about the business.”
“You seem to have put in an uncomfortable morning,” laughed Ellery. “Or are you always so cautious? Well, what was it?”
“You’d have to know Varjian to appreciate it. He’s straight as a die, as I’ve said?but he is Armenian, with the usual bargaining instincts of his race. You have to know how to buy from Varjian. He always asks prices which are exorbitant and he must be dealt with shrewdly. I can’t recall the time when I haven’t had to beat down his initial asking-price. And yet,” said Macgowan slowly, “this time he set a price and absolutely refused to budge from it. And I had to pay what he demanded.”
“Well,” drawled Ellery, “that’s different. If what you say is true, there’s no question in my mind that the man acted as agent for some one who had stipulated in advance the selling-price of the stamp; plus, I suppose, a commission.”
“You really think so?”
“Positive of it.”
“Well,” said the big man with a sigh, “I guess I’m being an old woman about this business. But I felt that I had to tell some one about it. I’m all clear?”
“As far as I’m concerned, you are,” said Ellery genially. And then he rose and crushed his cigaret in an ashtray. “By the way, would you mind introducing me to this Varjian, Macgowan? It mightn’t hurt to check up a bit.”
“Then you do think . . . “
Ellery shrugged. “There’s only one thing about it I don’t like?the fact that it’s coincidental. And I detest coincidences.”
* * *
The establishment of Avdo Varjian, Ellery found, was a small shop on East Forty-first Street with dusty windows cluttered with cards of postage stamps. They went in and found themselves in a narrow store with a battered counter covered with glass, under which were similar cards each bearing priced stamps. There was a vast old-fashioned iron safe at the rear.
Varjian was a tall thin dark man with sharp features and beautiful black eyes under long lashes. There was something quick and authoritative about his gestures, and his fingers were as deft and sensitive as an artist’s. He was busy over the counter with an old shabby man who was consulting a torn notebook and calling for stamps by number, when they came in; and he shot Macgowan a keen glance and said: “Ah, Mr. Macgowan. Something wrong?” Then he looked at Ellery out of the corner of his eyes and looked away again.
“Oh, no,” said Macgowan stiffly. “I just dropped back to introduce a friend of mine. We’ll wait if you’re busy.”
“Yes,” said Varjian, and turned back to the shabby old man.
Ellery watched him tentatively as the man served his customer. He handled his tongs as if they were alive. It was a pleasure to see him strip the little slips of adhesive hinge from the backs of stamps, he worked so surely. He was a character, Ellery recognized, and in his proper setting he might have been a figure out of a continentalized Dickens. The store, the man, the stamps exuded a musty flavor, like the nostalgic odor of the Old Curiosity Shop to a sighing bookworm. Ellery became fascinated as he watched the little bits of colored paper being tucked into a pocketed card.
Macgowan sauntered about looking at the cheap display cards without seeing them.
Then the shabby old man took four twenty-dollar bills out of a wallet which might have held a Crusader’s bread and cheese, and received some small bills and silver in exchange, and went out of the shop with his card tucked away in his clothes and a faraway smiling expression in his eyes.
“Yes, Mr. Macgowan?” said Varjian softly, before the echoes of the old-fashioned hanging doorbell had died away.
“Oh.” Macgowan was rather pale. “Meet Mr. Ellery Queen.’’
Varjian turned the remarkable lamps of his black eyes upon Ellery. “Mr. Ellery Queen? So. You are a collector, Mr. Queen?”
“Not of postage stamps,” said Ellery in a dreamy voice.
“Ah. Coins, perhaps?”
“No, indeed. I’m a collector, Mr. Varjian, of odd facts.”
Lids obscured three-quarters of the glittering pupils. “Odd facts?” Varjian smiled. “I’m afraid, Mr. Queen, I don’t understand.”
“Well,” said Ellery jovially, “there are odd facts and then there are odd facts, you see. This morning I’m on the trail of a very odd fact. I wager it will become the choicest item in my collection.”
Varjian showed milkwhite teeth. “Your friend, Mr. Macgowan, is joking with me.”
Macgowan flushed. “I?”
“I was never more serious,” said Ellery sharply, leaning across the counter and staring into the man’s brilliant eyes. “Look here, Varjian, for whom were you acting when you sold Mr. Macgowan that Foochow stamp this morning?”
Varjian returned the stare for slow seconds, and then he relaxed and sighed. “So,” he said reproachfully. “I would not have believed it of you, Mr. Macgowan. I thought we had agreed it was to be a confidential sale.”
“You’ll have to tell Mr. Queen,” said Macgowan harshly, still flushed.
“And why,” asked the Armenian in a soft voice, “should I tell anything to this Mr. Queen of yours, Mr. Macgowan?”
“Because,” drawled Ellery, “I am investigating a murder, Monsieur Varjian, and I have reason to believe that the Foochow is tied up in it somewhere.”
The man sucked in his breath, alarm flooding into his eyes. “A murder,” he choked. “Surely, you are?What murder?”
“You’re procrastinating,” said Ellery. “Don’t you read the newspapers? The murder of an unidentified man on the twenty-second floor of the Hotel Chancellor.”
“Chancellor.” Varjian bit his dark lip. “But I didn’t know . . . I do not read the papers.” He felt for a chair behind the counter and sat down. “Yes,” he muttered, “I acted as agent in the sale. I was asked not to reveal the person?for whom I acted.”
Macgowan placed his fists on the counter. He shouted: “Varjian, who the hell was it?”
“Now, now,” said Ellery. “There’s no need for violence, Macgowan. I’m sure Mr. Varjian is ready to talk. Aren’t you?”
“I will tell you,” said the Armenian dully. “I will also tell you why I telephoned to you the first of all, Mr. Macgowan. A murder . . . “ He shivered. “Mv?this person told me,” and he licked his lips, “to offer it to you first.”
Macgowan’s big jaw dropped. “You mean to say,” he gasped, “that you sold me the Foochow this morning on specific instructions? You were to sell only to me?”
“Yes.”
“Who was it, Varjian?” asked Ellery softly.
“I?” Varjian stopped. There was something extraordinarily appealing in his black eyes.
“Speak up, damn you!” thundered Macgowan, lunging swiftly forward. He caught the Armenian’s coat in his big fist and shook the man until the dark head wobbled and went olive-gray.
“Cut it out, Macgowan,” said Ellery in a curt voice. “Drop it, I say!”
Macgowan, breathing hoarsely, relinquished his grip with reluctance. Varjian gulped twice, staring with fright
