The Recycled Citizen (23 page)

“Mr. Bittersohn doesn’t want to hear all this stuff, Walt,” George interrupted. “Getting back to those keys, Mr. Bittersohn, I don’t suppose it would be too hard for somebody to get hold of one if he had access to the house and knew where the master was kept.”

“Nobody could have swiped yours and put it back without your knowing?”

“No way.” George hauled out his bunch of keys again and showed Max how the ring was attached to his trouser loop by a slim chain. “They’d have had to take my pants, too, and I’d sure as hell have noticed that. The key must have come from the house. You better go talk to Genevieve.”

G
ENEVIEVE WOULD HAVE TO
wait; the police were already here: Lieutenant Codfin in a smart blue suit and Sergeant Mufferty in a trim blue uniform. Osmond Loveday brought them around from the front entrance. He’d managed to get his outer garments on this time: a sedate black homburg, a black cashmere topcoat, and the de rigueur white silk scarf. Dolph came lumbering up from the ballroom wing at full bellow and met them just as they entered the toolhouse.

“What the hell’s going on here?” he roared. “Sarah tells me somebody’s been—oh, him.”

“You know this man?” asked Lieutenant Codfin.

“I damned well ought to. He’s been cadging meals off me under false pretenses for the past two months. What’s he doing here? I told him to get out and stay out.”

“When was this?”

“Who are you, since you’re so damned free with your questions?”

“Oh, sorry. Lieutenant Codfin, and this is Sergeant Mufferty. And you’re Mr. Adolphus Kelling, the owner of this property, if I’m not mistaken?”

“You’re not. This is my cousin, Max Bittersohn.”

“Max Bittersohn is your cousin?”

“Married my cousin. Same thing, isn’t it? Where the hell was I? Oh, Harry Burr, who came to help out; and these two are my gardeners, George Hanover and Walter Presman. Both of them, I may say, are thoroughly reliable men who’ve been with us for—how long, George? Twenty years?”

“Twenty-three years this past June, boss. I’m the one who found him, in case they want to know.”

“My God! Must have given you an awful turn. Better go ask Genevieve for a slug of whiskey.”

“I’m okay, boss. Mrs. Bittersohn gave me some brandy.”

“Mr. Hanover,” said Lieutenant Codfin with considerable determination, “how did you happen to find him?”

“How could I miss him? I opened the door and there he was, just like he is now.”

“You didn’t touch him at all?”

“I started to try for a pulse, but as soon as I laid a finger on his wrist, I knew it was no good. So I locked the door again and ran up to the house yelling for the boss. But Mr. and Mrs. Bittersohn were in the kitchen when I got there. He said he’d come with me and she’d find the boss. I figured, him being a detective, he’d know what to do, so I came back with him.”

“And exactly what did you do, Mr. Bittersohn?”

“Asked my wife to telephone the police, came out here and took a look, got George to round up the other two men who’d been working in the grounds and waited for you.”

“Quite right and proper,” said the lieutenant, making it plain by his tone that he knew perfectly well Max was leaving out all the more interesting parts. “Now, Mr. Hanover, you said you locked the door again before you went to the house. Does that mean you’d had to unlock it in order to discover the body?”

“I didn’t open it to discover the body. I opened it to put away some ropes and stanchions we’d been using to mark off the parking areas.”

“That’s right, you held some sort of charity function here this evening, Mr. Kelling. I hope it went well. Was the dead man one of your guests?”

“He was supposed to be one of our workers.”

“Perhaps I can explain,” Osmond Loveday interrupted.

“Why the hell should you?” Dolph retorted sourly. “I’ve got a mouth on me, haven’t I?”

“Excuse me,” said the lieutenant, “I still don’t have this gentleman’s name.”

“Osmond Francis Loveday, formerly confidential assistant to Mr. Frederick Kelling, now serving Mr. Adolphus Kelling in a somewhat similar capacity,” Loveday replied smartly. “That was why I thought I should endeavor to make myself useful. If I’m not needed here, I may as well go back to the house.”

“Go ahead,” said Dolph.

“Stick around,” said the lieutenant. “Sergeant, you’d better go back to the cruiser and contact the station. Ask for the homicide team and tell them to put a rush on it. Mr. Loveday, your employer has stated he told the deceased to get out and stay out. Were you present when he did so?”

“I certainly was, and I may add that Frederick Kelling himself could not have handled the incident more forcefully.”

Walter snickered. “Are you kidding? Mr. Kelling used to pick ’em up by the scruff of the neck and the seat of the pants and pitch ’em into the geranium beds. I’ve replanted more geraniums than you can shake a stick at. He chucked a policeman halfway down the front drive once, just for trying to sell him a ticket to the Policemen’s Ball.”

“I recall the incident as if it were yesterday,” Osmond Loveday replied with what must have struck Lieutenant Codfin as decidedly misplaced pride. “Mr. Kelling was a man of firm principles. He believed policemen ought to be out guarding the public welfare, not prancing around a dance floor.”

“Blast it, Osmond, will you leave Uncle Fred out of this?” Dolph shouted. “You’re getting as soft in the head as he was. I do not go hurling people around. I never laid a hand on Ted Ashe. Ask Sarah, she was there.”

Loveday cleared his throat. “In point of fact, Sarah went upstairs right after you—er—ushered Ashe out and closed the door behind you.”

“You’re saying that both Mr. Kelling and Mr. Ashe were then on the outside, while you and this woman you refer to as Sarah were left on the inside?” demanded the lieutenant.

“That is correct. I’d offered to help, but Dolph said my assistance was not required.”

“So what did you do, then? Did you look out the window to see what was happening?”

“No, I didn’t. Sarah—formerly Sarah Kelling and now Mrs. Bittersohn—had suggested I circulate among the guests in the adjoining rooms to find out if they’d noticed the disturbance.”

“And had they?”

“Apparently not. Mrs. Emma Kelling’s musical ensemble was playing, people were chatting, and of course the auction was going on. Most of their attention seemed to be on the bidding.”

“I see. Just out of curiosity, Mr. Loveday, what would you have said if you’d been asked for an explanation?”

“Mrs. Bittersohn had told me to say a reporter had tried to gate-crash and had been ejected, which was true as far as it went.”

“Then you knew Mr. Ashe was a newspaperman?”

Loveday glanced at Dolph. Dolph turned to Max. “You tell it.”

“According to my information, Lieutenant, the man we’d known as Ted Ashe wrote feature articles for a publication called
Syndicated Slime,
using the name Wilbraham Winchell. I’ve been told he also had other noms de plume, but I don’t know what they were. Anyway, as Winchell, he’d been doing a series about graft and corruption in charitable agencies and was reputed to have been in the habit of manufacturing evidence himself if he couldn’t find any in the course of his so-called investigations. He’d recently attached himself to the Senior Citizens’ Recycling Center, which was established by Dolph Kelling and his wife, Mary, and which tonight’s auction was designed to benefit. We assume Ashe had selected the SCRC as his next target. We also assume Ashe was another of his aliases, but we’d only just discovered the Wilbraham Winchell identity and hadn’t had time to pursue the matter.”

“How was the imposture discovered, Mr. Bittersohn?”

This was a tricky bit. “Serendipitously, as you might say. I was showing some photographs of the SCRC people to a friend of mine a couple of nights ago, and he happened to spot Ashe, whom he’d met as Winchell in a nightclub recently and also at a cocktail party.”

“Would you mind giving us this friend’s name, just for the record?”

“Not at all. It was Bill Jones. Know him?”

“Oh, Bill Jones? Sure, I know Bill. Doesn’t everybody?” Lieutenant Codfin’s affability became a degree less professional. “Then it was Bill who told you Ashe falsified his information when he was writing as Winchell?”

“Well, you know Bill.” Max shrugged and waved his hands, and Lieutenant Codfin actually laughed.

“One gets the message. Mr. Kelling, when Ashe was at the center, did he wear some kind of disguise?”

“He dressed like a bum and got himself so filthy nobody cared to get close enough for a good look,” Dolph sputtered. “Showed up tonight dressed to the nines, calling himself Hetherton Montague and thinking I wouldn’t recognize him because he’d washed his face.”

“What a strange thing to do,” said Lieutenant Codfin politely. “When you escorted him out of your house, Mr. Kelling, was either of your gardeners around, or Mr. Burr? I take it you’re a friend of the Kellings, Mr. Burr?”

“It would be more accurate to say the Kellings have been good friends to me,” Harry replied. “I’m a bona fide member of the SCRC. I’m sorry, but I was not near the door at the time. One of the neighbors had taken exception to having cars parked near his property, so Mrs. Kelling asked me to stay down by the end of the drive and make sure they parked up here instead of on the street.”

“Precisely where up here?”

“Back by the tennis courts,” said George. “I can show you if you want, but there’s nothing much left to see. Walter and I were back there most of the evening. We got a lot more cars than we’d figured on, and we had to keep opening up more places to put them. Then people who’d come early started wanting to leave, so we’d be helping them find their cars and steering them out the right way. We kept pretty busy.”

“I see, thank you. Mr. Kelling, after you’d gone out and shut the door as Mr. Loveday testifies, you didn’t bring Mr. Ashe out here to the toolhouse?”

“What kind of damn fool question is that? No, I did not. I merely walked out with him as far as the front terrace, told him I’d punch his face in if I ever laid eyes on him again either here or at the center and pointed out the way to Chestnut Hill Station.”

“Why did you do that? Didn’t Mr. Ashe have a car?”

“I never thought to ask. I assumed he didn’t because he’d come with some other people.”

“Were these people friends of yours?”

“No, but they’re all right,” said Dolph. “Their daughter’s engaged to Eugene Porter-Smith. Young fellow who boards with my cousin Brooks and works for my cousin Percy. Gene, clerked at the auction.”

“Can you add anything to that, Mr. Bittersohn?”

“Only that my wife chatted with them for a few minutes as she was showing them into the auction rooms and got the impression that Ashe simply had been making use of the Wilton-Rugges. When Dolph confronted Ashe at the door, Sarah thought she’d better get the Wilton-Rugges away and also find out how well they knew Ashe. Assuming what they told her is true, he’d shown up with somebody or other at their cocktail party, where Bill Jones met him. Bill Jones told me Ashe was identified to him as Wilbraham Winchell at the party, but evidently the Wilton-Rugges didn’t hear that. They claim they only knew the man as Hetherton Montague. He bumped into the husband a couple of times after that, and it was his suggestion that they meet for dinner and go on to the auction together tonight.”

“Why do you think he picked on the Wilton-Rugges?”

“Presumably because he knew their daughter’s engaged to Eugene Porter-Smith. Gene’s done some volunteer work for the SCRC, and as Dolph mentioned, he was also working here tonight. The auction hadn’t been announced at the time of the cocktail party, but I suppose Ashe went on speculation, so to speak. Scavengers like him are always looking around for an angle, you know.”

“Thank you, Mr. Bittersohn. Mr. Kelling, the station is a fair distance from here. Did you actually expect this man you call Ashe to walk that far?”

“Walked it myself often enough, why shouldn’t he? Exercise would have done him good.”

“It would have done him more good than staying here, obviously. What did you do after you’d shown him the way?”

“I went back into the house. The place was crawling with people and I had my duties as a host.”

“And Mr. Ashe went off quietly?”

“Of course not. He’s still here, isn’t he? I assumed he would because I’d told him to. I now assume the crafty swine sneaked back here to see if he could cadge a ride from somebody. He couldn’t find anybody leaving, saw the toolhouse door open—”

“Sorry, boss, but he couldn’t have,” said George. “My orders are to keep it locked, and I do.”

“Then he picked the lock. Had a lock picker taped to his leg, I suppose. That’s how they do, I’ve seen ‘em in the movies. Anyway, he came in here to hide out till somebody came, tripped over the pickax and stabbed himself. Hell of a way to go, but there it is. Plain as the nose on my face. Get him out of here, can’t you? I said I didn’t want him around, and I still don’t. I’m going back to the house.”

“Just a moment, please, Mr. Kelling,” Lieutenant Codfin protested. “This man is lying on his back. The pickax has penetrated his rib cage and pinned him to the floor. It’s not reasonable to assume he got into such a position by accident.”

“Seems reasonable enough to me. Well, you figure it out. My wife will be wondering where I’ve got to. Come along, Osmond. No sense in your standing around cluttering up the place. If you have any notion of keeping George and Walter up all night, Lieutenant, kindly bear in mind that they’re getting time and a half for overtime and it’s my pocket the money’s coming out of.”

“Yes, Mr. Kelling. Neither you nor Mr. Loveday was planning to leave this house tonight, I hope?” Codfin glanced over at the tremendous agglomeration of misguided architecture whose lights still showed through the trees. “I expect you could find room to put Mr. Loveday up?”

“A suite is always kept ready for me,” Loveday informed him with a deprecating little laugh. “At least I assume it still is. I haven’t had occasion to use it lately.”

“Nobody’s swiped your pink pajamas that I know of,” Dolph growled. “No, Lieutenant, I’m not going anywhere tonight except to bed. Max, you and Sarah had better stay too. She should have been asleep hours ago, in her condition.”