Plot It Yourself

“Yeah. When I went for a walk you knew I wanted to think. I did. When I got back you knew from the expression on my face that I was empty, and I knew you were. The best I can do is remind you that thinking is your department. I haven’t pestered you, have I? I know darned well it’s a beaut.”

“Then I have a suggestion. I don’t like it, but we must either act or capitulate. You told Mr Oshin on Monday that Jane Ogilvy might grab at the bait or she might spurn it. We have his ten thousand dollars and Mr Dexter’s offer to make any necessary contribution. It may be worth trying.”

“It may,” I conceded. “Wait till you see her.”

“I’m not going to see her. That’s for you. You are adept at dealing with personable young women, and I am not. Of course you will be severely handicapped. For Simon Jacobs you were provided with agreements by Richard Echols and Title House not to prosecute or demand reimbursement. You can’t offer that inducement to Jane Ogilvy. She won her case in court, and even if we could get a similar agreement from Marjorie Lippin’s heirs and from Nahm and Son, her publishers, which is doubtful, again our plan would be known to a number of people.”

“Then it’s a hell of a suggestion.”

He nodded. “But it leads to another. From Jane Ogilvy’s testimony at the trial, and from your report of your encounter with her, I gather that she is daft, and therefore unpredictable. Another approach might get her. Appeal to her sensibilities. Disclose the situation to her, all of it. Explain why we know that her claim against Marjorie Lippin was instigated by some person unknown to us, X. That X, threatened by imminent exposure, killed Simon Jacobs. Describe the grief and the plight of the widow and children; you might take her to see them and talk with them. Can you get a photograph of the corpse?”

“Probably, from Lon Cohen.”

“Show it to her. Get one that shows the face, if possible; the face of a dead man before it has been rearranged is much more affecting than a mere heap of clothing. If you can’t stir her sympathy perhaps you can arouse her fear. She is herself in peril; X may decide that she too must be removed. It would probably be a mistake to try to get her to supply evidence and details of her association with X, of the swindling of Marjorie Lippin; that would scare her off; all you really need is his name. Once we know him he is doomed. I want your opinion.”

I glanced at the clock: ten minutes past nine. “It may take a while to find Lon. After seven o’clock there’s no telling where he is. And the photograph would help.”

“You think it’s worth trying?”

“Sure. It may work. We’ve got to try something.”

“We have indeed. Then as early in the morning as may be.”

I turned to the phone and started after Lon Cohen.

Chapter 11

At a quarter to ten Thursday morning I braked the Heron sedan to a stop in front of 78 Haddon Place, Riverdale. Perhaps that wasn’t “as early as may be,” but I didn’t want to tackle her before she had had breakfast, and besides, I hadn’t been able to get the photograph until Lon got to the Gazette office at nine o’clock. As I was soon to learn, it didn’t matter anyway, since she had already been dead about twelve hours.

If it had been a nice sunny morning I might have gone around to the side for a look at the terrace where I had found her before, but it was cloudy and cool, so I went up the walk to the entrance and pushed the button. The door was opened by a DAR type, a tall, upright female with a strong chin, in a gray dress with black buttons. Unquestionably the mother under whose devotion Jane had once been suffocating and probably still was.

“Good morning,” she said.

“Good morning,” I said. “My name is Archie Goodwin. Are you Mrs Ogilvy?”

“I am.”

“I would like to see your daughter. Miss Jane Ogilvy.”

“Does she know you?”

“We have met. She may not recognize the name.”

“She is in the cloister.”

Good Lord, I thought, she has taken the veil. “Cloister?” I said.

“Yes. She may not be up yet. Go around the house to the left and from the terrace take the path through the shrubbery.” She backstepped and was closing the door.

I followed directions. I had a feeling that I might have known she had a cloister-a cloister felt though not perceived. Rounding the house to the terrace, which was deserted, I took a graveled path which disappeared into bushes that gave it a roof. After winding among the bushes for some distance it left them and straightened out to pass between two big maples to the door of a small building-one story, gray stone, sloping roof, a curtained window on each side of the door. I proceeded and used the knocker, a big bronze flower with a red agate in the centre. When nothing happened I knocked again, waited twenty seconds, turned the knob, found the door wasn’t locked, opened it a couple of inches, and called through the crack, “Miss Ogilvy!” No response. I swung the door open and stepped in.

It was a fine well-furnished cloister and probably contained many objects that were worth a look, but my attention centred immediately on its tenant. She was on her back on the floor in front of an oversized couch, dressed in a blue garment that I would call a smock but she probably had called something else. One of her legs was bent a little, but the other one was out straight. Crossing to her, I stooped to get her hand and found that the arm was completely stiff. I got a foot, which was covered by a sock but no shoe; the leg was stiff too. She had been dead a minimum of six hours, and almost certainly more.