McNally's Secret

by Lawrence Sanders

  “Sure,” he said. “A cat burglar.” When I nodded, he went back to washing the Rolls.

  “Just a few questions, Mr. Bodin,” I said. “When was the last time you saw the stamps?”

  He stopped his work and appeared to think a moment. If he was capable of it. Which I doubted.

  “Oh lordy,” he said, “I haven’t seen those things in years. Maybe two or three.”

  “You live on the premises?”

  “Nope.” He gestured toward the end of the garage where a lavender ’69 Volkswagen Beetle was slumbering peacefully on the Venetian tiles. “That’s mine.”

  “Beautiful car,” I said politely.

  “I keep it up,” he said proudly. “Anyway, I drive in every day. I live in Delray.”

  “Long way to commute,” I observed.

  “Not really,” he said. “I start out early. Not much traffic, so I can make time. That’s a Miata you got—right?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Nice,” he said. “I wish I could afford one.”

  “Mr. Bodin,” I said, “you suggested the stamps might have been lifted by a cat burglar. Have you seen anyone casing the place recently? You know—lurking about or driving past frequently?”

  He shook his head. “No one like that. You could ask the Beach Patrol.”

  “Good idea,” I said. “Can you think of anyone—staff or houseguests—who might have been tempted?”

  He stopped wiping off the Rolls with a shammy and turned to face me. God, he was a bruiser! Even his muscles had muscles. If the gossip was true—that he had once been Lady C.’s lover—I could understand her brief fling. The guy was a hulk.

  But my admiration for his physique stopped at his thick neck. I thought he had the face of a dyspeptic terrier, and his blond hair was too metallic to be credited to the Florida sun. It was carefully coiffed and artfully streaked. Clairol, I was certain, had provided assistance.

  “Why no,” he said. “To my way of thinking there’s no one around here who’d rob the Lady. She’s a good boss, and the guests are all family.”

  “What about the friend, Angus Wolfson?”

  “Shit!” he said with unnecessary vehemence. “That old guy’s a butterfly. But he seems to be loaded. So why should he cop the stamps?”

  “Why indeed?” I said, and couldn’t think of any more questions to ask that he might be willing to answer. “Thank you for talking with me, Mr. Bodin. I appreciate it.”

  “Sure,” he said. “Why not? I got nothing to hide.”

  He turned away, and I saw he had an unlighted cigarette tucked behind his ear. Why he wasn’t sucking on a toothpick I’ll never know.

  I wandered out into the sunlight, heard soft laughter coming from the pool area, and ambled over there. A man and a woman were seated at an umbrella table, working on what appeared to be iced black coffees and a plate of mini-croissants. They looked up as I approached, and the ancient male rose slowly to his feet.

  “Good morning,” I said, taking off my white linen cap and giving them a 75-watt smile (my max is 150). “I hate to disturb you, but I wonder if I might join you for a few moments. My name is Archibald McNally. I hope Lady Horowitz warned you I might come puttering around asking questions about the missing Inverted Jennies.”

  “Of course, my dear chap,” the man said, offering a halibut handshake. “I am Angus Wolfson, an old friend of Cynthia’s. And I do mean old—but please don’t ask me to be more precise about my age. Growing old is a dreadful thing—until you consider the alternative!” He paused and waited for my laugh.

  I gave him a 25-watter. “Maurice Chevalier,” I said.

  Something changed in his face. “Oh-ho,” he said, “an erudite detective.”

  “Not very,” I said, and then tried to make amends for squelching his big boffola. “That’s a marvelous jacket you’re wearing, Mr. Wolfson.”

  It was, too: burgundy velvet in the belted Norfolk style. He wore it over creamy flannel trousers. There was a flowered ascot looped casually around his chicken neck. Quite the aged peacock.

  “Thank you,” he said, regaining his good humor. “And this lovely lady is Gina Stanescu, daughter of Cynthia and her—which was it, darling? Third or fourth husband?”

  “Third,” Ms. Stanescu said with a faint smile and offered me a cool hand to shake. “So nice to meet you, Mr. McNally. Do join us.”

  I pulled up a webbed patio chair and placed it so I was facing both of them.

  “We’re having iced coffee,” Wolfson said. “Would you care for a glass?”

  “Thank you, no,” I said. “I never drink on duty.” I meant it as a joke, of course—a feeble joke, I admit—but it didn’t earn so much as a snigger.

  “Shocking thing about those stamps,” Wolfson said. “Absolutely shocking.”

  “It is so unpleasant,” Stanescu said in a small voice. “It makes one look at other people with new eyes—wondering.”

  “Could you tell me the last time you saw the stamps.”

  They looked at each other. Then Wolfson replied:

  “Let me see... It was at dinner the night Alan DuPey and his bride arrived. Felice had never seen the Inverted Jennies, so Cynthia brought them downstairs to show. Is that correct, Gina?”

  She nodded.

  “Did everyone see the stamps at dinner?”

  “I believe so,” Wolfson said. “The book was passed around the table.”

  “Yes,” Stanescu said. “I looked at them and passed the book along.”

  “And then? After everyone had seen the stamps?”

  “I couldn’t swear to it,” Wolfson said, “but I believe that after we all left the table, Cynthia took them back upstairs to her bedroom.”

  “She did,” the Lady’s daughter said definitely. “I walked up the stairs with her. I was going to my room to get a light sweater because we had all decided to sit outside awhile and have a brandy. I saw mother take the little red book into her bedroom.”

  “And neither of you saw the stamps after that?”

  “No,” they said in unison.

  “Have either of you noticed any strangers prowling about? Anyone who apparently doesn’t belong on the estate?”

  Wolfson laughed. “You mean some chappie dressed in black and wearing a mask? No, I’ve seen no one who even remotely resembles a villain. Gina?”

  “No,” she said, “no one. Everything has been quite normal.”

  “Do either of you have any doubts about any member of the staff? I assure you, any accusation you may make will be held in strictest confidence.”

  “I accuse the chef of putting too much saffron in the rice last night,” Wolfson said, “but that’s hardly criminal. No, to the best of my knowledge everyone on the staff is honest—and remarkably efficient, I might add.”

  “I agree with Angus,” Stanescu said. “All of mother’s people seem to be trustworthy and very loyal to her.”

  Wolfson gave me a derisive smile. “We’re not much help, are we?” he said.

  “No,” I agreed, “not much.”

  He took a sip of his iced coffee, started on another croissant, and I had a moment to eyeball him directly. He must have been a dandy fifty years ago, but now the Barrymore profile had softened. His entire face, in fact, had melted downward, pulling at a broad, high brow that was now pale and shiny with stretched skin.

  “Mr. Wolfson,” I said, “this has nothing to do with the stamps, and if you feel I am prying unnecessarily, please tell me, but are you retired?”

  “Semi,” he said. “I was somewhat of a bookman. Had a sweet little shop on the Square. I am also somewhat of a bibliophile, and somewhat of an antiquarian. I have been a somewhat all my life, Mr. McNally, and have done very well at it, I might add. These days my professional activities are limited. Occasionally I am called upon to serve as a consultant to librarians, private and public, and to make appraisals of rare books prior to sale or auction.”

  “Interesting,” I said. “I have a first edition of Mad Com
ics. Should I sell it, sir?”

  “No,” he said. “Hold.”

  We all laughed.

  “What about me,” Gina Stanescu said. “I feel left out. Don’t you want to know about me?”

  “I do indeed,” I said.

  “I am forty-one and unmarried,” she stated flatly, “and well on my way to becoming what in your country is called an old maid. A strange fate for the daughter of a mother who has been married six times—is it not? I live in France, in Rouen, where I am the director of an orphanage. And that is the whole story of my life, total and complete.”

  “An orphanage?” I said. “That must be very rewarding work.”

  “Rewarding and frustrating. There is never enough money.”

  “You shouldn’t have said that, Gina,” Wolfson chided. “Now Mr. McNally will suspect you pinched your mother’s stamps to support your home for bastards.”

  I was offended but she wasn’t. She reached out to place a soft hand on one of his veined claws. “Dear Angus,” she said fondly. “You talk like a devil, but I know you have a heart of gold.”

  He snorted. “Of tarnished brass you mean,” he said, and lifted her hand to kiss her knuckles.

  This Gina Stanescu seemed to me a curious woman. She was swathed in a summery gown of miles and miles of white chiffon and wore a woven straw hat with a wide, floppy brim that sometimes obscured her dark eyes. The floating dress and garden hat gave her a wispy look as if she might go galloping through the heather bellowing, “Heathcliff! Heathcliff!”

  But despite that vaporish appearance, her features were as sharp as her mother’s. She had a no-nonsense manner, and I suspected those orphans in Rouen did their lessons and cleaned their plates. I wondered, idly, what the body of Lady Cynthia’s daughter might be like, hidden beneath those yards of billowing silk. The image that sprang to mind was that of a very elegant Japanese sword.

  Wolfson suddenly turned to me. “You are the son of Cynthia’s attorney, Prescott McNally, are you not?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I have met your father,” he said. “A gentleman of the old school.” His smile held more than irony but less than scorn.

  “He is that,” I agreed and rose to make my farewells. I thanked them for their cooperation and warned I might return with more questions. They couldn’t have been more gracious, but when I returned to the Miata, I heard their muted laughter drifting across the manicured lawn.

  Since no one had invited me to stick around for a spot of lunch, I raced home with a terrible craving for a cold ale and a corned beef sandwich on the sour rye Ursi Olson baked once a week. There was no corned beef in the fridge, but Ursi provided smoked salmon topped with slices of onion, which added up to a very satisfactory substitute.

  Sandwich in hand, I sauntered around to the garage where Jamie was planting a few dwarf palms to make the place look less like a barrack.

  “What’s new?” I asked him.

  “Nuthin,” he said, so I gave him a nudge.

  “I talked to Kenneth Bodin this morning,” I said. “You were right; he’s a big one.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And not too much between his ears,” I added.

  “Air,” Jamie said.

  I waited patiently.

  “Girlfriend’s name is Sylvia,” he said finally. “Sylvia Montcliff or Montgrift or Montgrief. Something like that. Lives in Delray Beach.”

  “Sure she does,” I said. “So does he. Thanks, Jamie.”

  I took what remained of my sandwich up to my lair and scribbled in my journal awhile. I figured I might not have the energy after what I hoped would be an enjoyable engagement with Jennifer Towley that evening.

  By two-thirty I was back at the Horowitz estate, and this time I entered the main house by the back door and went directly to the kitchen. Jean Cuvier, the chef, was seated at a stainless steel table, the usual Gitane dangling from his lower lip. He was poring over a handicap sheet for the races at Calder. Instead of the white toque of his calling, he wore a New York Yankee baseball cap, the beak turned to the rear.

  If girth was any indication of culinary talent he should have been a Cordon Pourpre instead of a Cordon Bleu. I mean he was a humongous man with three chins, two bellies and, I presumed, jowls on his kneecaps. He was also living refutation of the popular belief that all fat men are jolly, being peevish and cranky. But his genius with a saucepan excused all.

  “Bonjour, maître,” I said.

  He squinted up at me through a swirl of blue smoke. “Bonjour, Ar-chay,” he said.

  The following conversation was entirely in French. My years at Yale weren’t a total loss.

  I asked him when was the last time he had seen the Inverted Jenny stamps. He shrugged and said years and years ago. I asked if he had seen a small red book being passed around the dinner table on the night Alan DuPey and his wife arrived. He shrugged and said no.

  I asked if he thought anyone on the staff might have taken the stamps. He shrugged. I asked if he had seen any nogoodnik-types skulking about. He shrugged and said no. Then I asked if he thought any of the houseguests might be capable of such a nefarious deed. This time he didn’t shrug, but slowly stubbed out the minuscule butt of the Gitane in a white china saucer.

  “Perhaps,” he said.

  “Who?”

  “The English son,” he said. “Harry Smythe and his wife.”

  “Why them?”

  Then he shrugged. “They are very cold people. And the last time they were here, they left me no tip. A month of meals, and no tip. I thought they were tight people. Cold and tight. But perhaps they are in need of money. They see the stamps and think the madam is rich and will not miss them. So they collar the stamps. Simple, no?”

  I was about to shrug when a young woman in a maid’s uniform entered the kitchen. I recognized her from those dinners my family had enjoyed at the Chez Horowitz. I knew she was addressed as Clara but didn’t know her last name. I introduced myself and learned she was Clara Bodkin—and you didn’t have to be a Shakespearean scholar for the phrase “bare bodkin” to leap to mind, for she was a toothsome creature, a bit plumpish but excellently proportioned. Her flawless, sun-blushed complexion was especially attractive.

  I ran through my list of questions, in English, with meager results. Yes, she had seen the stamps being passed around the table at the DuPey dinner. That was the last time she had seen them. No, she did not believe anyone on the staff or any of the houseguests was capable of the theft. And while she had seen no strangers hanging about, it was her theory that some fiend had sneaked into the house while everyone slept, and took the Inverted Jennies from madam’s wall safe. It gave her, Clara, chills to think about it.

  I listened to all this somewhat absently. My attention was elsewhere. For as Clara spoke so volubly, she stood alongside Jean Cuvier’s chair, and he was steadily stroking her rump in a thoughtful fashion. She did not move away.

  He must have seen astonishment in my face, for after Clara finished talking, he lighted another Gitane and said to me, in French, “It is all right, Ar-chay. Clara and I are to be married.”

  “Congratulations,” I said heartily.

  “For one night,” he added, and gave a great shout of laughter.

  “What did he say?” Clara demanded of me. “Is the blimp talking dirty again?”

  “Not at all,” I said hastily. “He told me that I can accept every word you say as gospel since you know everything that’s going on in this house.”

  “That I do,” she said, nodding. “But I see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.”

  “Very wise,” I assured her.

  When I left, she was tickling the back of his fat neck. I do believe she might have seated herself on his lap—if he had one.

  I decided I had earned my salary for the day, and besides, asking the same questions continually had the same effect as the Chinese water torture. I drove home, changed, and went down to the beach for a swim. I resolutely did my two miles and returne
d home in time to dress for the family cocktail hour and my date with Jennifer Towley.

  Mother remarked how handsome I looked, father stared disgustedly at my acid green polo shirt, and I ingested my share of the martini pitcher’s contents. Then I bid them good night and departed for what I hoped would be an evening of a thousand delights. I didn’t forget Jennifer’s tennis racquet. Talk about Greeks bearing gifts!

  She lived across Lake Worth, south of the Royal Park Bridge. It was an old neighborhood of short streets west of Flagler Drive. The homes were small but pleasant, the grounds limited but neatly groomed. Jennifer rented the ground floor of a two-story stucco building painted a sky blue. Her apartment was her antique shop; everything in the place was for sale—except the lady herself, of course.

  She greeted me at the door, and I entered into a foyer (Edwardian) and then was ushered into the living room (Victorian). I had suggested she dress informally, but she was impeccably upholstered in a black dress so simple and nothing that it must have cost a fortune. The only jewelry she wore was a pale amethyst choker. Elegant? On a scale of 1 to 10, I’d rate her a 12.

  The tennis racquet was an instant success; after hefting it and trying a few swings, she declared the weight and balance were perfect. I received a kiss in gratitude. It was a very small kiss but much appreciated.

  I held the Miata door for her, and she slid in with a flash of bare tanned legs that made me want to turn cartwheels on her lawn. But I controlled my rapture and we sped off to the Pelican Club. I called her attention to the full moon I had ordered for the occasion.

  “I may turn into a werewolf,” I cautioned.

  “I’ll get some garlic at the restaurant,” she said.

  “Garlic is for vampires,” I told her. “And frogs’ legs. There is no known defense against a werewolf.”

  “I have a black belt in karate,” she claimed.

  “I have a white belt in Indian wrestling,” I said. “Perhaps later this evening you will permit me to demonstrate.”

  She laughed. “What am I going to do with you?” she asked.

  “Love me,” I replied, but I did not say it aloud.