Stolen Away

“Say, Elsie,” I said, friendly as an election-year politician, “could I talk you out of a cup of that stuff?”

“Yes sir,” she said, unenthusiastically.

“Cream and sugar, Elsie?” Betty asked.

Elsie nodded curtly.

“How are you bearing up under all this, Miss Gow?” I asked.

“It’s a bit of a trial, isn’t it, Mr. Heller?”

“I wish you’d call me Nate.”

“All right.”

But she didn’t suggest I call her Betty.

Elsie brought me my coffee, and Betty the cream and sugar. Normally I drank mine black, but I stirred some sugar in, and cream, too. We’d both had Elsie’s coffee before.

“I understand your friend Red Johnson is dropping by today,” I said.

“I don’t think ‘dropping by’ is exactly how I’d put it.”

“He hasn’t been arrested.”

“No. But he’s in custody.” She added more sugar, stirred, looked into the muddy liquid.

“I hope you don’t mind talking, a little.”

Her smile was tight and pretty and sarcastic. “Do I have a choice?”

“Well, sure. You’re free, white and twenty-one…barely. And Colonel Lindbergh has asked me to help look into this.” Of course, he’d have me on the next train out of here if he knew I was ignoring his request to leave the help alone.

“It was my understanding,” she said, “that the Colonel only wants to get his son back. That pursuing those responsible is not his inclination, at this point.”

“I think that’s right. But I’m a cop, Miss Gow. I’d like to try to understand what happened that night.”

She sipped her coffee; her eyes looked right past me, cold, unblinking, and a bit bloodshot.

“You talked to Red Johnson on the telephone, didn’t you?” I asked. “The night of the kidnapping?”

She nodded. “He called me about eight-thirty. I tried to call Henry on the telephone at Englewood, before I left for Hopewell, but I couldn’t reach him—he wasn’t at his boardinghouse. So I left word for him to call me, in the evening, at Hopewell.”

“And he did.”

“Yes. We’d intended seeing each other that evening, but when he called, I told him how it happened that I wasn’t at the Morrow house. I told him…told him the baby had a cold.”

“How long had you known Johnson? When did you meet him?”

“I met him last summer. He had a job as a deckhand on the Reynard, the Lamont yacht.”

“Lamont yacht?”

“Thomas W. Lamont. He and the late Mr. Morrow were partners in J. P. Morgan and Company. The banking house? Last summer, last August to be exact, the yacht was anchored off North Haven, Maine, where the Morrows have a summer home. I was there with Mrs. Lindbergh and the baby. Henry used to play cards with the Morrow chauffeurs. One of them introduced us and we hit it off. Then, in the off-season, the Reynard was moored in the Hudson, near the Palisades. Which allowed us to continue seeing each other.”

“Were you two serious, Miss Gow?”

She shrugged; sipped her coffee. “We dated quite often. Boating, movies, dancing—the Palisades Amusement Park was nearby.”

“Were you engaged?”

“No. I like Henry, Mr. Heller. He’s a good-hearted bloke. I don’t think he’s capable of being involved in something like this. I know there’s speculation that he…used me to get information. I just don’t believe it.”

“Where does your loyalty lie, Miss Gow? With the Lindberghs, or with Henry Johnson?”

Her smile was thin as a razor slash. “Who do you think told the police where Henry could be found? If you’ll excuse me.”

She went into the servants’ sitting room; I followed her.

“Thanks for your time, Miss Gow,” I said.

She was sitting absently paging through a film magazine; she didn’t look up, didn’t respond.

I went outside.

The usual barely controlled chaos was afoot in the command-post garage; troopers were going through the mail, bags of which were piled against one wall. Inspector Welch, the hard-nosed, potbellied flatfoot who’d confronted me shortly after my arrival, met me as I was about to step inside.

“Are you still around?” he said.

“I seem to be. Where’s Schwarzkopf?”

“That’s Colonel Schwarzkopf to you, sonny boy.”

“That’s Mr. Sonny Boy to you, bud.” I brushed by him.

Schwarzkopf was leaning over the telephone switchboard, having a word with the trooper at that post. “Ah,” he said, spotting me, “Heller.” Almost glad to see me.

“Any news from the front?”

“Henry ‘Red’ Johnson is due here momentarily. Would you like to sit in on the interrogation?”

“Yes, thanks,” I said, realizing he wouldn’t have made the offer if Lindbergh hadn’t requested it. “Tell me, Colonel…is there any reason to think there might be a connection between this case and New Haven, Connecticut?”

That damn near startled him. “Actually, yes.”

That damn near startled me. “No kidding,” I said.

“Why do you ask, Heller?”