Ellery was silent.
“Also,” said Jimmy McKell, “Beldame Rumor hath it that the Mayor’s been attacked by the Cat, that the FBI’s taken over Police Headquarters, that the Stock Exchange positively will not open its doors tomorrow — and that’s a fact, seeing that tomorrow’s Saturday.” Jimmy unfolded himself. “Ellery, I went downtown this afternoon. The shop is a madhouse. Everybody’s busy as little beavers denying rumors and believing every new one that comes in. I stopped on my way back to see if Mother and Father are maintaining their equilibrium and do you know what? I saw a Park Avenue doorman get hysterics. Brother, that’s the end of the world.” He swiped his nose back-handedly, glaring. “It’s enough to make you cancel your membership in the human race. Come on, let’s all get drunk.”
“And the Cat?” Ellery asked his father.
“No news.”
“Whithacker?”
“Cazalis and the psychiatrists have been working on him all day. Still are, far as I know. But they’re not doing any backbends. And we didn’t find a thing in his West 4th Street flop.”
“Do I have to do it all by myself?” demanded Jimmy, pouring Scotch. “None for you, Celeste.”
“Inspector, what’s going to happen now?”
“I don’t know,” said the Inspector, “and what’s more, Miss Phillips, I don’t think I give an Irish damn.” He got up. “Ellery, if Headquarters calls, I’ve gone to bed.”
The old man shuffled out.
“Here’s to the Cat,” said Jimmy, lofting his glass. “May his giblets wither.”
“If you’re going to start toping, Jimmy,” said Celeste, “I’m going home. I’m going home anyway.”
“Right. To mine.”
“Yours?”
“You can’t stay up in that foul nest of underprivilege alone. And you may as well meet Father now and get it over with. Mother, of course, will be nightingale soup.”
“It’s sweet of you, Jimmy,” Celeste was all olive-pink. “But just impossible.”
“You can sleep in Queen’s bed but you can’t sleep in mine! What is this?”
She laughed, but she was angry. “It’s been the ghastliest and most wonderful twenty-four hours of my life, darling. Don’t spoil it.”
“Spoil it! Why, you proletarian snob!”
“I can’t let your parents think I’m some dead-end kid to be taken in off the streets.”
“You are a snob.”
“Jimmy.” Ellery turned from the fireplace. “Is it the Cat you’re worrying about?”
“Always. But this time the rabbits, too. It’s a breed that bites.”
“You can stop worrying about the Cat, at any rate. Celeste is safe.”
Celeste looked bewildered.
Jimmy said, “The hell you say.”
“For that matter, so are you.” Ellery explained the diminishing-age pattern of the murders. When he had finished he packed a pipe and lit it, watching them, and all the time they stood peering at him as if he were performing a minor miracle.
“And nobody saw that,” muttered Jimmy. “Nobody.”
“But what does it mean?” Celeste cried.
“I don’t know. But Stella Petrucchi was 22; and you and Jimmy being older than that, the Cat’s passed your age groups by.” Just relief, he thought, wondering why he was disappointed.
“May I print that, Ellery?” Jimmy’s face fell. “I forgot. Noblesse oblige.”
“Well, I think,” said Celeste defiantly, “that people ought to be told, Mr. Queen. Especially now, when they’re so frightened.”
Ellery stared at her. “Wait a minute.”
He went into his study.
When he returned he said,’ “The Mayor agrees with you, Celeste. Things are very bad... I’m holding a press conference at 10 o’clock tonight and I’m going on the air with the Mayor at 10:30. From City Hall. Jimmy, don’t double-cross me.”
“Thanks, pal. This descending-age business?”
“Yes. As Celeste says, it ought to quiet some fears.”
“You don’t sound hopeful.”
“It’s a question which can be more alarming,” said Ellery, “danger to yourself or danger to your children.”
“I see what you mean. I’ll be right back, Ellery. Celeste, come on.” He grabbed her arm.
“Just put me in a cab, Jimmy.”
“Are you going to be pork-headed?”
“I’ll be as safe on 102nd Street as on Park Avenue.”
“How about compromising in a — I mean on a hotel?”
“Jimmy, you’re wasting Mr. Queen’s time.”
“Wait for me, Ellery. I’ll go downtown with you.”
They went out, Jimmy still arguing.
Ellery shut the door after them carefully. Then he went back to the radio, turned it on, and sat down on the edge of the chair, like an audience.
But at the first blat of the newscaster he leaped, throttled the voice, and hurried to his bedroom.
It was afterward said that the press conference and radio talk of the Mayor’s Special Investigator on that topsyturvy night of Friday, September 23, acted as a brake on the flight of New Yorkers from the City and in a matter of hours brought the panic phase of the case to a complete stop. Certainly the crisis was successfully passed that night and never again reached a peak. But what few realized who were following the complex psychology of the period was that something comparably undesirable replaced it.
As people straggled back to the City in the next day or so, it was remarked that they no longer seemed interested in the Cat case. The cataract of telephone calls and in-person inquiries which had kept City Hall, Police Headquarters, and precincts all over the City swamped for almost four months ebbed to a trickle. Elected officials, who had been under continuous bombardment from their constituents, discovered that the siege had unaccountably lifted. For once, to their relief, ward politicians found their clubhouses deserted. Vox populi, which had kept the correspondence columns of the newspapers in an uproar, sank to a petty whisper.
An even more significant phenomenon was observed.
On Sunday, September 25, churches of all denominations throughout the City suffered a marked drop in attendance. While this fall from grace was deplored by the clergy, it was almost unanimously regarded by lay observers as an agreeable evil, considering “the recent past.” (Already the panic had dwindled to the size of a footnote in the City’s history, so dramatic was the change.) The unusually heavy church attendance during the summer, these observers said, had been inspired largely by Cat-generated fears and a panic flight to spiritual reassurance; the sudden wholesale defection could only mean that the panic was over, the pendulum had swung to the other extreme. Shortly, they predicted, church attendance would find itself back in the normal rhythm.
On all sides responsible people were congratulating one another and the City on “the return to sanity.” It was recognized that the threat to the City’s young people had to be guarded against, and special measures were planned, but everyone seemed to feel — in official quarters that the worst was over.
It was almost as if the Cat had been caught.
But there were contrary signs to be seen by those who were not blinded by sheer relief.
During the week beginning Saturday, September 24, Variety and Broadway columnists began to report an extraordinary increase in night club and theater attendance. The upswing could not be ascribed to seasonal change; it was too abrupt. Theaters which had not seen a full house all summer found themselves under the pleasant compulsion to rehire laidoff ushers and hall out ropes and S.R.O. signs. Clubs which had been staggering along were regarding their jammed dance floors with amazement; the famous ones were haughtily turning people away again. Broadway bars and eating places sprang to jubilant life. Florist shops, candy shops, cigar stores were crowded. Liquor stores tripled their sales. Scalpers, barkers, and steerers began to smile again. Bookmakers rubbed their eyes at the flow of bets. Sports arenas and stadiums reported record receipts and new attendance marks. Pool room and bowling alleys put on extra employees. The shooting galleries on Broadway, 42nd Street, Sixth Avenue were mobbed.