The Mother Hunt (Rex Stout Library)

The result was that shortly after two o'clock I was seated in the anteroom of the Exclusive Novelty Button Co., waiting for a phone call, or rather, hoping for one. I had made a deal with Mr. Nicholas Losseff, the button fiend, as he had sat at his desk eating salami, black bread, cheese, and pickles. What he got was the button I had removed from the overalls and a firm promise to tell him the source when circumstances permitted. What I got was permission to make a phone call and wait there to get one back, no matter how long it took, and use his office for an interview if I needed to. The phone call had been to the Stopgap Employment Service. Since I had known beforehand that I might have a lot of time to kill, I had stopped on the way to buy four magazines and two paperbacks, one of the latter being His Own Image by Richard Valdon.

I never got to His Own Image, but the magazines got a big play, and I was halfway through the other paperback, a collection of pieces about the Civil War, when the phone call came at a quarter past five. The woman at the desk, who had known what I wanted Wednesday before I told her, vacated her chair for me, but I went and took it on my side, standing.

Goodwin speaking.

This is Anne Tenzer. I got a message to call the Exclusive Novelty Button Company and ask for Mr. Goodwin.

Right. I'm Goodwin. Her voice had plenty of feminine in it, so I put plenty of masculine in mine. I would like very much to see you, to get some information if possible. I think you may know something about a certain kind of button.

Me? I don't know anything about buttons.

I thought you might, about this particular button. It's made by hand of white horsehair.

Oh. A pause. Why, how on earth do you mean you've got one?

Yes. May I ask, where are you?

I'm in a phone booth at Madison Avenue and Forty-ninth Street.

From her voice, I assumed that my voice was doing all right. Then I can't expect you to come here to my office, Thirty-ninth Street and crosstown. How about the Churchill lobby? You're near there. I can make it in twenty minutes. We can have a drink and discuss buttons.

You mean you can discuss buttons.

Okay. I'm pretty good at it. Do you know the Blue Alcove at the Churchill?

Yes.

I'll be there in twenty minutes, with no hat, a paper bag in my hand, and a white and green orchid in my lapel.

Not an orchid. Men don't wear orchids.

I do, and I'm a man. Do you mind?

I won't know till I see you.