5

A weekend intruded here, and a very welcome intrusion it was. For two sun-spangled days I was able to enact my favorite role of blade-about-town. On Saturday morning I played tennis with Binky Watrous on his private court- and lost. I treated Connie Garcia to lunch at the Pelican Club, challenged her to a game of darts-and lost. In the evening I played poker with a group of intemperate cronies-and lost.

I was more successful on Sunday. I spent most of the afternoon gamboling on the beach with Connie and a Frisbee, and demolishing a bottle of a chilled Soave I had never tried before. Tangy is the word. Then we picked up two slabs of ribs barbecued with a Cajun sauce and returned to Connie's digs with a cold six-pack of Heineken. A pleasant time was had by all. I was home and in bed by ten o'clock and asleep by 10:05, sunburned, slightly squiffed, exhausted, and oh so content.

I overslept on Monday morning, as usual, and found a deserted kitchen when I bounced downstairs. I fixed myself a mug of instant black, and built an interracial sandwich: ham on bagel.

I used the kitchen phone to call the office. I asked Mrs. Trelawney if the honcho could spare me a few moments that morning. She put me on hold, and I listened to wallpaper music a few minutes while she went to check. She returned to tell me His Majesty would grant me ten minutes at precisely eleven o'clock.

"Thank you, Mrs. T.," I said. "Tell me, have you ever cooked a goose-or vice versa?"

"Why, no," she said. "But I once took a tramp in the woods."

She hung up cackling, and I trotted out to my chariot, much refreshed by that silly exchange of ancient corn.

Twenty minutes later I was in my crypt at the McNally Building and lighted my first English Oval of the day, considering it a reward for having spent the entire weekend without a gasper. On my desk was a sheaf of faxed replies to my inquiries to national credit agencies regarding the financial status of Theodosia and Hector Johnson.

I read them all slowly and carefully, and, to put it succinctly, my flabber was gasted. It was not that they contained derogatory information about the Johnsons; they contained no information at all.

If those reports were to be believed, Theo and Hector had never had a credit card, never had a charge account, never bought anything on time, never made a loan or had a mortgage, never purchased anything from a mail order catalogue, never received a government check for whatever reason, had no insurance, owned no assets such as real estate, stocks, bonds, or other securities, and had never filed a tax return.

Improbable, would you say? Nay, dear reader. Utterly impossible! In our society even a toddler of three has already left a paper trail, carefully recorded on a computer somewhere. I refused to believe that two adults had no financial background whatsoever. Even if they scrupulously paid cash for all their purchases, what was the source of the cash and why was there no mention of bank accounts, checking and savings, and no record of having paid federal, state, and local taxes?

They had names and Social Security numbers. And that's all their dossiers revealed.

I tried to puzzle it out, resisting the urge to light another cigarette. The more I gnawed at it, the more ridiculous it seemed to me that the Johnsons could be totally without a financial history. There must be a logical explanation for it, but whatever it might be I could not imagine. I hoped my Palm Beach contacts would help solve the riddle.

It was then pushing eleven o'clock, and I rushed upstairs to my father's office, for if I was even one minute late he was quite capable of canceling the appointment.

Prescott McNally, Esq., was standing solidly planted before his antique rolltop desk, and in his three-button, double-breasted suit of nubby cheviot, looking somewhat of a relic himself. He cast a baleful glance at my awning-striped seersucker jacket and didn't invite me to be seated.

I recited a condensed account of my interview with Shirley Feebling in Fort Lauderdale and finished by suggesting the lady might be sincere in professing love for Chauncey Wilson Smythe-Hersforth.

"She seemed totally uninterested in a cash settlement, sir," I remarked.

"Nonsense," father said sharply. "Did you make a specific offer?"

"No, I did not."

"That was a mistake, Archy," he said. "The mention of dollars would have concentrated her mind wonderfully. I'm afraid the lady bamboozled you. Her protestations of love were merely a bargaining ploy. And even if she is smitten, as you seem to believe, how can she possibly profit from an unrequited love? She can't force that young fool to marry her, you know."

"No, sir, but she can carry out her threat to sell his letters to a tabloid."

"Don't be so certain of that," he admonished me. "I would have to research relevant law, but it might be claimed the letters are his property since he created them, and if so ruled, the sale and publication could be legally enjoined. But before we go to that trouble, I suggest you consult with Smythe-Hersforth. Obtain his approval of your returning to Fort Lauderdale and making a definite offer to this woman. I believe the proposal of an actual cash payment will persuade her to talk business."

I was doubtful but made no demur. "How much do you think we should offer?"

He went into his mulling trance, and I waited patiently for his decision.

"I reckon a thousand dollars would be adequate," he finally said.

I was startled. "Isn't that rather mingy, sir?"

"Of course it is," he said testily, "and I expect the woman will reject it immediately. But it will serve as an opening move to begin bargaining. It will require her to reveal what she believes she should receive, and eventually, I trust, an equitable compromise can be agreed upon. The important thing is to shift negotiations away from discussion of her alleged emotional injury to the realm of a hard cash settlement. Do you understand?"

"Yes, father, and I'll attempt to explain it to CW, though he is not the swiftest man in the world."

"When you speak to him you might also ascertain how high he is willing to go. Five thousand? Ten? Or more? The decision must be his. Now is there anything else?"

"Just one more thing," I said hastily. "I had occasion to speak to Mrs. Louise Hawkin prior to the death of her husband. She said a friend was seeking a divorce lawyer and asked if we might recommend someone."

Father stared at me. "Do you really believe she was asking on behalf of a friend?"

"No, sir."

"Nor do I. And now that Mrs. Hawkin is a widow I doubt very much that she will inquire again about a divorce attorney. Your ten minutes are up."

I returned to my broom closet, slumped behind my steel desk, and silently groused. I was frustrated by that conversation with the senior. I thought he was totally mistaken about Ms. Shirley Feebling-but then I had met the lady and he had not. I really didn't believe she would accept a cash settlement, no matter how generous.

Still, I had no wish to flaunt my father's advice. His experience had been so much more extensive than mine, I simply had to defer to his judgment. But I am, as you may have guessed, an incurable romantic, and I mournfully reflected that if mein papa was correct and Shirley accepted money in lieu of love, I would be horribly disappointed and possibly take up the lute to express my weltschmerz in musical form.

Meanwhile, I had a job to do and when duty calls, yrs. truly can never be accused of shlumpery. I called Information and obtained the phone number of Hector Johnson. I had prepared a scam that, I felt, included sufficient truth to convince the most worldly-wise pigeon.

"The Johnson residence," a man's voice answered. Deep and resonant. A very slight accent. Midwestern, I guessed.