by Emma Lathen
Eric’s determination that he should be recognized as the genius behind Numero Uno.
And, above all, Eric’s unfaltering certainty that he was destined for the top.
Chapter 22
Send Out the Runners
THE murder of Barbara Gunn had shaken and horrified everyone unfortunate enough to be present, but not all of them had become entangled in the aftermath. Quite a few had shaken off the tragedy. The representatives of the Hogarth company, for instance, were preparing to inundate the market with bigger and better rototillers. And an improved Shawmut weed killer was about to be unveiled. This in turn meant that Pete and Mary Larrabee could proceed with their plans to fund the next generation.
“I don’t have a business manager yet,” Mary explained to Thatcher when she arrived at the bank for her appointment. “Pete said I should wait until I saw you. But I have signed these contracts.”
He ran his eye down the paragraphs of fine print to get to the meat. Each contract was comfortably inside the six-figure bracket. Mrs. Mary Larrabee was going to be worthy of the Sloan’s attention.
That is, unless the Larrabees were planning to make whoopee.
“And how much of this would be for investment?” he inquired tactfully.
Mrs. Larrabee was surprised he had to ask. “Why, all of it. We’ve decided we can carry Pete, Junior, for the next two years. That is, as long as he’s the only one in college.”
“I thought you might be considering some of it for immediate expenditure.”
“Oh, no.” Mary shook her head decidedly. “Pete keeps us going very nicely, and we’d hate to change our style of living any more than we have to. Besides, you’d be surprised at how many extra expenses the sponsor is picking up. Do you realize they’ve given me a hairdresser?”
By no effort of will could Thatcher recall her coiffure in Chicago. Now, however, artful tendrils descended down her cheeks and cascaded onto her shoulders.
“I expect you noticed,” she pressed him.
Cautiously he admitted seeing something different.
“Awful, isn’t it? I’m supposed to be part of the back-to-nature movement,” she confided.
“I thought you were supposed to be pushing fertilizer and grass seed.”
Mary grinned. “It’s bigger than that. I’m practically Mother Earth. You should see the clothes they’ve gotten for me.”
Thatcher was pleased that the sane and cheerful Larrabee attitude was surviving good fortune. After striking gold, too many people harped on the pinpricks associated with their bonanza.
This approval continued right through Thatcher’s introductory lecture covering paperwork, investment goals and trust officer. His critical faculties revived when he buzzed Miss Corsa and she seized the opportunity to relay a message.
“Mr. Withers called and would like to have lunch if you’re free,” she reported. “He’s just back from Buenos Aires.”
As the president of the Sloan Guaranty Trust had been in Argentina for the yachting, Thatcher had a fair notion of what aspects of South American life Brad wanted to describe.
“Just a minute,” he directed, shamelessly turning to the nearest honorable escape. “I hope you’ll be able to join me for lunch, Mrs. Larrabee, after you’re though with Mr. Trinkam.”
Upon her acceptance, he reactivated Miss Corsa and was able to say truthfully, “Tell Mr. Withers I’m already engaged. And would you reserve a table for Mrs. Larrabee and me?”
Whenever Thatcher was entertaining clients or guests who were not part of the financial world, he left the choice of locale to Miss Corsa and she invariably produced a winner. How she did it was a wonder. Except for an occasional meal in honor of a departing employee, Miss Corsa was a stranger to Manhattan’s expense-account restaurants. Raised in a frugal tradition, she did not waste her money on frivolities. Instead she invested it. It was some years since she had approached her employer about purchasing securities through the Sloan.
Thatcher was not likely to forget the episode. His immediate offer of bank counseling services had produced a long thoughtful silence. Miss Corsa had clearly been appraising the available personnel and their capabilities.
“No, thank you, Mr. Thatcher,” she had finally said with her customary composure. “I prefer to plan my own investments.”
And there the matter had rested. But recently curiosity had reared its head. Never in a million years would Thatcher have dreamed of prying into either the amount or the nature of Miss Corsa’s holdings. But, it turned out, that calm rejection had rankled over the years, and he would have given a great deal to ask the statistical department for a performance rating. In fact, several times he had actually reached for the phone until, at the last moment, sanity had stayed his hand.
If Miss Corsa were holding her own or posting a modest improvement over the Trust Department, all would be well. But, God help us, what if she were outperforming the bank two to one? The only logical course of action would be to offer to trade places with her. How much wiser in the long run to let sleeping dogs lie! It was enough that Miss Corsa did her job incomparably well. Let him be grateful for her many excellences, including a sixth sense about restaurants.
Nonetheless Thatcher was rather surprised when he found himself escorting Mary Larrabee to Rockefeller Center and a table with a view of the ice skaters. His qualms were soon allayed.
“I’ve heard about this,” she said happily, “but I never dreamed it would be so much fun to watch.”
Indeed she could scarcely take her eyes off the rink and, throughout the meal, kept reverting to the spectacle before them. “I always thought it would be just children and really professional skaters, but there are a lot of beginners out there,” she observed. “And some of them are as old as I am.”
A chill premonition began to form. All unconsciously, Mrs. Larrabee was edging toward the dividing line that separates spectators from participants. Her next words came as no surprise.
“I suppose they rent skates here,” she suggested, toying with a new idea.
“Yes,” he said so reluctantly that she read his mind.
“Oh, not you,” she told him on a wave of merriment. “But Pete is coming tomorrow, and there’s no reason why he shouldn’t make a fool of himself. Nobody in New York has ever heard of him.”
Thatcher was confirmed in his opinion of Mary Larrabee’s good sense. Still, a little insurance is always welcome and he was quite pleased when an early luncher, on his way to the exit, halted by their table.
“Mrs. Larrabee!” exclaimed Jason Ingersoll. “What a pleasant surprise.”
Jason extended the courtesies so long that Thatcher was almost forced to offer coffee.
“I’m in New York settling the television contract,” Mrs. Larrabee prattled happily as the waiter bustled about. “You have no idea how grateful I am to the Vandam contest for the opportunities it’s given me.”
Jason was more than cordial. “I’m glad everything has worked out. We were afraid the sponsor might have second thoughts, you know, because of the murder and your finding the body and all that. It would have been a real shame if you’d lost out simply by being an innocent bystander.”
It was clear that Vandam’s had revised its initial reaction to the Shawmut abduction of Mary Larrabee. Presumably cooler heads had realized that she would inevitably be touted as the developer of Vandam’s Firecracker, thereby spreading the wealth. But Thatcher was more interested in other modifications of company policy. These casual references by Ingersoll suggested a real departure.
“You see,” said Jason with a display of great frankness, “there’s no way of avoiding the conclusion that Barbara Gunn’s death had something to do with Numero Uno. Now that makes it our problem and Wisconsin Seed’s, but it’s got nothing to do with you. It wouldn’t be right if you got caught up in the undertow.”
He certainly wasn’t getting any argument from Mary Larrabee about that. But, in spite of the engaging smile that he fixed on her, Jason’s li
ttle speech was really directed toward the Sloan.
And, therefore, Thatcher felt that it was only right that the Sloan should respond.
“Everything I hear from Chicago these days implies the police are satisfied with the motive for Barbara Gunn’s death,” he said. “And I must say, the discovery of that $15,000 seems to support their theory.” Mary Larrabee shook her head sadly. “I realize they’ve proved that poor girl was taking bribes, but she didn’t look the type.”
Smoothly Jason used this opening for his own purposes. “She certainly didn’t. You know, I spoke with her a few times at the meetings and she seemed to me remarkably young and impressionable.”
“That’s exactly it,” Mary agreed. “I have a 19 year-old niece who’s a lot more independent and self-reliant than Barbara Gunn was. Patty’s used to making up her own mind, and she doesn’t take the time of day from anyone. But there’s no denying that some of these girls who go straight from their daddy’s house to their husband’s house never do learn to become grown-ups. Poor Barbara probably could have been talked into anything.”
Now that Jason had the conversation where he wanted, Thatcher expected a few pithy allusions to the longstanding association between Scott Wenzel and Barbara Gunn. But no, Jason had other fish to fry.
“I’m afraid so,” he said. “She was very close to being a child. I’ll bet she would have accepted, almost without hesitation, the views of someone older and more authoritative about what was proper and acceptable.”
Thatcher had no intention of playing straight man to somebody else’s comedy act. Deliberately he fielded the wrong cue.
“Like Dr. Pendleton, you mean?” he asked, hiding his amusement. “Mrs. Gunn had known him for years, he’d been the head of the laboratory where she worked, he might well have the status of a father figure.”
Jason, thrown for a loop, hastened to rectify the error. “Good God, I never meant to impugn Dr. Pendleton’s integrity. His reputation alone should—”
Thatcher interrupted the testimonial. “No, of course not,” he said innocently. “I meant someone about his age.”
But once bitten, twice shy. Jason had now decided to do his own dirty work. “Exactly,” he said, refusing the bait.
Only Mary Larrabee was taking every word at face value. “I think you’ve put your finger on it. Barbara didn’t really know what she was getting into. I can tell you one thing. She didn’t have any conception of how valuable that tomato is.”
For once Jason spoke without ulterior motive. “She can’t have,” he said crisply. “If she had, she would have gotten a lot more than $15,000.”
Thatcher had been waiting for someone to point out the disparity between the value of the bribe and the value of the data stolen. “I’ve wondered about that myself,” he admitted.
Mary, who had constituted herself defense counsel for the dead, seized on this ammunition. “That proves it. That poor girl let someone persuade her to do something she thought wasn’t very important and wasn’t very bad. He probably told her that it was the kind of thing that goes on in business all the time, about on a par with selling a mailing list.”
“And the figure of $15,000 was nicely calculated to reassure her,” Thatcher decided. “Big enough to be a real temptation, but small enough so it did not suggest stealing the atom bomb.”
Even Jason was becoming interested in the reconstruction of Barbara Gunn. “Then, when a big lawsuit sprang up, she went to pieces.”
But Mary, gazing into her coffee cup as if she were reading the dregs, disagreed. “It wasn’t that simple. A lot of things piled up on her. When she got to Chicago, everywhere she turned someone was talking about the value of Numero Uno, and not as a feather in some researcher’s cap but in terms of cold cash. She kept telling me she hadn’t realized how big a discovery it was, and I thought she was wondering how a plain little secretary got mixed up in something so earthshaking. But actually she was trying to justify herself. Then the day of the deposition was looming, when she’d have to choose between perjury or admitting what she’d done. Oh, she was scared all right, she was probably afraid of going to jail. But she was guilty too, about what she’d done to the man she’d worked for so long. And then, just to make things more complicated, she also felt betrayed. After all, she’d trusted somebody to advise her and they’d taken advantage of her. The poor thing was going around in circles, and anything could have happened. She might have burst into tears and confessed everything to Mr. Wenzel.”
As Mary Larrabee innocently disclosed her own conviction as to which way the theft had gone, Thatcher had to admire Jason Ingersoll’s response. Smiling wryly, the young man said, “I guess by now the whole world is sure that Numero Uno was really developed in Wisconsin. Naturally we’ve spent a lot of time trying to find alternative explanations, and we’ve come up with some. But I don’t want you to think we’re blind. Five years is a long time ago, but the present management at Vandam’s is determined to get to the bottom of this business. We’ve decided to press forward with the patent suit as the best way to bring everything out into the open. I’m confident that presenting the facts and letting an impartial authority decide the issue is the only course open to us.”
Like so many ringing declarations, this one, in Thatcher’s opinion, addressed the wrong problem.
“Very commendable,” he commented. “But I doubt whether a patent court is the appropriate tribunal to determine a question of bribery, let alone murder. And certainly not on the basis of the evidence before it. In this case, I understand, that boils down to two sets of identical lab records. It’s hard to see how that is going to result in a flood of light.”
Jason took his time formulating a reply while his companions sat silently. Thatcher was waiting and Mary Larrabee, who was not interested in patent suits, had allowed her attention to return to the rink. She was pleasurably absorbed in the sight of a rubicund middle-aged man in a motoring cap coming down hard after an inglorious tumble.
“Not without cooperation from us,” Jason agreed at last. “But we’re willing to range more widely if that seems promising. So Dick and I have come to New York to help the lawyers get ready for Washington. Even Milton insisted on coming. Of course he’s not with the company anymore and I don’t really know why he’s here, but he seems to feel he has a stake in the outcome.”
Rarely had Thatcher seen a knife inserted so delicately. “No doubt after his many years at Vandam’s, your cousin identifies with its interests,” he suggested.
“That could be it. And it goes without saying how much we appreciate his loyalty and support,” Jason said staunchly before shaking his head. “Although I can’t imagine what he thinks he can do.”
One of the things Milton was doing was keeping in touch with Earl Sanders, who by now had moved his command post from Chicago to New York. Many of the phrases pouring from Milton’s lips into the phone might have been stolen from his cousin—with suitable modification.
“. . . talked to the girl myself at the meetings. . . . She didn’t have any idea of her own in her head. ...”
“So what? We already knew she was just a cat’s-paw.”
“These girls! Only one thing on their minds. . . . Show them a handsome young man and they lose whatever sense they had. ...”
“Yes, yes.”
“... She came from a very limited background. She’d be flattered by the attentions of someone outside her world . . . lose her head completely and take his word for gospel. . . .”
By the time that Thatcher got through to Sanders, each had a budget of news for the other.
“Jason has just been trying to persuade me that a man like his cousin Milton would have had no trouble bribing Barbara Gunn into a little simple theft. She would have been overawed by an older, authoritative man,” Thatcher got in first. “Furthermore, Milton has come rushing to New York because, for some mysterious reason, he has a stake in the outcome of the patent suit.”
“What do you know!” marveled Sander
s. “Milton has just been telling me how she would have been a pushover for a handsome young preppy type.”
When Captain McNabb had said there was skirmishing between Jason and Milton, Thatcher had not realized it amounted to open warfare.
“Tell me,” he demanded, “does this precious pair realize the game they’re playing? This is not a matter of managerial incompetence we’re discussing. Somebody poisoned Barbara Gunn.
“They’re setting each other up for a murder charge.”
“Milton doesn’t realize a damn thing beyond the end of his nose,” Sanders retorted. “That old fool is so hell-bent on worming his way back into the company, he’d do anything. But what about Ingersoll? He’s supposed to be playing with a full deck.”
In spite of his irritation, Thatcher carefully reviewed Jason’s program. “He wants Milton firmly saddled with the theft in the minds of Standard Foods and the family. Then, with the patent suit out of the way, he’d like to see the police investigation bog down and Barbara Gunn’s death join the ranks of unsolved crimes,” he predicted. “To do him justice, I don’t think he’s trying to railroad Milton into death row.”
Sanders had justifiable grounds for displeasure. “That means they both want the court to decide Wenzel developed Numero Uno. Boy, that’s some subsidiary we’ve got! Do you wonder I’m going with them to Washington?”
“You’d better do more than that.”
“I will! I’m going to read the riot act to Dick Vandam. Then I’m going to bird-dog him every step of the way!”
Chapter 23
Encouraging New Growth
EVEN Miss Corsa, a true believer in the priority that attached to any Vandam concern, was growing recalcitrant by 11:30 the following morning. Once again the phone had rung, once again she had laid down her dictation book to answer it. For almost two hours she and Thatcher, with the best will in the world, had been unable to make inroads on the pile of correspondence.