by Nan Lyons
“That, Achille, for your future reference, is known as a mistake. Something that happens at the last moment contrary to one’s plan is a mistake and you have made a mistake. Oh my Cod. After all I went through! To have you make a mistake at the last minute. Oh, how like you that is, Achille. You send me corrected galleys and I find seven mistakes in them. I suppose I shouldn’t have expected you to carry out the killing of the chefs any better than you carry out the preparation of your manuscripts.”
“Estella, listen to me. There was nothing I could do.”
“Life is filled with alternatives, Achille. I’m sure you could have done something. Surely you could have done something other than come here to upset me. And you came here on the wrong day!”
“Estella, the mixer, and not I, killed the wrong person.”
“An innocent person?”
“Yes.”
“Dreadful.” Estella walked to her desk and sat down. “The most dreadful mistake of all.” She put her hand to her forehead. “An innocent person. You’ve never killed an innocent person before. We’ve always been so civilized about it. Who was it?”
“Hildegarde Kohner.”
“Oh.” Estella lit another cigarette and fanned the match out slowly, a puzzled look on her face. “Her?” She exhaled a long stream of smoke and then said, almost cheerily, “Well, that’s not so bad. I never liked her. But a mistake is still a mistake, Achille. It was unspeakably careless of you.”
“It might not have happened if we had followed my original idea to lock Natasha inside a freezer.”
“Such a boring way to die.”
“But it might have worked. And I could have finished off my dinner without indigestion.”
“Well, then I guess it’s back to the old boring board.”
“Estella, you’re ridiculing me.”
She smiled and put her hand to her breast in mock amazement. “I? Ridicule you? No, darling, you must be thinking of a hundred other people.”
“Estella, I’ve come here because I need your help.”
“But you’ve always needed my help, Achille. From the very beginning. Well, what kind of help do you want now? Do you want more money to start another magazine? Do you want a loan to buy a freezer? Perhaps you’d like me to lose the weight for you? By the way, darling, you don’t look any thinner to me. Have you really been dieting, or are you still glutting yourself like a Périgord goose?”
“I demand you stop this at once,” he shouted. “Don’t you realize that the police will be after me?”
“Why? You didn’t mean to kill Hildegarde. It was an accident. However, you did make a serious mistake, Achille. You should have stayed there as we had planned. As though you were innocent. Instead, you’ve focused needless attention on yourself. But they have no evidence. There’s nothing they can prove. I’m the one who bought you the false passports, the mixer, and the explosive. And as long as you’re a good boy, all of Estella’s horses and all of Estella’s men will keep little Achille safe again.”
He watched her as she walked from window to window correcting the way the drapes were hung. Estella was right. What could they prove? He could say he had run from Harrods because he was upset. That he wanted to see Estella. And that was the truth. But she thought he had made a mistake. Suppose she sought revenge and abandoned him?
“Estella, if you say anything to the police, ever, you will become an accessory to the murders. They will take you out of your robin’s egg and put you into a small, dark, damp cell in which you will spend the rest of your life. The only mistakes you’ll chart will be those of the rats who gnaw hungrily at your tattered clothes. The police will lock you up forever.”
“They can’t. It was you who made the mistake. It was your mistake, not mine. Give me back my list.”
Achille handed it to her. She tore it into shreds and sat down at her desk. She took a fresh sheet of blue notepaper and dipped her pen into the ink. “Here,” she said, holding out the freshly scratched note, “I’ve revised my instructions.” He took the note and stared disbelievingly at the scrawled message.
He had lost Estella forever. The finality was overwhelming. The grief unbearable. He said for the last time, “Estella, I have always loved you.”
“And I have endured you, Achille. I don’t want to see you any more. You are repellent to me. You’ve allowed too many mistakes. Seven typographical errors in one issue! God knows how you managed to keep the murders quiet.” She went to the file cabinet and unlocked it. She opened the second drawer. It, too, was empty except for a single sheet of blue notepaper. “My count is twelve photographers, twenty-eight proofreaders, six editors, fourteen printers, and the secretary who spilled tea on one of the galley sheets. How did you manage to kill them without a mistake?”
“Estella, for years I have been taking your little blue notes home with me. Kill the photographer. Kill the proofreader. Kill the editor. Kill the printer. Do you know, Estella, what I did with those little blue notes? I threw them away. I tossed them out I dismissed your instructions. Listen to me carefully, Estella. I did not kill them.”
“Well, then, who did?”
“No one did. They are all still very much alive. The twelve photographers, the twenty-eight proofreaders …”
Estella stepped back. She put her hand to her mouth and screamed. “You betrayed me! You told me they were dead.”
He smiled. “They are alive, Estella. At this very moment, they are taking out-of-focus photographs, they are misspelling words, they are making mistake after mistake after mistake.”
“Liar! You told me you had killed them. Achille, tell me they’re dead!”
“Some of them are even hyphenating words incorrectly.”
“Oh, my God. They’re all still alive. Then the only one who was killed was the first one. The one I killed. You’ve lied to me all these years. You never killed anyone for me. You only killed for yourself. What kind of marriage is that?” She began tearing all of her blue notepaper into shreds.
“And, Estella, there’s something else I haven’t told you. Something you certainly should know. There were not one hundred and twelve errors. There were one hundred and thirteen. The one hundred and thirteenth was such an obvious one. How could you have missed it?”
“There were one hundred and twelve!” She began throwing the galley sheets at Achille. “You’re trying to destroy me. But no matter how hard you try, I’m on to you now. I know they’re alive. And I’ll get them. I’ll correct every last mistake.”
A nurse ran into the room. “Mrs. van Golk, what is it?”
“Get him out of here. He’s a liar. Get him out of here. It’s Wednesday. He’s made a mistake. He’s not supposed to be here. It’s Wednesday.”
“Please, Mr. van Golk.”
“They’re all alive. He didn’t kill them for me. They’re all still out there. I’ve got to stop them. I’ve got to get out of here.”
Two male attendants ran into the room and held Estella while the nurse injected her with a tranquilizer. Achille’s eyes filled with tears. He crumpled the note on which Estella had written KILL YOURSELF and dropped it to the floor.
“Get him out of here,” she shouted as he turned to leave. “It’s not Thursday.” Achille walked down the corridor. Frightened faces peered out from open doorways as Estella’s screams were heard.
“Monsieur.”
Achille had not seen the police approaching him. “What is it?”
“We must ask you to come with us at once. Scotland Yard has ordered your immediate return to London.”
“Indeed.” But there was no evidence, he thought. Estella was right, as always. There was no evidence. He had just destroyed the last of it.
NEW SCOTLAND YARD
Division of Homicide
1 October
From: Detective Inspector Carmody
To: Inspector Gilli (Rome)
Inspector Griege (Paris)
Inspector Friemond (Geneva)
Enclosed you will
find the one hundred and sixty-three (163) documents and statements relating to the case of THE CROWN VS. ACHILLE VAN GOLK. I greatly appreciate your co-operation in permitting access to your files as well as for having obtained supplementary statements for us. I do not believe we would have been able to prepare charges against van Golk for the death of Hildegarde Kohner were it not for our ability to relate her death to a larger pattern.
Indeed this has been a most difficult case to assemble on all levels. Our only lead was Miss O’Brien’s testimony that van Golk had told her the killer was an accountant named Arnold Tresting. (Tresting subsequently suffered a fatal heart attack while sleeping in the cinema.) Our only possible witness is the accused’s wife, an incurable paranoid. As you will see from the documents enclosed, we have tried to avoid submitting her statements as evidence, although without them we could not have prepared any case whatsoever.
We have begun with the accused’s medical report, in which his personal physician states that his life was threatened by his dietary habits. The statements of our psychiatrists each characterize van Golk as an extremely disturbed personality easily capable of acts of violence.
Our position was that the accused sought to avenge his declining physical condition by murdering the chefs whose food he valued most. We have the testimony of seven witnesses to a celebration prepared by Kohner, Fenegretti, Moulineaux, and O’Brien in response to the accused’s request for his favorite dinner. The theory that the accused could have planned to kill each chef symbolically according to the dish each prepared, and in the sequence of the courses themselves, was upheld by statements from our psychiatrists, and from the accused’s wife. We were advised that Mrs. van Golk’s statements are not automatically to be discounted because of her mental condition, but that we would be ill advised to try to present such testimony to a jury.
We have been able to establish only the following:
DEATH OF LOUIS KOHNER
1. Van Golk has no witnesses to verify his alibi that he was at home asleep.
2. We do not have any witnesses who saw him at the scene of the crime.
DEATH OF NUTTI FENEGRETTI
1. Airline records show that van Golk flew from London to Geneva and back.
2. We have evidence that Mrs. van Golk secured a false Swiss passport, containing a picture of the accused, in the name of Hugo Victor. (We have not been able to find this passport and presume it has been destroyed.)
3. Dr. Enstein has confirmed he agreed to provide the accused with an alibi for that afternoon, but clearly the doctor did not know the accused’s motivation. Although the accused flew to Geneva allegedly to see his wife, he did not see her that afternoon.
4. Airline records show a passenger named Hugo Victor traveled from Geneva to Rome and back within the time period the accused was allegedly in Geneva.
5. Estimated time of death of Fenegretti coincides with the time Hugo Victor was in Rome.
DEATH OF JEAN-CLAUDE MOULINEAUX
1. The accused has witnesses who saw him board a train to Brighton, and who saw him leave Victoria Station after allegedly returning from Brighton. There are no witnesses who actually saw him in Brighton.
2. We have evidence that Mrs. van Golk secured a false British passport, containing a picture of the accused, in the name of Hardy Thomas. (We have not been able to find this passport either.)
3. During the time the accused was allegedly in Brighton, airline records show that a passenger named Hardy Thomas traveled from London to Paris and back.
4. Estimated time of death of Moulineaux coincides with the time Hardy Thomas was in Paris.
DEATH OF HILDEGARDE KOHNER
1. We have evidence that Mrs. van Golk procured an electric mixer fitted with a detonating device, as well as an amount of plastic explosive known as C3.
2. We have statements that someone impersonating a female employee of the BBC arranged for and insisted upon the use of the mixer which contained the bomb.
3. Our psychiatrists concur that if the accused had been innocent, he would not have fled from Harrods in order to see his wife in Geneva.
We based our case on the fact that the accused was in collusion with his wife, taking full advantage of her distressed mental state. We argued it was the intent of the accused to murder Natasha O’Brien and that Mrs. Kohner was killed due to her unexpected use of the mixer.
Needless to say, we would not have been able to construct the plot this far were it not for your mutual co-operation. It is with regret, therefore, that I report to you the final disposition of this case.
We were prepared that a case predicated so heavily upon psychiatric supposition, and supported only by the testimony of the accused’s insane wife, might well be dismissed before being brought to trial. However, we were not prepared for the suggestion from sources close to 10 Downing Street (who assured us the matter had NOT been discussed with the Royal Family) that we negotiate with the defendant and accept his solicitor’s compromise that we refrain from pressing charges if the accused would admit himself to an institution for psychiatric care. (It appears that Mrs. van Golk is related to the Foreign Secretary, and the accused has himself been a frequent visitor to Buckingham Palace.) I was assured that if we had a stronger case, under no circumstances would there have been any suggestion of compromise.
Achille van Golk is presently a patient at St. Anthony’s Clinic, where we have him under surveillance until his departure within a few days to the Enstein Clinic in Geneva.
Although it was decided, against my judgment, to close this case, I realize you are not bound by considerations which determined the disposition in London. While I cannot, in an official capacity, provoke any further local investigation, I most certainly would be bound to honor any such requests you might have while preparing your own cases which I presume you are developing with utmost dispatch. Surely, any co-operation on my part with your own local investigations is merely reciprocating the courtesy shown to me, and cannot be viewed as contrary to policy.
Of course, it is obvious that in a sense our investigation in London has precluded any effective conclusion to this case. We have been advised by van Golk’s solicitors that if any charges are pressed, at any time, the plea would be innocence by reason of insanity.
Chapter 18
The band was playing Keep Your Sunny Side Up! American Good Foods had rented the ballroom at the Dorchester in London for its press party announcing the opening of the H. Dumpty chain. The room was filled with reporters, cameramen, food editors, restaurant people, executives, and the customary “fillers” who made a gathering into a crowd. Four chefs stood in a circle in the center of the room and made omelettes. Waiters dressed as Humpty Dumpty carried large trays laden with glasses of champagne. Huge baskets were filled with yellow and white sunflowers, daisies, and chrysanthemums.
“Is it true, Mr. Ogden, that your firm has funded a study to disprove the dangers of egg cholesterol?”
“Well, how many chickens have coronaries?” Max smiled and drank some of the ginger ale that was in his champagne glass.
“And what about your chefs? Mr. Ogden, are they all imported from France?”
“Just our head chef, Auguste. All the others will be trained by him.”
“Someone said you had tried to hire each of the chefs who were killed recently.”
“Why don’t we forget about that. It’s last month’s news.”
“How will H. Dumpty be different from the other omelette restaurants in London? Why do you think we need another fast-food outlet?”
“Fast food is only for people who are fasting. We’re different We’re using only fresh ingredients. Nothing in a tin can, nothing frozen, nothing packaged.”
“Isn’t that rather un-American of you?”
“Good business is never un-American.”
“How about a picture of you making an omelette?”
“I thought you’d never ask.” Max began walking through the crowd, smiling, saying his excuse me’s as he
nodded hello to people he had never before seen. Word spread among the photographers that he would be making an omelette, and they began converging upon the circle of chefs. Max walked over to Auguste. “I’ll give you a dollar later,” he whispered. “I want to make one.”
“You will ruin everything,” Auguste hissed angrily.
“Two dollars.”
Auguste shrugged his shoulders and stepped aside. “Okay, gang. Here’s how you do it. Take two eggs from Mother Nature’s specially designed ‘crack pack,’ tickle them with a steel fork, and add a teaspoon of water. Use a seasoned pan that’s been doing nothing but omelettes, add butter—not margarine—and get it really hot. Let the butter bubble and then, before it turns brown, add the eggs. Scratch their backs with the fork a few times and start folding. No omelette should take longer to make than thirty seconds. Fold it out onto a plate and voilà!’ Who’s daring enough to taste it?”
“I am.”
Max turned quickly. It was Natasha. She smiled at him and extended her arm to take the plate. He stared back, smiling broadly. Natasha wore a metallic-silver-and-brown zebra-striped pants suit. Her beige satin blouse matched the turban on her head. Without taking her eyes from him, she cut into the center of the omelette.
“Aren’t you going to taste it, Miss O’Brien?” a reporter asked.
“Where have you been since the murders, Miss O’Brien?”
“Are you two planning to get married again?”
Max walked around the table and took Natasha’s hand. They made their way through the crowd, out of the ballroom, and closed the door behind them. Max took her in his arms and they kissed, holding each other tightly. Then Natasha slowly rubbed her cheek against his.
Max sniffed and cleared his throat. “Well, you sure screwed up my press party.” They kissed again, but were jostled apart by someone trying to open the door. “Let’s find someplace we can be alone.” He took her hand and began walking down the carpeted hallway looking for a door, for a place to be alone. He brought her fingers to his lips and kissed them. With his other hand, he opened the first door he found.