The Four of Hearts Read Free Page B

probably be over in Las Vegas playing craps with silver dollars. When he does show up he’ll be boiled on both sides. Nobody in town remembers the last time Lew was even relatively sober … Excuse me.’ Butcher snapped into his communicator: ‘Yes, Madge?’
    The Second Secretary said wearily: ‘Mr. Bascom just whooshed through, Mr. Butcher, and on the way he grabbed my letter-knife again. I thought you’d like to know.’
    â€˜Did she say knife?’ asked Ellery, alarmed.
    A chunky man whizzed in like a fat thunderbolt. He wore shapeless clothes, and he had blown cheeks, nose like a boiled onion, frizzled moustache, irritated hair, eyelids too tired to sit up straight, and a gaudy complexion not caused by exposure to the great outdoors.
    This apparition skidded to a stop, danced an intricate measure symbolizing indignation, and brandished a long letter-knife. Then he hopped across the rug to the Boy Wonder’s desk, behind which Mr. Queen sat paralysed, and waggled the steel under the petrified Queen nose.
    â€˜See this?’ he yelled.
    Mr. Queen nodded. He wished he didn’t.
    â€˜Know what it is?’
    Mr. Queen gulped. ‘A knife.’
    â€˜Know where I found it?’
    Mr. Queen shook his head at this inexplicable catechism. The chunky man plunged the steel into Jacques Butcher’s desk-top. It quivered there menacingly.
    â€˜In my back!’ howled Mr. Bascom. ‘Know who put it there – rat?’
    Mr. Queen pushed his chair back an inch.
    â€˜You did, you double-crossing New York story-stealer!’ bellowed Mr. Bascom; and he seized a bottle of Scotch from the Boy Wonder’s bar and wrapped his lips fiercely about its dark brown neck.
    â€˜This,’ said Mr. Queen, ‘is certainly the second feature of an especially bad dream.’
    â€˜Just Lew,’ said Butcher absently. ‘Always the dramatist. This happens at the start of every production. Listen, Lew, you’ve got Queen wrong – Ellery Queen, Lew Bascom.’
    â€˜How do you do,’ said Mr. Queen formally.
    â€˜Lousy,’ said Lew from behind the bottle.
    â€˜Queen’s just going to help you with the treatment, Lew. It’s still your job, and of course you get top billing.’
    â€˜That’s right,’ said Ellery, with an ingratiating smile. ‘Just your little helper, Lew, old man.’
    Mr. Bascom’s wet lips widened in a grin of pure cameraderie. ‘That’s different,’ he said handsomely. ‘Here, pal, have a shot. Have two shots. You, too, Butch. Let’s all have two shots.’
    Gentle Alan Clark, the peace and sanity of New York’s quiet streets, the milieu of normal people, seemed light-years away. Mr. Queen, hangover and all, wrested the Scotch from Mr. Bascom with the artificial courage of a desperate man.
    There was a spare workroom off the Boy Wonder’s office which smelled slightly of disinfectant and was furnished with all the luxury of a flagellant monk’s cell.
    â€˜It’s where I go when I want to think,’ explained Butcher. ‘You boys use it as your office while you’re on this assignment; I want you near me.’
    Ellery, facing the prospect of being caged within the four nude walls with a gentleman whose whimsies seemed indistinguishable from homicidal mania, appealed to the Boy Wonder with mute, sad eyes. But Butcher grinned and shut the door in his face.
    â€˜All right, all right,’ said Mr. Bascom irritably. ‘Squat and listen. You’re bein’ let in on the ground floor of next year’s Academy prizewinner.’
    Eyeing the door which led to the patio and possible escape in an emergency, Ellery squatted. Lew lay down on the floor and spat accurately through an open window, arms behind his frowsy head.
    â€˜I can see it now,’ he began dreamily. ‘The crowds, the baby spots, the stinkin’ speeches –’
    â€˜Spare the