by Dan Willis
Alex reached for the telephone, but before he could pick it up, the intercom on his desk buzzed. It made a clicking noise, then Sherry’s voice came out of the little speaker.
“Alex, there’s a Detective Nicholson here to— Hey! You can’t go back there.”
The intercom cut off and Alex rose with a sigh. Clearly Nicholson was in a hurry. When he walked around his desk and opened the office door, however, he found himself face to red face with Earnest Harcourt, the government man.
“There you are, you thieving rat,” he fumed, trying to push Alex backward into his office. At six foot one, Alex was no lightweight and he just stood his ground.
“Mr. Harcourt,” he said, putting on the most insincere smile he could manage. “It’s a pleasure to see you. What brings you to my office this fine day?”
“Don’t you give me that, you charlatan. I’ll have your license for this.”
Alex looked past the unintelligible G-man and found Detective Nicholson coming along behind him. The Detective looked irritated, but not with Alex.
“Lockerby,” he said, nodding.
“Well what are we standing out here for?” Alex said, as if it hadn’t been him blocking the door all along. “Come in. Make yourselves comfortable.”
He finally stepped back, and Harcourt barged in, followed by Nicholson. They each took a chair in front of Alex’s desk while Alex made a show of checking the hall as if he expected there to be more in their party. Satisfied that he’d let Harcourt steam long enough, he closed the door and walked back around his massive, leather-topped desk.
“What’s all this about?” he asked Harcourt as he sat down.
The government man had been quivering with rage and he popped out of his seat as if he’d been burned.
“You know very well why I’m here,” he fumed. “You were alone in her office and now they’re missing. You’re the only one who could have taken them.”
Harcourt was so mad he wasn’t speaking in complete sentences and Alex had to pinch his thigh to keep from smiling.
“I assume you’re talking about Miss Cartwright,” he said. “I already told you I didn’t take anything from her apartment.”
“Then where are they?” he raged, getting spittle on Alex’s desk. “The police don’t have them, I checked.”
Since Harcourt had mentioned Alex being alone, he must be referring to Alex’s time in Miss Cartwright’s office. Obviously some of her files were missing.
“Mr. Harcourt,” Alex said with the exaggerated patience usually reserved for toddlers and drunks. “I told you that I hadn’t had a chance to go through Miss Cartwright’s files.”
“Well, files are missing, and you’re the only one left who could have taken them.”
Alex resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose and sigh.
“Has it occurred to you, Mr. Harcourt, that Alice Cartwright was murdered? Most people are murdered for a reason,” he went on. “Maybe the killer was looking for the missing files. Maybe that’s why they’re missing…because he took them.”
Harcourt looked stunned for a minute, then shook his head.
“You said Miss Cartwright was killed over the math on her blackboard,” he said.
“That is a possibility,” Detective Nicholson spoke up. “But it’s by no means definite, as I tried to tell you back at the station. And in the cab ride over here.”
Alex almost smirked at the wounded tone in the Detective’s voice.
“Actually,” Alex said, “I’m pretty sure Miss Cartwright wasn’t killed because of the math on her board.”
“Oh,” Harcourt and Nicholson said together.
Alex pulled the pages he’d torn from his notebook out of his pocket and tossed them on his desk.
“I forgot I wrote these,” he lied. “But when I found them in the pocket of my suit coat, I showed them to the head of the mathematics department over at Columbia.”
“What!” Harcourt shouted, snatching the papers off the desk. “This could be top secret government information. Giving it out is treason, Lockerby.”
“Relax, Mr. Harcourt,” Alex said, raising his voice for emphasis. “It’s not secret anything.” He stood and pointed to the main equation, the one Alice Cartwright had written large in the center of her musings. “That is called Fermat’s Conjecture, it’s a kind of mathematical puzzle that’s been around since the sixteen-hundreds. Professor Phillips, who runs the math department, assured me that no one would be killed over this.”
“Then what—” Harcourt began but Alex cut him off.
“It’s far more likely that Miss Cartwright was killed because of that top secret work you just mentioned, the work she was doing for the government. Unless she’s got a violent lover,” Alex added. “Then my money’s on him.”
“No relations of any kind,” Nicholson said. “Miss Cartwright was quite the homebody. According to her neighbors, she never went out after work and only to church on the weekends.”
Harcourt sat down heavily with a stunned look on his face.
“I have to call my office,” he said. “Let them know the files are no longer secure.”
“I don’t think you need to do that yet,” Alex said.
Both men across the desk stared at him.
“Why not?” Nicholson said. “Unless you have the files, they aren’t accounted for in Miss Cartwright’s house.”
“I don’t have them,” Alex assured him. “But I think I know where you can find them.”
“I don’t see how,” Nicholson replied.
“You said it yourself,” Alex said. “Miss Cartwright was a woman of regular habits who never went out after work.”
“Why is that important?” Harcourt demanded.
“Because,” Alex said, “she never went out after work. We assumed Alice worked from home because of her blackboards, but what if those boards were for her private musings on Fermat’s Conjecture?”
“Then she must have been going out somewhere to do her work,” Nicholson said, nodding.
“What!” Harcourt exploded. “Are you telling me she has an office somewhere? And you didn’t know that?”
“I only just met the woman,” Alex said. “Actually, come to think of it, I’ve never met her; the coroner removed her body before I even arrived.”
“So?” Harcourt pressed. “You’re supposed to be a detective.”
“Me too,” Nicholson said with a growl. “And my keen detective skills are telling me that the man she worked for, who brought her math to work on for who-knows-how-long, should damn well know where she works.”
Harcourt sat with his mouth open like a fish.
“I was wondering that myself, Mr. Harcourt,” Alex said. “Why is it that, by your own admission, you gave Miss Cartwright sensitive government information without knowing where she took it?”
“I…” Harcourt started, but his voice cracked, and he had to start again. “I work in Albany,” he managed. “I have to take the train to get into the city, so I would always meet Alice on the weekends.”
“When she was home,” Nicholson said. He shook his head and rolled his eyes.
Alex agreed with the sentiment. As much as he hated to admit it, though, Harcourt simply wasn’t smart enough to cook up a lie that convincing on the spot. Most likely he was telling the truth.
“Well, Mr. Harcourt,” Alex said. “I wouldn’t be calling in your superiors just yet.”
“Don’t tell me what to do, scribbler,” he snapped.
Alex shrugged at that.
“Well, if you do call them, do me a favor and make sure I’m in the room when you tell them you don’t know where Alice Cartwright was working on their super-secret government math. That ought to be a hoot.”
Harcourt turned green at the thought.
“What am I going to do?” he asked, before he thought better of it.
“I’d suggest you start playing ball,” Alex said, leaning across the desk. “Cooperate with Detective Nicholson and go through
Miss Cartwright’s apartment with a fine-toothed comb. There must be a reference to her office somewhere; a lease agreement, record of a rent payment, check her key ring, maybe you can get a room or building number.”
“Yes,” Harcourt said, leaping to his feet. “We need to get over there right away.”
With that, he turned on his heel and left the office without even waiting for Nicholson to stand up.
“I don’t envy you this case,” Alex said, as the Detective stood and put away the note pad he’d been using during the meeting.
“Are you kidding?” Nicholson said with a predatory grin. “He’s terrified. He’ll do anything I tell him now.”
Alex stuck out his hand and Nicholson shook it.
“If you run across any magical problems, you know where to find me.”
Nicholson thanked him, then picked up his hat and headed out into the hall after Harcourt.
11
Stolen Property
Alex waited a few minutes before digging into Sherry’s list. Truth be told, he wanted to make sure Harcourt and Nicholson were actually gone. To pass the time, he opened the polished oak drawer in his magnificent desk and pulled out a bottle and a tumbler. Just like former days, he always kept something to drink handy. Unlike former days, this was a bottle of twelve-year-old single malt.
Alex poured out two fingers’ worth of the amber liquid in the tumbler, then leaned back in his chair and sipped it. Cheap Scotch always reminded Alex of cough medicine, but the good stuff had a taste that made him think of fine wood, oiled leather, and beautiful women. It was worth what he paid for it.
Closing his eyes, Alex just sat, enjoying the experience of the whiskey. It was something he could do for an hour if he let himself, but he had work to do, so he inhaled deeply, then finished his drink and sat up.
Sherry’s notes had a list of all the warehouses she had called, to whom she spoke, and the names of the businesses that had property stolen. Further down she had listed the property owners, the address of their businesses, to whom she spoke, and what had been stolen. It was all laid out perfectly in neat, orderly rows.
Iggy would have been proud.
At the bottom of the page, Sherry had compiled her results into a list of everything that had been stolen. As Alex read it, he couldn’t help thinking there must have been a mistake. Of the four entries, only one was decently valuable, and none of them would be used together. He’d assumed the thieves were looking for specific items for a specific buyer, but this made no sense at all.
According to Sherry, the stolen items were Su Hi’s alchemy ingredients, some surgical tools manufactured in Belgium, and several bottles of oil from Italy.
With nothing on the list standing out, Alex picked up his telephone and dialed the first number on the list, Fransson Medical Instruments. The owner, one Hans Fransson, told Alex that he received shipments of specialty surgical tools about once a quarter, and they weren’t exactly hot sellers. Most of the buyers tended to be new doctors setting up practices. Nothing about the shipment was special or important to Hans, so the tools were a dead end.
Next on the list was Enzo Romero, who made a name for himself creating perfume for the fashionable ladies of the Core. Sherry’s notes indicated that she’d spoken with his secretary and she hadn’t known much beyond the fact that what had been taken were ‘oils from Italy.’ Alex didn’t know much about perfume, but he imagined it was similar to alchemy and that meant some of those oils might be expensive or even rare. He resolved to call and find someone at the perfume company who could give him a better answer.
That turned out to be easier said than done. Enzo Romero’s secretary seemed to exist solely to prevent anyone from talking to Enzo, or anyone else of any importance at the company. Frustrated, Alex hung up.
If he was going to have a shot at finding Hi Su’s missing herbs, however, the perfume oils were probably his only chance.
Glancing at the address, Alex contemplated going down to the office and taking his chances that he wouldn’t be thrown out. Fashion people tended to be eccentric and picky.
There was something interesting about the address, though. It was only half a block from the House of Leone. Alex had met famous fashion designer, Maybelle Leone when he was investigating the decade-old murder of Broadway starlet Dolly Anderson. She had been friends with Dolly and had been eager to help once she understood what Alex was doing.
It presented an interesting opportunity, so Alex fished out his address book from his center desk drawer and dialed the number for the House of Leone. The secretary who answered the phone didn’t sound familiar, but if the tabloids were to be believed, turnover was a fact of life in the fashion industry. It took almost ten minutes to explain what he wanted to the woman, but once she understood, Maybelle herself came on the line.
“Alexander,” she said, as if he were an old friend she hadn’t seen in ages. “How are you? I recognized your friend from the police in the newspaper story about Dolly, and I know you helped him with that. I can’t tell you how grateful I am that you finally got justice for my dear friend.”
She said all of that with the air of someone giving a speech to a crowded theater, but Alex didn’t mind, since he wanted a favor. He spent another ten minutes recounting the events leading up to the arrest of Ethan Nelson, Dolly’s old lover who murdered her out of jealousy. When he finished, he didn’t give Maybelle any room to brush him off.
“I’m calling because I need to talk to Enzo Romero about a case. I can’t get past his secretary, so I was hoping you knew him.”
“Well of course I know him, darling,” Maybelle said with a smile Alex could hear. “I’ll give him a call and let him know to expect you in an hour. I have to go now, darling. Don’t be a stranger.”
With that she hung up, leaving Alex chuckling in his seat. Maybelle was a force of nature, and he had no doubt that when he showed up at Enzo’s business, the man himself would be there to greet him.
Since the fashion district was only a twenty-minute cab ride away, Alex was tempted to refill his whisky glass. After a moment’s prevarication he decided against it. He had at least half an hour for lunch before visiting Enzo and he intended to take advantage of it. Grabbing his hat, he said goodbye to Sherry and headed out. Since the Core was near the fashion district, Alex stopped at an upscale cafe for a Reuben sandwich and a coffee.
As he perused the paper and ate, he couldn’t help reflecting on the early days of his career. Back then he always seemed to be running from one place to another, chasing down whatever cases he could get. Stopping for lunch back then usually involved a stale sandwich from an automat, eaten while Alex waited for a crawler.
Dropping a dollar on the counter for his meal, Alex was amazed how far he’d come from his basement office in Harlem.
The office of Enzo Romero was only a few blocks away, but Alex was running a bit late, so he caught a cab and made it just in time. Like many of the businesses in the fashion district, Enzo’s offices had a sales floor on the ground level. Racks of decorative bottles, some with fully formed glass figures on top, were scattered around the room on polished chrome shelves. Among all this sparkling opulence, immaculately dressed ladies browsed. Occasionally they would request one of the many attractive young salesgirls to spray some concoction or other on their wrists as they went. Alex asked a perky young brunette behind the counter where the offices were and was directed to a staircase behind a door tucked into an alcove.
When he reached the offices, he was greeted by a sturdy-looking woman with her dark hair up in a tight bun who sat behind an equally sturdy-looking desk. Alex introduced himself to the spinsterly woman and found she was a totally different person than she’d been on the phone. Clearly Maybelle Leone had made an impression.
“Mr. Romero is expecting you,” she said, indicating a large set of double doors at the end of a short hallway.
Alex thanked her and made his way to the doors, knocking politely before pulling one open. Based on the
rest of the building, Alex expected Enzo’s office to be full of wood paneling with a massive desk made of mahogany. What he found was a workshop that was only a little fancier than the basement where Dr. Kellin had her lab. Rows of tables lined the walls, with all kinds of equipment and glassware on them.
Alex recognized evaporators and distillers, and there were several jars over open flames, bubbling away. If he hadn’t expected the sight of the room, Alex simply wasn’t prepared for the smell. It was like a truck carrying pastries had crashed into a flower shop, leaving a sickly sweet, cloying odor that assaulted Alex as he entered.
In the center of this mess stood a thick, blocky man with large hands, a square jaw, flat nose, and a well-coiffed mass of gray hair. As Alex entered, he turned from where he had been making notes in a blank book.
“Are you the person dear Maybelle told me about?” he said in an Italian accent that was just a bit too thick to be credible.
“I’m Alex Lockerby,” he said, holding out one of his cards. “I’m a private detective.”
Enzo Romero waved the card away with a look of disinterest.
“I don’t remember needing a detective,” he said. “Does Maybelle think I have some skeletons in my closet that need the airing out?”
“No, sir,” Alex said. “I’m here about your missing oils, the ones you ordered from Italy.”
Enzo gave him a penetrating look.
“I am familiar with my missing supplies,” he said, not bothering to hide his irritation. “I have already requested another shipment, so the matter is done.”
“That will take months to get here,” Alex said. “It might be possible for me to find your missing supplies.”
That got Enzo’s attention.
“How?” he asked after a pause.
Alex explained about his finding rune and asked if Enzo had any particular attachment to any of his missing supplies. Since both the supplies and Enzo came from Italy, Alex had high hopes.
“Most of them are typical enough,” he said with a dismissive gesture. “But the benzoin comes from bushes in my family’s vineyard. I tended the plants myself as a boy.”