He pulled me close. His aides clustered around, twittering with eagerness.
'This very short man is sitting in a bar,' Orsini said, 'and down at the other end he sees this great big gorgeous blonde by herself. Get the picture?'
When it was over I stumbled back to my office, called Ardis, and asked her to meet me on 74th and Amsterdam in twenty minutes, about 1.45. Next I rang up the Stonehouse residence and asked if I could come by at 2.00 p.m., to talk to the maid, Olga Eklund, and to pick up a photograph of Professor Stonehouse to be used on reward posters. This was a ruse to get into the house again. I spoke to Glynis Stonehouse; she told me that she and her mother would be happy to see me.
I grabbed a gyro and a Coke on my way to meet Ardis.
She was on the north-west corner, waiting for me.
'Thank God! You're on time! I had one of the nurses cover for me, but if Stolowitz calls in and I'm not at my desk, he'll go crazy.'
'Thank you, Ardis,' I said in a low voice, handing her an envelope. 'A big help.'
'Any time,' she said, whisking the envelope out of sight.
'You're in the neighbourhood, give me a call. We'll have lunch — or whatever.'
'I'll do that,' I said.
I walked south on Central Park West to the Stonehouse apartment house and went through the business of identifying myself to the man behind the desk.
The door to 17-B was opened by a Valkyrie. She lacked only a horned helmet. This was undoubtedly Olga Eklund.
She was almost a foot taller than I, broad in the shoulders and hips, with long, sinewy arms and legs. Her head seemed no wider than her strong neck, and beneath her black uniform I imagined a hard torso, muscle, and tight skin flushed with health.
I had fantasized flaxen tresses. They existed, but had been woven into a single braid, thick as a hawser, and this plait had been wound around and around atop her head, giving her a gleaming crown that added another six inches to her impressive height. The eyes, as I had fancied, were a deep-sea blue, the whites as chalky as milk. She wore no makeup, but the full lips were blooming, the complexion a porcelainized cream.
She gave such an impression of bursting good health, of strength and vitality, that it made me shrink just to look at her. She seemed of a different species, someone visiting from Planet 4X-5-6-Gb, to demonstrate to us earthlings our sad insufficiencies.
'Mr Bigg,' she asked in the sultry, throbbing voice that had conjured up all those exciting images when I had heard it on the phone.
'Yes,' I said. 'You must be Miss Eklund.'
'Yah,' she said. 'Hat? Coat?'
She hung my things away in the hall closet. I followed her down the long corridor. She moved with a powerful, measured tramp. Beneath the skirt, rounded calves bunched and smoothed. She had the musculature of a trapeze artist, marble under suede. I was happy she hadn't offered to shake hands.
Mrs Ula Stonehouse and Glynis were waiting for me in the living room. There was a tea service on one of the small cocktail tables, and at their urging I accepted a cup of tea from the efficient Olga Eklund.
'I'm sorry I have no news to report,' I told mother and daughter. 'I have discovered nothing new bearing on the Professor's disappearance.'
'Mother said you asked about Father's health,' Glynis said. 'His illness last year. Did you speak to his doctor?'
She was curled into one corner of the long couch, her splendid legs tucked up under her.
'Yes, I spoke to Dr Stolowitz,' I said, addressing both of them. 'He wouldn't reveal the exact nature of the illness, but I gathered it was some kind of flu or virus. Tell me, was anyone else in the family ill at the same time the Professor was sick?'
'Let me think,' Mrs Stonehouse said, cocking her head.
'That was last year. Oh yes. I had a cold that lasted and lasted. And poor Effie was sniffling for at least a week.
Glynis, were you sick?'
'Probably,' the daughter said in her husky voice. 'I don't really remember, but I usually get at least one cold when winter comes. Does this have anything to do with my father's disappearance, Mr Bigg?'
'Oh no,' I said hastily. 'I just wanted to make certain he 144
was in good health on January 10th. And from what you and Dr Stolowitz have told me, he apparently was.'
Glynis Stonehouse looked at me a moment. I thought she was puzzled, but then her face cleared.
'You're trying to determine if he might have had amnesia?' she asked. 'Or be suffering some kind of temporary mental breakdown?'
'Yes,' I said, 'something like that. But obviously we can rule that out. Mrs Stonehouse, I wonder if you'd mind if I talked to your maid for a few moments. Just to see if she might recall something that could help.'
'Not at all,' Glynis Stonehouse said before her mother could answer. 'She's probably in the kitchen or dining room. You know the way; go right ahead. I've already instructed Olga to tell you whatever you want to know.'
'Thank you,' I said, rising. 'You're very kind. It shouldn't take long. And then there are a few more things I'd like to discuss with you ladies, if I may.'
I found the maid in the dining room, seated at one end of the long table. She was reading Prevention.
'Hi,' I said brightly. 'Miss Stonehouse said it was all right if I talked to you in private. May I call you Olga?'
'Yah,' she said.
She sat erect, her straight spine not touching the back of the chair; seated, she still towered over me.
'Olga,' I said, 'I work for the family's attorneys and I'm investigating the disappearance of Professor Stonehouse. I was hoping you might be able to help me.'
She focused those turquoise eyes on mine. It was like a dentist's drill going into my pupils. I mean I was pierced.
'How?' she said.
'Do you have any idea what happened to him?'
'No.'
'I realize you weren't here the night he disappeared, but had you noticed anything strange about him? I mean, had he been acting differently?'
'No.'
'At the time he disappeared, he was in good health?'
She shrugged.
'But he had been sick last year? Right? Last year he was very ill?'
'Yah.'
'But then he got better.'
'Yah.'
I sighed. I was doing just great. Yah, no, and one shrug.
'Olga,' I said, 'you work here from one o'clock to nine, six days a week — correct?'
'Yah.'
'You serve the afternoon lunch and dinner?'
'Yah.'
'Did he eat anything special no one else ate?'
'No.'
I gave up. The Silent Swede. Garbo was a chatterbox compared to this one.
'All right, Olga,' I said, beginning to rise. 'You've been very kind, and I want to — '
Her hand shot out and clamped on my arm, instantly cutting off the circulation. She drew me to her. I instinctively resisted the force. Like trying to resist a Moran tugboat. She pulled me right up to her. Then her lips were at my ear. I mean I could feel her lips on my ear, she clutched me so tightly.
'He was being poisoned,' she whispered.
