The Chinese Orange Mystery

Foochow Error

Djuna, the Queens’ boy-of-all-work, thrust his olive and hatchety young face into the bedroom the next morning. “Why, Mr. Ellery!” he exclaimed. “I didn’t know you’d got up!”

His astonishment was based upon experience, and the current blasting of it. Mr. Ellery Queen — who neither toiled nor spun, except within the environs of his mind — was not the earliest riser in the world; and indeed his lean figure sprawled in innocent sleep upon the second of their twin beds caused the Inspector to erupt, like a patient volcano, each morning in a growling thunder of expostulation. But this morning there he was, his hair still ruffled from sleep, sitting up in pongee pajamas, pince-nez perched on the bridge of his thin nose, gravely reading a fat book at the unheard-of hour of ten o’clock.

“Wipe that smirk off your face, Djuna,” he said absently, without looking up from the page. “Can’t a man get up early one morning?”

Djuna frowned. “What you reading?”

“Somebody’s massive tome on Chinese customs, you heathen. And I can’t say it’s much help.” He flung it aside, yawning, and plopped back on the pillow with a luxurious sigh. “Might rustle me a yard of toast and a liter of coffee, Djun’.”

“You better get up,” said Djuna grimly.

“And why had I better get up, young ’un?” murmured Ellery in a smothered voice from the depths of the pillow.

“’Cause some one’s waiting here to see you.”

Ellery bolted upright, the glasses dangling from his ear. “Well, of all the exasperating—! Why didn’t you say so before, homunculus? Who is it? How long has he been waiting?” He scrambled out of bed and reached for his dressing-gown.

“It’s a Mr. Macgowan, an’ how’d you know it was a ‘he’?” demanded Djuna with restrained admiration, lounging against the door.

“Macgowan? That’s strange,” muttered Ellery. “Oh, that! Very simple, number one boy. You see, there are only two sexes — not taking into account certain accidents of nature. So it was at the very least a fifty-fifty guess.”

“G’on,” said Djuna with a disbelieving grin, and vanished. Then he materialized again, sticking his gamin head back into the room, and said: “Got the coffee on the table,” and vanished once more.

When Ellery emerged into the Queens’ living-room he found tall Glenn Macgowan pacing restlessly up and down before the fire that crackled in the grate. He ceased his patrol abruptly. “Ah, Queen. I’m sorry. Had no idea I’d be routing you out of bed.”

Ellery shook his big hand lazily. “Not at all. You did me a service; there’s no telling when I’d have got up. Join me in some breakfast, Macgowan?”

“Had mine, thank you. But don’t let me stop you. I can wait.”

“I hope,” chuckled Ellery, “you’re cultivating what Bishop Heber was pleased to term ‘Swift’s Eighth Beatitude,’ although it’s really Popish in origin.”

“I beg your pardon?” gasped Macgowan.

“Popish advisedly. I meant Pope. In a letter to John Gay he wrote: ‘Blessed is he who expects nothing for he shall never be disappointed.’ I don’t feel in the donative mood this morning... Well, well! I find I’m ravenous, now that I put my mind to it. We can talk while I’m refueling.” Ellery sat down and reached for his orange-juice, leaving Macgowan with a partly open mouth. He observed that one bright young eye was fixed to the crack of the kitchen door — fixed very curiously upon his visitor. “Sure you won’t join me?”

“Quite.” Macgowan hesitated. “Er — do you always talk this way before breakfast, Queen?”

Ellery grinned as he gulped. “I’m sorry. It’s a nasty habit.”

Macgowan resumed his pacing. Then he stopped short jerkily and said: “Ah, Queen. Sorry about the other night. Dr. Kirk’s unpredictable. I assure you Marcella and I — all of us — felt very bad about the whole dismal business. Of course, the old gentleman’s exercising the prerogative of senility. He’s a tyrant. And besides, he doesn’t understand the necessities of official investigation—”

“Quite all right,” said Ellery cheerfully, munching toast. And he said nothing more, seeming content to leave the conversation to his visitor.

“Well.” Macgowan shook his head suddenly and sat down in an armchair by the fire. “I imagine you’re wondering why I’ve come here this morning.”

Ellery raised his cup. “Well, I’m human, I suppose. I can’t say I was precisely prepared for it.”

Macgowan laughed a little gloomily. “Of course, I did want to express my apologies personally. I feel like one of the Kirk family, now that Marcella and I... Look here, Queen.”

Ellery sank back with a sigh, dabbing his lips with his napkin. He offered Macgowan a cigaret, which the big man refused, and took one himself. “There!” he said. “That’s worlds better. Well, Macgowan? I’m looking.”

They studied each other in silence for some time, quite without expression. Then Macgowan began to fumble in his inner breast-pocket. “Y’know, I can’t quite make you out, Queen. I get the feeling that you know a good deal more than you pretend—”

“I’m like the grasshopper,” murmured Ellery. “Protective coloration. Really, that’s an air cultivated for purposes of my avocation, Macgowan.” He squinted at his cigaret. “I assume you have the murder in mind?”

“Yes.”

“I know nothing. I know,” said Ellery sadly, “rather less than nothing, when it comes to that. I might, however, ask you what you know.” Macgowan started. “I hadn’t got round to you, you see. But you do know something, and I think it would be wise for you to let me share your knowledge. I’m the repository for more secrets than you could throw at a dead cat, if that’s the polite custom. I’m unofficial — blessed state, you understand. I tell what I think should be told and keep all the rest to myself.”

Macgowan stroked his long jaw nervously. “I don’t know what you mean. I holding something back? Really—”

Ellery eyed him calmly. Then he put the cigaret back into his mouth and smoked with a thoughtful air. “Dear, dear. I must be losing my grip. Well, Macgowan, what’s on your mind — or rather in your hand?”

Macgowan unfolded his big fist and Ellery saw in the broad palm a small leather object, like a card-case. “This,” he said.

“One case, leather or leatherette. Unfortunately I haven’t X-ray eyes. Let’s have it, please.”

But without taking his eyes off the case in his hand and without raising his hand Macgowan said: “I’ve just purchased — what’s in this case. Something valuable. It’s pure coincidence, of course, but I believe in anticipating trouble — trouble that might lead me into some embarrassment, though I assure you I’m perfectly innocent of any...” Ellery watched the man unblinkingly. He was extraordinarily nervous. “There’s nothing in it for me to conceal, but if I neglected to mention it, some one of the police, I fancy, might find out. That would be awkward, perhaps unpleasant. So—”

“Obviously inspection is called for,” murmured Ellery. “What are you talking about, Macgowan?”

Macgowan handed him the leather case.

Ellery turned it over in his fingers curiously, with that deliberate detachment which years of examination of strange objects had bred in him. It was made of a plain morocco, black, and apparently operated on a simple spring-catch arrangement. He pressed the small button and the lid flew back. Inside the case, imbedded in a hollow of satin, lay a rectangular envelope of stiff milky glassine. And in the envelope, incased in a pochette, lay a postage stamp.

Silently Macgowan produced a stamp-tongs of nickel and offered it to Ellery. Ellery opened the envelope and with the tongs, rather clumsily, extracted the pochette. The stamp showed clearly through the cellophane. It was an oversize stamp, wider than deep, and perforated evenly along its four edges. The border was an ochre-yellow in color, and the bottom was designed as a sort of Chinese flower-garland. In the two lower corners appeared the denomination of the stamp: $1. In squat ochre letters running across the top of the border was the word: Foochow, capitalized.

But inside the border, where even to Ellery’s untrained eye it was evident that there should have been a pictorial design of some kind in another color, there was — nothing. Merely the blank white paper of the stamp.

“That’s funny, isn’t it?” murmured Ellery. “I’m not a philatelist, but I can’t remember ever having seen or heard of a stamp that was blank in the center of the design. What’s the idea, anyway, Macgowan?”

“Hold it up to the light,” said Macgowan quietly.

Ellery flung him a sharp glance and obeyed. And instantly he saw, through the thin paper, a very charming little scene in black. In the foreground there was what appeared to be a long ceremonial canoe of some kind, filled with natives; and in the background a harbor scene; obviously, from the legend at the top, a view of the harbor of Foochow.

“Amazing,” he said. “Perfectly amazing.” And something glittered in his eye as he flung Macgowan another sharp glance.

Macgowan said in the same quiet voice: “Turn the stamp over.”

Ellery did so. And there, incredible as it seemed, was the harbor scene in its black printing-ink, impressed upon the back of the stamp. There was a gloss of dried gum over it, cracked and streaky.

“Backwards?” he said slowly. “Of course. Backwards.”

Macgowan took the tongs with the pochette between its tines and replaced the pochette in the envelope. “Queer, isn’t it?” he said in a smothered voice. “The only error of its kind to my knowledge in the whole field of philately. It’s the sort of rarity collectors dream about.”

“Backwards?” said Ellery again, as if he were asking himself a question the answer to which was too pat to be true. He leaned back in his chair and smoked with half-closed eyes. “Well, well! This has been a fruitful visit, Macgowan. How on earth does such an error occur?”

Macgowan snapped the lid of the case shut and replaced the case almost carelessly in his breast-pocket.

“Well, this is a two-color stamp, as you saw. What we term a bicolor. Ochre and black in this instance. That means that the sheet of stamps — they come in sheets, of course — aren’t printed separately; the sheets of stamps had to be run through the presses twice.”

Ellery nodded. “Once for the ochre, once for the black. Obviously.”

“Well, you can deduce what happened in this strange case. Something went wrong after the ochre impression had been made and dried. Instead of placing the sheets face up in the press, a careless printer permitted them to get in face down. Consequently the black impression came out on the back of the stamps, not the face.”

“But, Lord, there must be some sort of government inspection! Our own postal authorities are strict, aren’t they? I still don’t understand how this stamp managed to get into circulation. I always thought that when errors of this sort occurred the sheets were summarily destroyed.”

“So they are in most cases, but occasionally a sheet or two gets out — either as a clerk’s mistake, or else they’re stolen by some official for the sole purpose of exploiting them philatelically. For example, the sheet of twenty-four-cent U.S. airmail inverts which is so well-known simply slipped by the inspectors. This Foochow...” Macgowan shook his head. “There’s no telling what actually happened. But here’s the stamp.”

“I see,” said Ellery; and for a space only the brisk sounds of Djuna washing the breakfast dishes in the kitchen broke the silence. “So you’ve come to me, Macgowan, to tell me about your purchase of it. Afraid of its backwardness?”

“I’m afraid of nothing,” said Macgowan stiffly; and Ellery, studying those level eyes and the set of that long jaw, could well believe. “At the same time, I’m a canny Scot, Queen, and I’m not going to be caught with my pants down in something...” He did not finish. When he spoke again it was in a lighter tone. “This Foochow stamp is what we call a ‘local’ — that is, the city of Foochow, one of the Treaty Ports, used to issue its own postage stamps for local postage purposes. I’m a specialist in locals, you see; don’t collect anything else. Locals from anywhere — U.S., Sweden, Switzerland...”

“Tell me,” murmured Ellery. “Is this something new? You’ve run across something whose existence has never been suspected?”

“No, no. Among experts it’s been known for years that such a printer’s error occurred during the issuance of these stamps, but it’s always been assumed that the misprinted sheets were destroyed by the Foochow postal authorities. This is the first copy I’ve ever seen.”

“And how did you come by it, may I ask?”

“It’s a rather peculiar story,” said Macgowan with a frown. “Ever hear of a man named Varjian?”

“Varjian. Armenian? Can’t say I have.”

“Yes, he’s Armenian; a great many of these fellows are. Well, Varjian is one of the best-known stamp-dealers in New York. This morning, quite early, he telephoned me at home and asked me to come down to his office at once, saying that he had something to show me in which he was sure I’d be interested. Well, I’ve been on a fruitless rampage this week — hadn’t picked up a thing of interest, you see; and then the murder had left a bad taste in my mouth... I felt I owed myself a little spree.” Macgowan shrugged. “I knew Varjian wouldn’t call me unless he had something good. He’s always on the lookout for locals for me; there aren’t many collectors who go in for that sort of thing and consequently locals are scarce.” He settled back and folded his hands on his broad chest.

“He’s done this before, I suppose?”

“Oh, yes. Well, Varjian showed me the Foochow. The copy, he said, had either slipped by inspection in a full sheet or had been smuggled out of the printer’s by some one who recognized the enormous value of such an extraordinary rarity. It’s lain doggo somewhere for years, unquestionably — of course it’s an old stamp; it was issued in the Treaty Port heyday in the province of Fukien — and here all of a sudden it turns up. Varjian offered it for sale.”

“Go on,” said Ellery. “Aside from the coincidental fact of the stamp’s distinctive error, which I’ll admit is a disturbing note, I don’t see anything queer in this business — yet.”

“Well.” Macgowan rubbed his nose. “I don’t know. You see—”

“Is it authentic? Not a forgery, or anything like that? It seems to me it would be easy enough to forge such a stamp.”

“Lord, no,” said Macgowan with a smile. “It’s unquestionably genuine. There are always certain minute and identifiable characteristics of the plates from which stamps are printed; and I satisfied myself that the Foochow showed those characteristics, which are virtually impossible to forge. And then Varjian guaranteed it; and he’s an expert. The paper, the design, sometimes the perforations... oh, quite all right, I assure you. It’s nothing like that.”

“Then what,” demanded Ellery, “is bothering you?”

“The source of the stamp.”

“Source?”

Macgowan rose and turned to the fire. “There’s something very queer in the wind. I naturally wanted to know where Varjian had picked up the Foochow. Often the ownership of a rare item is as important in establishing its authenticity as the more usual internal evidence. And Varjian wouldn’t say!”

“Ah,” said Ellery thoughtfully.

“You see? He was absolutely close-mouthed about where he’d got it. Said he couldn’t tell me.”

“Did you gather the impression that he really didn’t know, or rather that he knew but wouldn’t tell?”

“He knew, all right. I got the feeling that he was acting as agent for some one. And that’s what I don’t like.”

“Why?”

Macgowan turned, and his bulk was black against the crisp little fire. “I don’t really know why,” he said slowly, “but I just don’t like it. There’s something smelly somewhere—”

“Do you think,” murmured Ellery, “that it’s stolen property? Is that what’s bothering you?”

“No, no. Varjian is honest, and I have his word for it that the stamp wasn’t stolen — I asked him point-blank. He was quite offended, in fact. I’m sure he spoke the truth there. He asked me why I wanted to know the source of the stamp; I’d never been so ‘particular’ before, he said. His actual words! That in itself was a peculiar statement, coming from him; downright insulting, really. But then I suppose he resented the implication that he was handling questionable merchandise... He’d called me first of all, he explained, because I was the biggest collector of locals he knew.”

“I wish I could see some sense in it,” said Ellery moodily. Then he looked up at the big man with a grin. “But I can’t.”

“I suppose I’m running true to form,” muttered Macgowan, shrugging. “Overcautious. But you can see my position. Here was something — well, backwards popping up out of nowhere on the heels of a damned murder that...” He knit his brows. “And then there was something else queer 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. “My — 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 from one to the other.

“Well?” snarled Macgowan.

“You see,” mumbled the Armenian, shifting his tortured eyes about, “this person is one of the greatest specializing collectors in the world on—”

“China,” said Ellery queerly. “Good God, yes. Foochow — China.”

“Yes. On China. You see — you see—”

“Who was it?” roared Macgowan in a terrible voice.

Varjian spread his hands in a pitiable gesture of resignation. “I am sorry to have to... It was your friend Mr. Donald Kirk.”