Partners In Crime (19 page)

"I don't know. Anything. His fly being down.
A knife in his chest."

"Okay," she said quietly. "What else?"

"I'm positive they'll do an autopsy. See if
Brian can find out the results. And they're looking for his
sailboat now. Let me know when and where they find it."

She nodded and finished her notes, pushing
the paper over by the phone. "I get the picture. When do you need
it?"

"As soon as you can get it." He drummed his
fingers on the desk. "And there's one more thing, if you could keep
it quiet."

"Of course."

"Find out if the police took Cheswick's
private files from his desk. I tried to ask Abromowitz but could
get nothing out of him."

She stared at him and made a note on her
pad. "I'll see what I can do. But it may take a while. Brian will
have to find someone he knows who's working on the case. Someone
who'll talk to him."

"I understand. But it's very important. We
need your help." He stood to return to his office. He wouldn't be
talking to John Boswell after all. But there were others.

Word of Boswell's death had not yet leaked
to the press, as was obvious by the lack of calls being put through
to Miss Fullbright. On the other hand, it was apparent that the
news had quickly spread throughout the employee population. T.S.
spotted clusters of people whispering on every floor he visited,
most with genuine expressions of alarm. He even saw a few tears.
John Boswell had been a well-liked man, one of the rare people in
power at Sterling who had actually worked hard on his way up to the
top.

Auntie Lil was home and answered the
telephone immediately. He came straight to the point. "There's been
another murder."

There was a sharp intake of breath on the
other end of the line. He could almost see her shaking her head
wisely. "I'm not surprised, Theodore. Not surprised at all."

"They've found another partner. This one was
drowned."

"Are you sure it was murder?"

"I am. But it's not official."

"Don't tell me who," Auntie Lil said. "Let
me guess." She got it right on the second try. T.S. was
impressed.

"How did you know?"

"Something I saw," she said.

"Well, you've got to tell me. I'm the one
over here in the middle of it. How do I know what to ask about if
you don't tell me everything?"

She sighed. "It's nothing, really. Just that
unimportant matter you pooh-poohed about memos possibly being
removed from some of the partners' files. John Boswell was one of
them."

"But that was maybe thirty years ago," he
protested.

"Yes," she said firmly. "It was."

"I've got to go now. I'm going to go ahead
and interview employees anyway. Boswell's death makes it twice as
important. I'll let you know what happens."

"Shall we do dinner tonight?" she asked
brightly.

"I don't know. I have a feeling it's going
to be a very long day. I'll call you later."

She was disappointed but he could not help
that. He didn't even know what he was searching for, so how could
he know how long it would take?

Auntie Lil had suggested that an interview
with Frederick Dorfen, the partner who sat behind Cheswick and
Boswell, might prove useful. But T.S.'s fears were realized when it
became apparent that the elderly partner was quite drunk.

"Hello there, T.S.," Mr. Dorfen said
cheerfully, folding his long frame into the visitor's chair. He was
very old but still exceedingly dapper, his pure white hair full and
carefully combed. A white linen handkerchief peeked out of the
pocket of his custom-made suit. He looked the perfect picture of a
distinguished and competent Wall Street executive. Unfortunately,
in the opinion of his fellow partners, his time had passed. It was
not the highest endorsement of their compassion, as Frederick
Dorfen had served the firm quite well for five years as Managing
Partner. True, it had been three decades before—and he had been
replaced quickly by younger men—but he was still acknowledged by
many to be the last remnant of the old Sterling & Sterling
tradition of gentility.

What a difference the years could make. T.S.
could smell the scotch plainly on his breath, and the partner's
eyes were slightly unfocused, almost dreamy.

"Mr. Dorfen. How good to see you again,
sir." T.S. shook his hand warmly. He remembered Frederick Dorfen in
his prime, cutting a swath through the crowded banking floor.
Confident, handsome, the epitome of Sterling elegance, Wall
Street's version of Errol Flynn.

"Call me Fred, T.S. You're old enough now."
The old man slurred his words slightly and leaned a bit too far to
the right.

T.S. sighed. Just once, he'd like his
illusions to remain untarnished.

"What is it you want to see me about?" Mr.
Dorfen asked. "It's not that Miss Butterworth is it?"

"I beg your pardon?" T.S. looked at the old
man quizzically. "What would Miss Butterworth have to do with
me?"

The old man flapped a hand and leaned back.
"She's always threatening me with sex discrimination if I don't
stop making remarks." He leaned toward T.S. "She likes it, though,
you know. That tough old bird." He placed the tips of his fingers
carefully together and crossed his legs. The maneuver took quite a
long time. After all, they were extremely old legs and he was
drunk. "She protests but I can tell she likes it. Who else is going
to compliment her on her legs? I wouldn't do it if it didn't keep
her young." He leaned forward in a conspiratorial manner. "The most
I ever do is pinch her old bottom now and then. I'm surprised she
can feel it at all through that steel girdle she wears." He leaned
back and gave a dry laugh that turned into a coughing fit. Alarmed,
T.S. waited until he recovered, then decided that he had better get
right to the point before the old man passed out at his feet.

"You sit behind Robert Cheswick and John
Boswell, Frederick," T.S. said.

"What?" The old man appeared confused at the
change in subject but recovered after a moment. "So that's it.
You're poking into their deaths. Most surprising, it is. Most
surprising."

"It surprised you?"

"Of course it did. Who'd want to do away
with those two?" Mr. Dorfen shook his head. "Cheswick was a regular
prune, acted older than I am. And Boswell was just a fool who
thought that if he chased skirts all day it would keep him
young."

"Does that mean they deserved to be
murdered?" T.S. asked.

Mr. Dorfen looked property rebuked. "Of
course not. I admire you for looking into it. What is it you want
to know?" He held himself rigidly in the chair as if he might slide
off onto the floor if he relaxed. As, indeed, he might.

"Did you notice anything unusual about
either of them recently?"

"Unusual?" The old man considered the
question, rubbing his chin with a hand as he thought. "I suppose
so," he said at last.

T.S waited, "Well," he finally prompted when
there was no response. "What? What was unusual?"

"Cheswick was even touchier than usual. Very
grouchy, in fact. I am his senior, you know. It wouldn't have hurt
him to show a little respect."

"What precisely did he do?"

"Practically accused me of snooping through
his mail." Clearly the old man's pride had been hurt. "Came in each
morning and snatched up his damn letters and looked at me like I
was going to paw through them or something. I have plenty to do,
you know, without going through other people's letters."

"I'm sure you do," T.S. soothed. "Anything
else?"

"He was drinking heavily," the old man said
darkly.

T.S. was tempted to ask if he'd been nipping
at Dorfen's bottle, but resisted the urge. "How do you know?" he
asked instead.

"How do I know?" The man gave a well-bred
snort. "He'd come back from lunch stinking of the stuff." Mr.
Dorfen tapped his nose slowly. "Don't think I'm so old that I don't
have good refractory nerves."

"Olfactory," T.S. corrected.

"Those, too," the old man said firmly.

T.S. sighed. "Anything else unusual?"

Mr. Dorfen tapped his fingers together
absently and bounced a foot lightly as he thought. "He was very bad
about returning his phone calls," he finally said.

"How do you know?"

"That bossy secretary of his kept coming in
and reminding him that so and so had called again and asking what
was the matter with him that he wouldn't call back. Nagged him
something fierce. She's a pushy one, even if she is a looker."

"In other words, he was preoccupied?"

"Yes, very preoccupied." The old man nodded
his head, satisfied at the diagnosis. "That's all I can think
of."

It hadn't been much, but at least T.S. had
tried. He rose and extended a good-bye handshake. Instead, the old
partner grabbed his hand and hoisted himself out of the chair,
mumbling his thanks.

"Thank you for stopping by, Frederick.
You've been most helpful."

The old man bent to smooth the creases in
his pants. "Glad to be of use." He straightened up. "Glad to be of
use." He strode to the doorway and turned back to T.S. "Believe me,
Cheswick was being a real grouch. Just ask John Boswell."

"Frederick—John Boswell is dead, too.
Remember?"

"That's so. That's so." The old man nodded
his head and looked perplexed. "Keep forgetting. Butterworth told
me." He sighed. "Too bad. He could have told you what they were
arguing about."

"Who argued?" T.S. asked quickly.

"Argued, hell. Those two fought." The old
man laughed in disbelief. "They fought, man. Two tremendous
arguments. Right in the middle of the Partners' Room. Once on
Tuesday and again on Thursday. Everyone was out to lunch but me.
Jimmy Ruffino caught them arguing the second time and they shut up
immediately. But as for me, they act like I'm not even there. No
respect. You'd think I was wallpaper. I saw the whole thing. A
regular shouting match." He tsk-tsked and shook his head. "Hardly a
suitable way for partners of Sterling & Sterling to
behave."

"What were they arguing about?"

"I haven't a clue." The old man shrugged. "I
heard Boswell telling Cheswick that he had better get his mind back
on work or the firm could lose millions. That he was imagining
trouble. It would be easy to take care of, Boswell said. Then
Cheswick told Boswell he was one to talk, that his extracurricular
activities would get them all in trouble one day. That's all I
remember. You think I eavesdrop or something?" He turned to go,
then whirled back to T.S., raised one hand in the air and added
jauntily, "Just meet me for a margarita at Magritte's."

"What's that?" T.S. asked. "What did you
say?"

"Meet me for a margarita at Magritte's!" the
old man repeated cheerfully.

"Who is Magritte?" T.S. asked.

Mr. Dorfen clung to the door frame with a
shaky hand and leaned forward, his eyes narrowing as he attempted
to focus them. "She was something else," he said. "Quite a liar,
you know. A bunch of lies. Still and all, it's very sad. Very sad
indeed."

T.S. stared at the old man. "Who was she?"
he asked him. "Tell me more."

Mr. Dorfen peered at him intensely and an
almost sly smile broke over his face. "It's just some old joke we
used to say," he finally told T.S., shaking his head. "Can't
remember how it started. I hadn't heard it in years until I
overheard Cheswick whispering it to Boswell the other day."

He staggered cheerfully out the door and
left a bemused T.S. behind, shaking his head in exasperation.

T.S. had decided it might save time and
prove clever to interview the firm's biggest gossips together, but
shortly into the proceedings he realized he had been out of his
mind. Between Francine Crisp and Effie the operator, more
misinformation and crazy theories flew about the room than you
might find at a group therapy session out at Creedmoor, the city's
most notorious mental hospital.

The two women sat, wide-eyed, in front of
him. They were a study in unfortunate contrasts. Effie was plump,
to put it kindly, with upswept gray hair and a pair of ancient
light blue cat's-eye glasses attached to her ears with silver
cords. Rhinestones winked out at him from the frames, as the
glasses balanced precariously on the tip of her large, wide nose.
She wore a purple, two-piece polyester pants suit. Thank god she
was seated behind the main desk all day.

On the other hand, Mrs. Crisp was very small
and birdlike and wore her hair chopped off short in a style much
too young for her pinched, wrinkled face. She was neatly decked out
in a gray flannel pants suit, looking more like a doorman than a
teller.

"We heard you were going to solve the
murder, Mr. Hubbert," Mrs. Crisp said.

"Murders," Effie quickly interrupted. "We
heard about Mr. Boswell today."

"Perhaps," T.S. said carefully. "I'm looking
into it. So are the police, of course."

"The police!" Mrs. Crisp snorted. "Why, when
my daughter's home was burglarized and they found out she had no
insurance, they said there wasn't even any point in filling out a
report. Imagine!"

"There's talk of embezzlement," Effie
interrupted in her excitement. "Wouldn't it be something if old Mr.
Cheswick had been embezzling money all these years?"

"Yes. We think maybe with an accomplice,"
Mrs. Crisp added. "We figure that Mr. Boswell found out and the
accomplice first killed Mr. Cheswick and then Mr. Boswell to keep
from being uncovered."

"Mr. Cheswick's nerves were in a terrible
state last week," Effie said confidently. "He was probably afraid
of being found out. We think he was going to confess the whole
thing out of guilt. That's why he had to be silenced. See what we
mean?"