'The day before he died,' he said promptly. 'On a Tuesday. We had a grand talk in his office and he gave me a very generous cheque. Then he had to go somewhere for a meeting.'
We sat a few moments in silence. We finished our second beers. Then I glanced at my watch.
'Good heavens!' I said. 'I had no idea it was so late. I've got to get back to my office while I still have a job. Pastor, thank you for a very delightful and instructive lunch. I've enjoyed every minute of it.'
'Come again,' he said. 'And often. You're a good listener; did anyone ever tell you that? And bring your friends. And tell them to bring their chequebooks!'
I returned to the TORT building at about 2.50, scurrying out of a drizzly rain that threatened to turn to snow. Yetta Apatoff greeted me with a giggle.
'She's waiting for you,' she whispered.
'Who?'
She indicated with a nod of her head, then covered her mouth with her palm. There was a woman waiting in the corridor outside my office.
She was at least 78 inches tall, and wearing a fake monkey fur coat that made her look like an erect gorilla.
As I approached her, I thought this was Hamish Hooter's particularly tasteless joke, and wondered how many applicants he had interviewed before he found this one.
But as I drew closer, I saw she was no gorgon. She was, in fact, quite pleasant looking, with a quiet smile and that resigned placidity I recognized. All very short, very tall, and very fat people have it.
'Hello,' I said. 'I'm Joshua Bigg. Waiting for me?'
'Yes, Mr Bigg,' she said, not even blinking at my diminutive size. Perhaps she had been forewarned. She handed me an employment slip from Hooter's office. 'My name is Gertrude Kletz.'
'Come in,' I said. 'Let me take your coat.'
I sat behind the desk and she sat in my visitor's chair.
We chatted for almost half an hour, and as we talked, my enthusiasm for her grew. Hooter had seen only her huge size, but I found her sensible, calm, apparently qualified, and with a wry sense of humour.
She was married to a sanitation worker and, since their three children were grown and able to take care of themselves, she had decided to become a temporary clerk-typist-secretary: work she had done before her marriage. If possible, she didn't want to work later than 3.00 p.m., so she could be back in Brooklyn in time to cook dinner. We agreed on four hours a day, 11.00 a.m. to 3.00 p.m., with no lunch period, on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
She was a ruddy woman with horsey features and a maiden's innocent eyes. Her hair was iron-grey and wispy.
For a woman her size, her voice was surprisingly light. She was dressed awkwardly, although I could not conceive how a woman of her heft could possibly be garbed elegantly.
She wore a full grey flannel skirt that would have provided enough material for a suit for me. With vest. A no-nonsense white blouse was closed at the neck with a narrow black ribbon, and she wore a tweed jacket in a hellish plaid that would have looked better on Man-o-War. Opaque hose and sensible brogues completed her ensemble. She wore only a thin gold wedding band on her capable hands.
I explained to her as best I could the nature of my work at Tabatchnick, Orsini, Reilly, and Teitelbaum. Then I told her what I expected from her: filing, typing finished letters from my rough drafts, answering my phone, taking messages, doing simple, basic research from sources that I would provide.
'Think you can handle that, Mrs Kletz?' I asked.
'Oh yes,' she said confidently. 'You must expect me to make mistakes, but I won't make the same mistake twice.'
She sounded better and better.
'There is one other thing,' I said. 'Much of my work — and thus your work, too — will involve matters in litigation.
It is all strictly confidential. You cannot take the job home with you. You cannot discuss what you learn here with anyone else, including husband, family, friends. I must be able to depend upon your discretion.'
'You can depend on it,' she said almost grimly. 'I don't blab.'
'Good,' I said, rising. 'Would you like to start tomorrow or would you prefer to begin on Monday?'
'Tomorrow will be fine,' she said, heaving herself upright. 'Will you be here then?'
'Probably,' I said, thinking about my Friday schedule.
'If not, I'll leave instructions for you on my desk. Will that be satisfactory?'
'Sure,' she said equably.
I stood on tiptoe to help her on with that ridiculous coat.
Then we shook hands, smiling, and she was gone. I thought her a very serene, reassuring woman, and I was grateful to Hamish Hooter, I'd never tell him that, of course.
The moment Mrs Kletz had departed, I called Hooter's office. Fortunately he was out, but I explained to his assistant what was needed: a desk, chair, typewriter, wastebasket, stationery and supplies, phone, etc., all to be installed in the corridor directly outside my office door. By eleven o'clock the following morning.
'Mr Bigg!' the assistant gasped in horror. I knew her: a frightened, rabbity woman, thoroughly tyrannized by her boss. 'We cannot possibly provide all that by tomorrow morning.'
'As soon as possible, then,' I said crisply. 'My assistant was hired with the approval of the senior partners.
Obviously she needs a place to work.'
'Yes, Mr Bigg,' she said submissively.
I hung up, satisfied. Today, a temporary assistant.
Soon, a full-time secretary. A larger office. Then the vvorrld!
I spent the remainder of the afternoon at my desk.
Outside, the snow had thickened; TORT employees with radios in their offices reported that three to five inches of snow were predicted before the storm slackened around midnight. Word came down from upstairs that because of the snowfall anyone who wished to leave early could do so.
Gradually the building emptied until, by 5.00 p.m., it was practically deserted, the noise stilled, corridors vacant. I stayed on. It seemed foolish to go home to Chelsea and then journey uptown to meet Perdita Schug at Mother Tucker's at 7.00. So I decided to remain in the office until it was time for my dinner date.
I got up and looked out into the main hallway. The lights had already been dimmed and the night security guard was seated at Yetta Apatoff's desk. Beyond him, through the glass entrance doors, I saw a curtain of snow, torn occasionally by heavy gusts.
I went back into my office, wishing that Roscoe Dollworth had left a bottle of vodka hidden in desk or file cabinet. A hopeless wish, I knew. Besides, on a night like that, a nip of brandy would be more to my liking. Now if only I had -
I sank slowly into my chair, suddenly realizing what it was that had puzzled me about Professor Yale Stonehouse's study: the bottle of Remy Martin on the silver salver was new, uncorked, still sealed. That meant, apparently, that it had been there since the night he disappeared.
There was a perfectly innocent explanation, of course: he had finished his previous bottle the night before and had set out a fresh bottle, intending to return when he left the Stonehouse apartment on the night of 10 January.
There was another explanation, not so innocent. And that was that Professor Stonehouse had been poisoned not by doctored cocoa, but by arsenic added to his brandy. He had both cocoa and brandy every night before retiring.
The lethal dose could have been added in either. And if he had discovered the source, it might account for the sealed bottle in his study.
I glanced at my watch. It was a few minutes past 5.30 — a bad time to call. But I had to know. I dialled the Stonehouse apartment.
'Yah?' Olga Eklund said.
'Hi, Olga,' I said. 'This is Joshua Bigg.'
'Yah.'
'How are you?'
'Is not nice,' she said. 'The weather.'
'No, it looks like a bad storm. Olga, I wonder if I could talk to Mrs Dark for a moment — if it isn't too much trouble.'