Trouble at the Brownstone

Chapter 11

I started to give Wolfe some lip about his presumptuous attitude when the telephone rang. It was Charlie King, from the Cabot & Sons Importers pier over on the Hudson. I motioned Wolfe to pick up, mouthing King’s name.

“Hi, Archie. When you were over here the other day, I told you everything on the docks seemed to be kosher,” Charlie said. “But something happened yesterday. Maybe it’s nothing, but...”

“Go on,” I prompted.

“One of my crewmembers, Ed Marcucci, went to visit a friend of his at the National Export Lines, two piers over. Do you know them?”

“I’ve heard of the company, but that’s the extent of it.”

“Well, they’ve been around for years, like us. Their ships sail to ports from Dover, Hamburg, and Rotterdam on the north to Marseilles, Barcelona, and Genoa on the south. It’s a big operation, larger than ours.”

“So, what does that have to do with Ed Marcucci?”

“Oh yeah, sorry. Ed has a friend at National named Mel Phipps, and they were going to grab lunch on Eleventh Avenue. Anyway, Ed walked over to National’s pier to pick up Phipps, and he noticed there were men getting off a cargo ship that had just docked who didn’t look like either crew members or longshoremen. He asked about them, and Mel pretty much ducked the question.”

“This is Nero Wolfe, Mr. King. Does National Export carry passengers on its ships?”

“That’s just it — they don’t. And that is what Ed found puzzling. That, plus the fact that his friend definitely did not want to talk about these men.”

“What did they look like?” I asked.

“Middle-aged, some older, according to Ed,” King said. “There were maybe a dozen of them in all, getting off the ship and walking along the pier, being guided toward the office by a couple of National’s men. According to Ed, most of them were grim and seemed frightened or suspicious, looking around and blinking like they were being followed.”

“Probably DPs,” I said. “Poor devils, heaven knows what all they had gone through during the war.”

“Did they look undernourished?” Wolfe asked.

“Ed didn’t say, although he mentioned that some of them wore clothes that didn’t seem to fit.”

“If they’re being smuggled here, which could be the case, they probably at least got decent grub on the ship,” I said. “The question is, how are they going to blend in and avoid getting caught? Truman’s act didn’t necessarily give every displaced person the right to come to the United States.”

“Archie, I will keep asking around,” King said. “It’s damned hard to keep secrets along the docks, although it seems that National Export has done a pretty good job of it up until now.”

After we hung up. I turned to Wolfe. “And now...?”

“Call Mr. Cohen again, and let him know what we have learned.”

Lon was going to get tired of hearing from me, but at least this time, I would have something that just might interest him.

“This isn’t the first time we’ve gotten reports of DPs possibly being smuggled into the country,” Cohen said when I reached him in the war room that passes as his office high up in the Gazette building and filled him in on what we had learned. “I’ll have one of our guys look into it,” he said. “What’s your interest? You still trying to connect those North River piers with your man Horstmann and his beating?”

“Let us say that we are exploring every avenue.”

“Swell, thanks for that. By the way, how is Horstmann doing?”

“No change, at least as of yesterday,” I said. I didn’t bother to mention that his sister had been to see us — and had hired us.

“Speaking of the North River piers,” Lon continued, “we got a police report this morning that a floater was found wedged between pilings on the Hudson at about Fifty-Eighth Street. “He’d been shot. A single bullet to the head did the job, efficient, like a mob hit. I thought you’d like to know, given your interest lately in the piers. His name was...” I could hear Lon shuffling papers... “Here it is, Chester Miller, age sixty-seven, according to papers found on his person. Fat guy and bald, retired postal worker. Name mean anything to you?”

“No,” I lied. “How long had he been in the water?”

“Less than a day, the medics said. A dog walker happened to spot him. We’ll give it a short item toward the rear of the first section.”

“That sounds like an uncommon occurrence.”

“Not as uncommon as you would think,” Lon said. “Between suicides and mob hits, bodies get fished out of the water often, and in various states of decay.”

“This obviously wasn’t a suicide, unless he still had the gun in his hand,” I remarked.

“The keen mind of the private eye at work once again. It is indeed a wondrous thing to see.”

“Kindly spare me your praise. Have your Gazette bloodhounds learned any more about Mr. — what, Miller’s — death?”

“It is still early in the game, my boy. Is it nothing more than my newsman’s innate curiosity, or do I sense some interest from you regarding this man’s demise?”

“What interests me is that it happened in the general neighborhood where Theodore had been residing,” I said.

“Worth considering, all right. Could be just a coincidence?”

“Maybe. But, as you said, a lot of bodies get pulled out of our town’s rivers for one reason or another.”

“But those bodies make a much more interesting story when they don’t go into the water by choice.”

“I can almost see the wheels turning in your exposé-driven newspaperman’s mind.”

“Now, be honest, Archie. Doesn’t a body with a bullet wound to the head make you wonder what caused this to happen?”

“In an academic way, I suppose.”

“You, an academic?” Lon snorted. “A pause here, while I cover my mouth with a handkerchief to keep from laughing.”

“Go ahead and laugh. As I recall, the only college you ever attended was the school of hard knocks.”

“It was a damned good school, Archie. And it taught me to question everything. Right now, in fact, I’m questioning just how much interest you have in this floater, Miller by name. Somehow, my antenna is up.”

“Glad to hear that you’re on the alert. I’m comforted to know that.”

“In other words, I gather that you’ve got nothing further to say on the matter.”

“You gather correctly. But I appreciate the information.”

“Just remember where it came from,” Lon said.

“If I happen to forget, I am sure you’ll remind me.” I said, using a word I won’t repeat and hanging up. I turned to Wolfe and repeated my conversation with Lon, along with a summary of the description I had given him earlier of Chester from my bridge game at McCready’s. “He seemed like a decent sort,” I continued, “although he did admit to being curious about the overall mood in that back room at the bar.”

“Do you feel we would be imposing upon Saul to ask that he appear at McCready’s again tonight, ready for bridge?” Wolfe asked.

“I don’t. I assume you want him to act surprised about what happened to Chester Miller.”

“Your assumption is accurate.”

“I also assume you expect me to call him.”

“Accurate again.”

I dialed Saul and he answered after several rings as Wolfe picked up his instrument. “I don’t know if you’ve heard, but one of your fellow bridge players was found dead in the Hudson.”

“No, I hadn’t. Who’s the victim?”

“Chester Miller, and he had been shot in the head. We got the word from Lon Cohen.”

“Has it been in the papers yet?”

“The police report came too late for the Times and the other morning papers, but according to Lon, it probably will make the Gazette’s first edition, which should be hitting our front steps any minute now.”

“Saul, would you be able to go to McCready’s tonight?” It was Wolfe, who had joined the conversation.

“Yes, sir. You’ll want me to gauge the mood in there, right?”

“It would be helpful to get the benefit of your observations.”

“I will drop in at McCready’s and report back. Will you again be on your stool at the bar, Archie?”

I looked at Wolfe, who shook his head. “No, I’ll take a pass tonight,” I said. “But I plan to assess the mood — if there is one — in that flophouse across the street where I’ve been staying.”

The Gazette had indeed arrived. Standing on the front porch, I leafed through it and found a two-paragraph item in the lower left-hand corner of page 28.

I showed Wolfe the item without comment. “It would appear that being a bridge player in the back room at McCready’s can be detrimental to one’s health,” he said, tossing the Gazette aside. Ever the wit.

That evening, I returned to my quarters in the Elmont, hoping to run into some of my fellow residents. On the way up the stairs to the fourth floor, I encountered an individual I had not seen before, a thin, almost emaciated man in middle age who wore his salt-and-pepper hair short and was dressed in clothes that seemed to be made for a larger person.

“Hello, my name is Art,” I said with a grin, holding out a hand. “I don’t believe I have seen you before.”

The man didn’t quite recoil, but he clearly was startled. He took my hand and made a feeble attempt at shaking it, then pulled away.

“Have you lived here long?” I asked, pressing the issue and forcing him to speak.

He looked like he wanted to run, but I was blocking the way down the stairs. “I... am new, very new,” he said, pronouncing each word precisely, as if trying, without much success, to mask an accent. He was only partially successful, at least to my ears. Based on that short sentence, he might have been from almost anywhere in Europe. I pressed on.

“And your name is?” I asked, maintaining my grin.

“George.”

“Where do you come from, George?”

“I am... how would you say it... a displaced person. I am from... Poland.”

“It must have been very hard for you to get here.”

“Very hard, yes,” George said, clearly eager to end the conversation and get away from me.

“How many other displaced persons have come to New York?”

He shrugged, palms up. “I do not know,” he answered, eager to squirm by me and head down the stairs.

“Well, I am glad you were able to make it here,” I told him, stepping aside. He took the steps two at a time and did not look back.