McNally's Dilemma

by Lawrence Sanders

  “How did she get into the house?” I asked incredulously.

  “The tonic, Mr. Archy. She told the men at the gate she had to deliver the tonic.”

  “And they let her through?”

  “But of course, and not a moment too soon. Poor Hattie was in desperate need—”

  “Is the coffee ready, Ursi?” I broke in, needing it more than poor Hattie needed Mrs. Marsden’s tonic.

  “Almost, Mr. Archy.”

  “So Hattie told Mrs. Marsden what transpired at the house last night and Mrs. Marsden has passed it along, house to house, on her way back to the Horowitz place.” I spoke as one who knows.

  “Isn’t it terrible, Mr. Archy. Poor Mrs. Williams.”

  No one had yet said “Poor Mr. Williams,” I noted.

  “When I went in to air the guest room, like I do every morning, I saw we had company and told Mr. McNally.” Ursi spoke as she poured my coffee. “That was before Mrs. Marsden’s visit, when we only suspected who the guest might be. We didn’t know you had gone to fetch Mrs. Williams’s child until Mrs. Marsden told us—she having got that news from poor Hattie.”

  My head was spinning, but not too fast for me to protest, “She’s not a child, Ursi. Twenty-one, at least.” I accepted the steaming cup of java with thanks and joined Jamie at the table.

  “Can I get you a proper breakfast, Mr. Archy?” Ursi offered.

  “No time, but I could hang around long enough for a toasted muffin.”

  Father knew, but obviously had not told them, who occupied our guest room. If he had, he would have had to tell them about the murder before he knew all the facts, which was not Prescott McNally’s style. Also, I’m sure, he didn’t want to upset Mother with the news sooner than was necessary. “So why,” I thought aloud, “did you suspect it was Veronica before Mrs. Marsden played Paul Revere?”

  “Because of Hobo.” It was Jamie who answered.

  “Hobo?” My stomach quivered, threatening to eject the hot coffee I was pouring into it.

  “When Hobo attacked your friend parking the Mercedes...”

  Thanks to Lolly’s mention of Binky being in need of a rabies shot, I didn’t have to hear the rest of Jamie’s story.

  “What a ruckus!” Ursi exclaimed, serving my muffin, which I doubted I could get down, let alone keep down.

  “When I heard the racket,” Jamie continued, “I went down to see what was going on. Hobo had him by the ankle and I had all to do to shake him loose.” I wanted to ask Jamie if it was Hobo or Binky who got shook, but refrained.

  “What a sight,” Ursi said. “I watched from the window, ready to call the police if need be, but then I recognized your friend, Mr. Archy, and told Jamie it was okay.”

  “Wasn’t there someone with Binky?”

  “Yes,” Jamie said. “There was a car behind the Mercedes, but the boy in it wouldn’t get out to help the other lad.”

  “He was afraid of Hobo biting him, too,” Ursi said. “I offered to wash and bandage the boy’s leg, but he refused my help. Just drove off with his friend.”

  I had the disquieting feeling that I was trapped inside an Olsen and Johnson movie.

  “This Binky said the car belonged to Veronica Manning and he was delivering it on your orders, Mr. Archy. Then he limped off to the other car. That’s why we suspected it was her in the guest room,” Ursi finished.

  I didn’t think I could take much more, but I had to know—“Why was father late this morning? Why couldn’t you just move the Mercedes so he could get the Lexus out of the garage?”

  “No key,” Jamie said and went no further. I wondered if he had spoken his allotted number of words for the day and whether I would I have to wait until tomorrow for the rest of the story.

  “The key wasn’t in the ignition?” I prompted.

  Jamie shook his head.

  “Did you try the glove compartment?”

  Jamie nodded.

  “And?”

  “It was locked,” Ursi said. “We had to jimmy the lock.”

  “I figure,” Jamie began, coming to life, “that the boy opened the glove compartment with the ignition key, but didn’t actually unlock it, if you get what I mean—then he put the key in the compartment, and when he closed the door, he locked the key inside.”

  I silently sentenced Binky Watrous to a year in the pen with Hobo as his cellmate.

  Mother was in the greenhouse surrounded by her beloved begonias. She wore a printed dress and gardening gloves and sported a dark smudge on her forehead. In this verdant setting, she looked as calm, serene, and happy as this lovely lady had every right to be. I had foolishly, and perhaps naïvely, hoped to keep mother from learning about the murder, but Mrs. Marsden’s visit had brought about the inevitable sooner rather than later.

  “Why, how nice you look, Archy,” she stated as I entered the greenhouse, which was warm even on this sunless morning.

  I kissed her flushed cheek and took her gloved hand in mine. “You’ve heard about Melva Williams?”

  “I have, Archy. Mrs. Marsden was here earlier, as I suppose Ursi has already told you.”

  “Melva’s daughter spent the night with us, Mother.”

  “We thought it was Veronica,” she said, putting down her trowel. “Is she very upset, Archy?”

  “Yes, Mother, but the young are resilient. It’s Melva I’m worried about.”

  “That’s kind of you, Archy. But I thought Melva’s husband fell off a horse and died a long time ago.”

  “He did, Mother. He was Veronica’s father. The dead man is Geoffrey Williams, Melva’s second husband.”

  Mother shook her head. “How things have changed, Archy. Time was when everyone had just one husband.”

  “I know, Mother.”

  “And something like this happening among people we know—why, it was unheard of. I don’t understand it, Archy.”

  “No one can understand something like this, Mother, so don’t dwell on it. Concentrate on your flowers. They are so beautiful.”

  “Yes, Archy, aren’t they?” She nodded and smiled, happy to focus on something other than the vulgarities of modern life.

  “I must go to the office, as Father is expecting me. When Veronica gets up and has had her breakfast, I was wondering if you would show her your garden and perhaps let her assist you in the greenhouse.”

  “Oh, Archy. What a lovely idea. I would be delighted. Shall I say how sorry I am that her father fell off his horse?”

  “No, Mother. I don’t think that will be necessary. But you might tell her the name of every variety of begonia you so ardently raise and nurture.”

  “Of course. She would like that, wouldn’t she, Archy?”

  “Yes, Mother, she would like that very much.”

  7

  “ARCHY? MY, MY, DON’T you look nice.”

  First Ursi, then mother, and now Mrs. Trelawney, my father’s secretary. Not exactly an authoritative triumvirate of male fashion, but even so, this diverse threesome had me regretting that I had not had a chance to show myself off to the lovely Veronica this morning. Would she have turned my female admirers into a quartet?

  I acknowledged Mrs. Trelawney’s compliment with a humble bow of the head, a gesture denoting modesty and the self-chastising employee who was ten minutes late for a meeting with the boss. “I didn’t have time to put together my expense account, Mrs. Trelawney, so it will have to wait until tomorrow.”

  “Fine, Archy. It’s been a busy morning and, truth be told, I’m not in the mood for lyrical fiction.”

  “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that, Mrs. Trelawney.”

  “And I’ll pretend I didn’t say it. Do you want to go out, come in, and start all over again?”

  “I can’t spare the time.”

  “I’ll say you can’t.” Extending her arm, she waved her wristwatch at my face.

  “Lovely, my dear. Is it a Rolex or a Timex?”

  “Whatever it is, my dear, it says it’s twelve minutes after twelve. You
are late.”

  “Better late than never, Mrs. Trelawney.”

  “Around here, better never late, Mr. McNally.”

  “Is the great one here?” I nodded toward the closed door of father’s inner sanctum.

  “Which one?” Mrs. Trelawney questioned.

  “How many are we expecting?”

  “Well, there’s the one in residence, and the other who arrived on the stroke of twelve. Had you not stopped to chat with Herb you would have been here before him.”

  Herb is the security person who keeps us safe from his post inside a glass booth in our underground garage. “How do you know I passed the time of day with Herb?”

  “He called me as soon as you pulled into the garage. You should have walked in here three minutes later, not ten.”

  “You are a remarkable woman, Mrs. Trelawney. The KGB’s loss is McNally and Son’s gain.”

  “Get in there, Archy. I’m to bring tea at halfpast noon.”

  “Sneak in two aspirin on my saucer and earn my undying gratitude,” I pleaded.

  “I don’t want your undying gratitude. I want your honest expense account.”

  Offer the improbable and they demand the impossible. I squared my shoulders and marched into the lion’s den.

  John Fairhurst III was a handsome man—noticeably tall even seated—slim, with a full head of white hair and blue eyes that looked guardedly at everything that came into their view, including Archy McNally. His handshake was firm and his smile more inviting than his stare.

  “Sorry I’m late, but my morning appointment ran over and the traffic on Worth Avenue is a harbinger of the approaching season.”

  Father raised one eyebrow at my opening salvo, but noticing the slight widening of his lips beneath his mustache, I knew I had passed muster.

  “No problem,” Mr. Fairhurst assured me. “I was enjoying your father’s company. He was up at Yale, too. After my time, to be sure,” he added with a sigh of resignation.

  “I was right behind you, John,” Father gallantly replied.

  John! Well, already on a first-name basis. How cozy. But then, Prescott McNally was a fakir par excellence who knew how to charm cobras, especially rich and famous ones.

  As Yale was not a subject I wished to dwell upon, I scrutinized John Fairhurst III while he and Pater replayed a Yale/Harvard football game whose participants were now either great-grandfathers or dead. Dressed in gray flannels, a double-breasted blazer, and school tie, all Fairhurst needed was a patch over one of those blue eyes to be mistaken for a Hathaway model awaiting his cue. But don’t let that mislead you. Fairhurst’s white shirt was more Turnbull & Asser than Macy’s mezzanine. His even tan and flowing white mane cried out for a glass of tonic water in one hand as the other rested gently on the steering wheel of a cabin cruiser, and—presto!—we had the man from Schweppes. The guy was a living manufacturer’s logo.

  When my grandfather Frederick McNally was a mere boy practicing pratfalls for his future career as Freddy McNally—a bulbous-nosed burlesque comic on the old Minsky circuit—Fairhurst’s grandfather was helping women and children into lifeboats before taking his place beside men of good breeding and little sense, all hell-bent on going down with the ship, thereby ensuring Hollywood an endless supply of oceanic disaster films.

  “And now,” Fairhurst was saying, “the reason for my visit.” He removed an envelope from the inside breast pocket of his blazer, handling it as if it were either scalding hot or contaminated. He passed it on to father, who read it with his glasses perched on the tip of his nose while a look of unbridled horror crossed his face.

  “Well,” Prescott McNally exclaimed to the piece of paper in his hand, “what a vile piece of hogwash.”

  I was bursting with curiosity, but Father, making the most of the moment, read the vile piece of hogwash a second time before letting out yet another, “Well!”

  “May I?” I leaned forward in my chair and reached across Father’s desk, my interest piqued beyond endurance. He was about to pass it over when there was a quiet knock on the door followed by the entrance of Mrs. Trelawney behind a tea trolley. We all smiled sheepishly, and Father, dropping the letter like a hot potato, said, “How nice, Mrs. Trelawney. Just what we needed, yes, John?”

  Fairhurst readily agreed as Mrs. Trelawney played mother. We could have been in the middle of a garden club confab, delighting one another with tales of rose blight and the pros and cons of forcing late bloomers to strut their stuff before their time. Palm Beach society could make the British stiff-upper-lippers look like wimps, and the head of McNally & Son reveled in this charade like a ham playing to the balcony. And, alas, so did I—proving once again that bird dip does not fall far from the carrier pigeon.

  Two white dots decorated the saucer given me by our tea lady. Bless her. I vowed to remove my lunch with Connie (appearing as “Sgt. Al Rogoff PBPD”) from this week’s expense account.

  Our collective smiles departed along with Mrs. Trelawney. We were left holding steaming cups and saucers, our eyes looking at everything in the office but one another and the sheet of paper resting benignly before father.

  Placing my tea on the desk, I inched my fingers farther along and tried once more to get my hot hands on the epistle that had brought us together.

  “May I?” I repeated.

  Father nodded. Fairhurst sipped rather noisily for one of genteel birth. I retrieved the letter and my tea, quickly downed the two aspirin while my cohorts examined the ceiling, and leaned back in my chair to read. Typewritten on a sheet of very ordinary white paper was the following:

  John Fairhurst III

  The Fairhurst Foundation states with each grant, “Given in memory of John Fairhurst who died April 15, 1912. A passenger on the ill-fated Titanic, John Fairhurst courageously assisted women, including his wife, and children into lifeboats, giving them hope when, for him and his peers, all hope was gone.”

  This is a lie. Your grandfather, dressed in one of his wife’s gowns and hat, was himself assisted into a lifeboat and ultimately returned to the safety and comfort of his home.

  In return for $25,000 your secret will remain a secret. I will contact you again with instructions for delivery of the money. If you do not agree to these terms, I will provide the press with proof of my allegation.

  There was no signature.

  The account of a man fleeing the Titanic in drag was not a new one. It has long been alluded to in books and films—the latter dramatically portrayed in Fox’s 1953 Titanic, starring Barbara Stanwyck and Clifton Webb. In this, the best Titanic film ever made, it is the versatile character actress Thelma Ritter who unmasks the skirted pretender.

  I put the letter back on Father’s desk and asked to see the envelope it came in. As I thought, it was posted in Miami, the biggest city within an easy drive from Palm Beach. I waited a respectable minute for the head of McNally & Son to speak, but when our silence segued from a meditative pause into gross embarrassment, I began to suspect that Father refused to even think what had to be said. I had no such compunction.

  “Is this true, Mr. Fairhurst?”

  John Fairhurst lowered his teacup and dabbed at his lips with the linen napkin supplied by Mrs. Trelawney. “May I speak in complete confidence, Mr. McNally?”

  “Our name is discreet, sir, and please call me Archy.”

  Fairhurst once again applied the linen to his lips. “It’s true,” he stated.

  Father looked as if John Fairhurst III had just shouted, “No, Virginia, there is no Santa Claus, now shut up and deal.”

  “I don’t understand how...”

  “How we got away with it?” Fairhurst finished for me. “I’ll explain.” He returned his cup to the trolley and proceeded to let us in on the Fairhurst family secret.

  “As the letter says, Grandfather got off the Titanic dressed as a woman, with Grandmother’s help I’m sure. Naturally, no one asked for names or identification of the people transferred from the lifeboats to the rescuing ship.
Remember, confusion reigned ashore as well as at sea and the world was horrified, or perhaps mesmerized, by the disaster. When the surviving passengers sailed into New York Harbor, the newspapers had already assumed that John Fairhurst had done the noble thing and reported him dead.

  “My grandparents went directly to their home in Hyde Park in upstate New York. They were neighbors of the Roosevelts, don’t-you-know. The Roosevelt Democrats, that is. They spoke, of course, only neighborly thing to do, but I never heard it said that they had broken bread with them.”

  Father was nodding as if he knew the consequence of breaking bread with the wrong Roosevelts.

  “I’ve always assumed my grandparents thought the situation over and decided it would be easier, and less humiliating, for poor grandfather to play dead rather than to confess to what he had done. Why end a celebrated life on a less than venerable note?”

  Unable to contain the thought, I exclaimed, “How did your grandfather manage to keep the fact that he was not dead a secret?”

  “Not as difficult as one would suppose,” Fairhurst answered. “Grandfather was far from young when he married, and sired a son at the end of his natural life. He lived only a few years after the Titanic went down. His widow, with her infant son, observed a long period of mourning in complete seclusion, which was not unheard of in those days. They were attended by an English couple who had been with them for years. When Grandfather died, in return for their silence, the couple were pensioned off and returned to England, where they lived rather lavishly in a charming home in Kent. Grandfather was never very social and I think he enjoyed his life as a recluse, surrounded by his books, pursuing his love of ancient Greek lore, and watching his son grow.

  “I also think Grandfather was ashamed of his cowardly act and perhaps thought of his confinement as penance,” Fairhurst explained.

  Father and I listened attentively but made no comment. John Fairhurst went on to extol his grandfather’s extraordinary business acumen as if to make up for the man’s shortcomings.

  “Grandfather was once a partner of Andrew Carnegie, don’t-you-know. Broke with him early on and started up a few smelteries of his own and turned the heat up on old Andy, he did. Ha, ha.”