MIDTOWN EAST SIDE in Manhattan is the New York they show in the movies. Elegant, charming, clean, ”I bought you violets for your furs.“ Patricia Utley occupied a four-story town house on East Thirty-seventh, west of Lexington. The building was stone, painted a Colonial gray with a wrought-iron filigree on the glass door and the windows faced in white. Two small dormers protruded from the slate mansard roof, and a tiny terrace to the right of the front door bloomed with flowers against the green of several miniature trees. Red geraniums and white patient Lucys in black iron pots lined the three granite steps that led up to the front door.
A well-built man with gray hair and a white mess jacket answered my ring. I gave him my card. ”For Patricia Utley,“ I said.
”Come in, please,“ he said and stepped aside. I entered a center hall with a polished flagstone floor and a mahogany staircase with white risers opposite the door. The black man opened a door on the right-hand wall, and I went into a small sitting room that looked out over Thirty-seventh Street and the miniature garden. The walls were white-paneled, and there was a Tiffany lamp in green, red, and gold hanging in the center of the room. The rugs were Oriental, and the furniture was Edwardian.
The butler said, ”Wait here, please,“ and left. He closed the door behind him.
There was a mahogany highboy on the wall opposite the windows with four cut-glass decanters and a collection of small crystal glasses. I took the stoppers out of the decanters and sniffed. Sherry, cognac, port, Calvados. I poured myself a glass of the Calvados. On the wall opposite the door was a black marble fireplace, and on either side floor-to-ceiling bookcases. I looked at the titles: The Complete Works of Charles Dickens, A History of the English-Speaking Peoples by Winston Churchill, Longfellow: Complete Poetical and Prose Works, H. G. Wells’s The Outline of History, Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, with illustrations by Rockwell Kent.
The door opened behind me, and a woman entered. The butler closed it softly behind her.
”Mr. Spenser,“ she said, ”I’m Patricia Utley,“ and put out her hand. I shook it. She looked as if she might have read all the books and understood them. She was fortyish, small and blond with good bones and big black-rimmed round glasses. Her hair was pulled back tight against her head with a bun in the back. She was wearing an off-white sleeveless linen dress with blue and green piping at the hem and along the neckline. Her legs were bare and tanned.
”Please sit down,“ she said. ”I see you have a drink.
Good. How may I help you?“ I sat on the sofa. She sat opposite me on an ottoman. Her knees together, ankles crossed, hands folded in her lap.
”I’m looking for information about a girl named Donna Burlington who you probably knew about eight years ago.“ I showed her the picture.
”And why would you think I know anything about her, Mr. Spenser?“
”One of your colleagues suggested that she had left his employ and joined your firm.“
”I’m sorry, I don’t understand.“ Her blue eyes were direct and steady as she looked at me. Her face without lines.
”Well, ma’am, I don’t mean to be coarse, but an East Village pimp named Violet told me she moved uptown and went to work for you in the late fall of nineteen sixty-six.“
”I’m afraid I don’t know anyone named Violet,“ she said.
”Tall, thin guy, aggressive dresser, but small-time. No reason for you to know him. The Pinkerton Agency has never heard of me either.“
”Oh, I’m sure you’re well known in your field, Mr.
Spenser.“ She smiled, and a dimple appeared in each cheek.
”But I really don’t see how I can help you. This Violet person has misled you, I suppose for money. New York is a very grasping city.“
The room was cool and silent, central air conditioning.
I sipped the Calvados, and it reminded me that I hadn’t eaten since about seven thirty. It was now almost four thirty. ”Ms.
Utley,“ I said, ”I don’t wish to rock your boat and I don’t want anything bad to happen to Donna Burlington, I just need to know about her.“
”Ms. Utley,“ she said. ”That’s charming, but it’s Mrs., thank you.“
”Okay, Mrs. Utley, but what I said stands. I need to know about Donna Burlington. Confidential. No harm to anyone, and I can’t tell you why. But I need to know.“ I finished the brandy. She stood, took my glass, filled it, and set it down on the marble-topped coffee table in front of me. Her movements were precise and graceful and stylish. So was she.
”I have no quarrel with that, Mr. Spenser, but I can’t help you. I don’t know the young lady, nor can I imagine how anyone could think that I might.“
”Mrs. Utley, I know we’ve only met, but would you join me for dinner?“
”Is that part of your technique, Mr. Spenser? Candlelight and wine and perhaps I’ll remember something about the young lady?“
”Well, there’s that,“ I said. ”But I hate to eat alone.
The only people I know in the city are you and Violet, and Violet already had a date.“
”Well, I don’t know about being second choice to—what was it you said—an East Village pimp?“
”I’ll tell you about my most exciting cases,“ I said.
”Why, I remember one I call the howling dog caper.
The dimple reappeared.
“And I’ll do a one-hand push-up for you, and sing a dozen popular songs, pronouncing the lyrics so clearly that
