “Am I boring you? Or perhaps you are disappointed that I didn’t throw more probing questions at the lady. Maybe you can give me a list of things to ask, and I can set up another coffee date with her. I’m always eager to improve my interviewing technique, and I’d be glad to—”

  “Archie, shut up!”

  “Yes, sir. If you have no further instructions for me, I’ll just mosey up to my room and polish my shoes. I noticed today that my brown ones are scuffed on the right toe and the black pair could use a good buffing.” As I walked out of the office, Wolfe’s nose was still buried in the catalog, and my blood pressure was rising.

  It is not unusual during a case for Wolfe to suffer a relapse and quit working altogether, but these spells usually occurred when an investigation was further along, and this one had barely gotten under way. I’ve lived through numerous relapses over the years and have yet to figure out what triggers them or how to end them. Some last less than a day while others go on for a week or more. The symptoms vary, but most often they involve eating, lots of eating. For instance, during one such episode, Wolfe consumed half a sheep in two days, with different parts of the animal cooked twenty different ways. During these spells, when he is not eating prodigious amounts, he either takes to his bed or sits on a stool in the kitchen driving Fritz to distraction with his dictates on precisely how dishes should—and should not—be prepared.

  It was still too early to tell if this was a full-fledged relapse or simply an aversion to work that might quickly pass. But taking no chances, I went to the kitchen to alert Fritz. He shook his head and frowned. “Archie, you are right. The signs are there. When you were away before lunch, he came into the kitchen and stood over me as I prepared the cutlets and kept insisting that I must use dried oregano leaves instead of powdered oregano.”

  “Did you poke him in the eye with a fork?”

  “No, Archie, I would never do such a thing— Oh, you are making a joke,” Fritz said, looking slightly chagrined. “But I did become somewhat angry, and he finally agreed to let me use the powdered oregano. I just hope that this afternoon he doesn’t tell me how to make my Brazilian lobster salad.”

  “That’s the dinner entrée?” I asked. Fritz nodded.

  “Darn, a favorite of mine,” I said. “I’m going to be away until well past dinnertime. Would you save me some?” Fritz said he would.

  Although Wolfe had apparently opted to sit on the sidelines for now, I still had the assignments he had given me earlier, back when he was pretending to work. Among those chores were visits to Jonah Keller, Ray Corcoran, and Howell Baxter up north of the city. I was sorry to stick Fritz with Wolfe in his present state but happy to be away from the brownstone for much of the day.

  Keller’s office was in White Plains, while Corcoran had his farther north in Carmel. Baxter, the head of Citizens Looking to Enjoy Arboreal Nature, or CLEAR, operated out of his home in Wappingers Falls. I armed myself with their addresses, and this being one of those perfect June afternoons, the kind poets rhapsodize about, I took the convertible rather than the Heron sedan from Curran’s Motors on Tenth Avenue, where Wolfe has garaged his cars for years.

  Within minutes, I was breaking the speed limit on the Henry Hudson Parkway, along with almost every other car heading north. Nothing improves my mood more than being behind the wheel on a fine day with only sky above me, and by the time I had angled east onto the Bronx River Parkway and entered White Plains, I was at peace with the world.

  I double-checked the address of the Northland Realtors Association, of which Jonah Keller was chairman, and had no trouble finding the building, a three-story redbrick American Colonial structure with white-shuttered windows near the downtown district. It was fronted by an elm-shaded lawn with grass that looked like it had been lifted from the putting green at an exclusive country club.

  Inside, the reception area sent a clear message that recent times had been very good indeed for the real estate industry in this part of the state. Plush carpeting, gleaming brass chandeliers, paneled walls with framed landscape paintings, upholstered chairs, and ivory draperies made me feel like I had stepped into the spacious lobby of a three-star hotel.

  Seated behind a half-acre of glistening, glass-topped mahogany, a perky young brunette whose desk plaque read arlene willis flashed me a smile that showed off her
dimples. “May I help you, sir?” she said breathlessly.

  “Yes, I would like to see Mr. Keller.”

  “Is he expecting you, sir?”

  When I said no, she gave me a little-girl frown and fed me the obviously rehearsed line that he was in conference and probably would be for some time—maybe all afternoon.

  “Oh, that is too bad, Miss Willis. I really had hoped to see him. Do you think you could get a message to him?” I asked, giving her a smile of my own, one that Lily Rowan had told me was deceptively disarming.

  Arlene batted her brown eyes. “What is the message, sir?”

  “Let me write it down; it is rather personal and very important,” I said, scribbling a sentence on the back of one of my business cards. “Do you have an envelope I might use?”

  She frowned again and opened a desk drawer, pulling out an envelope and handing it to me. I slipped my card in, sealed the flap, and wrote Keller’s name on the front. “Would you see that he gets it now, please?”

  “I will try, sir,” she said, getting up and opening a door several paces behind her. She disappeared and was gone for two minutes. On returning, she soberly reported, “Mr. Keller will be out to see you momentarily, sir.”

  The “momentarily” became closer to ten minutes. I was prepared for an angry Jonah Keller, and he did not disappoint. Stocky and florid, the man looked like he could have had smoke coming out of both ears. “You!” he barked, “Come with me.” As the ever-so-proper Arlene watched with a furrowed forehead, I followed Keller through a doorway and into a windowless conference room with a round table, four leather chairs, a few framed paintings of mountains and lakes, and a brass chandelier, which looked like a smaller version of the ones in the lobby.

  He closed the door and tossed my business card down on the table. “What in the hell is the meaning of this, Goodwin?” he barked, tugging on the points of his overtaxed vest.

  “I thought it was self-explanatory,” I replied blandly, picking up my card. “Did I misspell any of the words? Let’s see . . . no, everything appears to be in order, and I like to think my handwriting is legible. Way back when I learned on the Palmer Method, I always got good grades in penmanship at school. In case you had trouble reading it, here’s what I wrote: ‘I need to talk to you about a murder.’ ”

  “I know damn well what you wrote,” Keller snapped, slapping a fleshy hand down on the tabletop. “But I don’t have the foggiest idea what in God’s name you are talking about.”

  “Sorry I wasn’t clearer. I am talking about the shooting of Senator Orson Milbank,” I replied, keeping my tone bland.

  “Yeah, so? Why do you need to talk to me? By the way, Goodwin, I know who you are, in case you believe we’re a bunch of out-of-touch yokels up here in what you think of as the sticks. You work for that fat so-called genius down in Manhattan, Nero Wolfe.”

  “Oh dear, Mr. Wolfe would not like the ‘so-called’ part. Anyway, we understand you were far from friendly with Senator Milbank.”

  “That’s right. And just what of it?” he said, folding beefy arms across his chest.

  “Mr. Wolfe has been hired to find out who is behind the senator’s death, and he felt you might be able to give us some insights.”

  Keller made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a growl. “So . . . he thinks I had something to do with Milbank’s killing, is that it?”

  “Not necessarily, he—”

  “I am offended, deeply offended,” he huffed, trying without success to square rounded shoulders. “Maybe you are not aware of this, Goodwin, but I am one of the best-known, most respected people in this entire county, and in the surrounding counties, for that matter. My name means something here. I could sue you—and your fat boss—for slander.”

  “Why? No one has accused you of anything, Mr. Keller, other than being well plugged into what goes on in this area.”

  “Goddammit, it’s the implication! Now, it’s hardly a secret that I had no love for Orson Milbank, but if I went around killing everyone I didn’t like, I would have a dead brother-in-law, a dead IRS auditor, and a dead local physician, who shall remain nameless. And by the way, shamus, you’re late to the party. I have already had a visit from a lieutenant named Lawson from the New York Police Department Homicide Squad.”

  “What did he ask you?’

  “None of your damned business!” Keller shouted, giving me a hard shove in the chest with his palm. I wasn’t expecting it and went back on my heels as he shoved me a second time. I sidestepped him, spun him around, and got his fat right arm in a hammerlock.

  “Hardly a very nice way to treat a guest,” I said, forcing the arm up as Keller groaned.

  “Not an invited guest,” he spit out between groans, along with a couple of other words.

  “True, but nonetheless, it isn’t neighborly,” I said, releasing him.

  Keller rubbed his arm and scowled. “You lay a hand on me again, Goodwin, and by God, I’ll call a guard to have you thrown out. Now, I have better things to do than talk to some sleazy New York gumshoe. That’s what they call you guys, isn’t it—gumshoes? I believe you know the way out. Don’t linger.” With that, the self-styled real estate kingpin of three counties stormed from the room, leaving the door open behind him.

  “Nice to have met you,” I said to Arlene Willis as I passed her desk. “Keep up the good work here. You’re doing an outstanding job.”

  “Thank you, sir. I certainly will try my best. I hope you have a fine rest of the day, sir,” she pronounced.

  “I will, in large part thanks to the memory of your wonderful smile,” I told her as the color rose in her cheeks. I departed having made one person in that office happy.

  Chapter 9

  So I had not endeared myself to Jonah Keller, but I wasn’t sure any approach would have worked on him other than one that would feed his outsized ego. As I wound north through the rolling hills and reservoir country to Carmel, I thought about how to figuratively tackle Ray Corcoran of the Westchester–Putnam–Dutchess Business Association. One thing was sure: I would not send him a business card with murder written anywhere on it.

  When I hit the outskirts of Carmel, I pulled into a filling station to gas up and get directions. I showed the lanky attendant the address, and he nodded, running a grease-stained hand over his unshaven cheek. “Oh sure, that’s Mr. Corcoran’s office. Just stay on this road; it’s less than a mile ahead on the left. You can’t miss the place, a brown-brick building with a red awning. Mac’s Barbershop is on one side of it and Belle’s Tip-Top Restaurant on the other.”

  After paying and thanking him, I prepared to drive off. “Appreciate your business, sir,” he said. “That Mr. Corcoran who you’re heading off to see is one fine gent, I’m here to tell ya. Been buyin’ his gas and oil here for years, ’cept, ’course, when he was off to the war. Always asks about the wife and kids, and how business is.”

  “And how is business?” I asked, to be sociable.

  “Pretty doggone good,” he said with a grin. “And that’s partly ’cause of Mr. Corcoran. He’s made sure that I’m the only one for miles around that carries this brand.” He pointed to the colorful oil company logo on the post above us. Driving into Carmel, I wondered how—and why—Ray Corcoran had allowed the gas station operator to have a monopoly of sorts.

  White Plains seemed like a metropolis compared with Carmel, although the main drag of this little Putnam County burg could have provided a fitting backdrop for a Norman Rockwell painting. I found the one-story brick building between the barbershop and Belle’s restaurant with no trouble. The sign painted on the glass of the front window proclaimed it to be the westchester-putnam-dutchess business association, always looking to the future, raymond l. corcoran, executive director.

  I stepped into a carpeted reception area and found myself looking at the cheerful face of a white-haired lady with rimless glasses. “W
elcome, sir,” she said as if she meant it. “How may I help you?” Her smile would have melted the heart of a process server.

  I gave her my name and asked to see Corcoran. When she asked about the nature of my business, I told her it was somewhat personal.

  “Well, Mr. Corcoran should be back in . . . oh, about twenty minutes, if you would care to wait. He’s in a meeting just down the street at the VFW hall. Can I get you coffee?”

  I declined with thanks and sat in one of the three guest chairs reading a three-week-old issue of the Saturday Evening Post—with a painting by Rockwell, no less, of boys frolicking at a swimming hole on the cover. As I was finishing my second pass through the magazine, a well-turned-out man of medium height who looked to be in his late thirties stepped in from the street, looked at me with raised eyebrows, then turned to his receptionist with a quizzical expression.

  “This gentleman, his name is Goodwin, asked to see you,” she said.

  “What can I do for you, sir?” Ray Corcoran asked in a neutral tone.

  “My name is Archie Goodwin, and I would like to take a few minutes of your time. I assure you that I am not selling anything, nor am I looking for money or a job, or a favor of any kind.”

  “Hmm, I suppose you’re harmless enough then,” he said with a grin. “Come on into my office, Mr. Goodwin.” I followed him through a doorway and into a large corner room that looked out onto a tree-shaded, parklike area with swings, a slide, a seesaw, and a baseball diamond with a wire-mesh backstop and some wooden bleachers. Corcoran gestured me to a guest chair and slid in behind his desk, leaning back and cupping his hands behind his head. The wall behind him was filled with certificates from various civic organizations, plus a brass plaque with two small American flags pinned above it.

  “That’s very nice,” I observed, pointing to the plaque. “Oh, thanks,” he said. “I got that from our local VFW for volunteer work I’ve done for them over the years. A great organization, wonderful people. I’m a veteran myself, marines, and saw some active duty in the Pacific, on a God-forsaken island called Tarawa, you may have heard of it.”