This, apparently, did not impress Simpson, who also developed a steadily intensifying impression that the company was cheating him. Like all companies, they wished to maintain ownership of any discoveries made by their employees, and one can see their point. The work done would not be possible without previous work done by other members of the company and was the product of the instruments, the ambience, the thought processes of the company generally.

  Nevertheless, however much this might be true, there were occasionally advances made by particular persons which netted the company hundreds of millions of dollars and the discoverer, mere thousands. It would be a rare person who would not feel ill-used as a result, and Simpson felt more ill-used than anybody.

  His wife’s description of Simpson’s state of mind in the last few years made it clear that he was rather over the line into a definite paranoia. There was no reasoning with him. He was convinced he was being persecuted by the company, that all its success could be attributed to his own work, but that it was intent on robbing him of all credit and financial reward. He was obsessed with that feeling.

  Nor was he entirely wrong in supposing his own work to be essential to the company. The company recognized this or they would not have held on so firmly to someone who grew more impossibly difficult with each year.

  The crisis came when Simpson discovered something he felt to be fundamentally revolutionary. It was something that he was certain would put his company into the absolute forefront of the international computer industry. It was also something which, he felt, was not likely to occur to anyone else for years, possibly for decades, yet it was so simple that the essence of it could be written down on a small piece of paper. I don’t pretend to understand what it was, but I am certain now it was a forerunner of microchip technology.

  It occurred to Simpson to hold out the information until the company agreed to compensate him amply, with a sum many times greater than was customary, and with other benefits as well. In this, one can see his motivation. He knew he was likely to die at any time and he wanted to leave his wife and two children well provided for. He kept a record of the secret at home, so that his wife would have something to sell to the company in case he did die before the matter was settled, but it was rather typical of him that he did not tell her where it was. His mania for secrecy passed all bounds.

  Then one morning, as he was getting ready to get to work, he said to her in an excited way, “Where’s my library book?”

  She said, “What library book?”

  He said, “Exploring the Cosmos. I had it right here.”

  She said, “Oh. It was overdue. I returned a whole bunch of them to the library yesterday.”

  He turned so white she thought he was going to collapse then and there. He screamed, “How dare you do that? It was my library book. I’ll return it when I please. Don’t you realize that the company is quite capable of burglarizing the home and searching the whole place? But they wouldn’t think of touching a library book. It wouldn’t be mine.”

  He managed to make it clear, without actually saying so, that he had hidden his precious secret in the library book, and Mrs. Simpson, frightened to death at the way he was gasping for breath, said distractedly, “I’ll go right off to the library, dear, and get it back. I’ll have it here in a minute. Please quiet down. Everything will be all right.”

  She repeated over and over again that she ought to have stayed with him and seen to it that he was calmed, but that would have been impossible. She might have called a doctor, but that would have done no good even if he had come in time. He was convinced that someone in the library, someone taking out the book, would find his all-important secret and make the millions that should go to his family.

  Mrs. Simpson dashed to the library, had no trouble in taking out the book once again and hurried back. It was too late. He had had a heart attack—it was his second, actually—and he was dying. He died, in fact, in his wife’s arms, though he did recognize that she had the book again, which may have been a final consolation. His last words were a struggling “Inside—inside—” as he pointed to the book.—And then he was gone.

  I did my best to console her, to assure her that what had happened had been beyond her power to control. More to distract her attention than anything else, I asked her if she had found anything in the book.

  She looked up at me with eyes that swam in tears. “No,” she said, “I didn’t. I spent an hour—I thought it was one thing I could do for him—his last wish, you know—I spent an hour looking, but there’s nothing in it.”

  “Are you sure?” I asked. “Do you know what it is you’re looking for?”

  She hesitated. “I thought it was a piece of paper with writing on it. Something he said made me think that. I don’t mean that last morning, but before then. He said many times ‘I’ve written it down.’ But I don’t know what the paper would look like, whether it was large or small, white or yellow, smooth or folded—anything! Anyway, I looked through the book. I turned each page carefully, and there was no paper of any kind between any of them. I shook the book hard and nothing fell out. Then I looked at all the page numbers to make sure there weren’t two pages stuck together. There weren’t.

  “Then I thought that it wasn’t a paper, but that he had written something in the margin. That didn’t seem to make sense, but I thought maybe. Or perhaps, he had written between the lines or underlined something in the book. I looked through all of every page. There were one or two stains that looked accidental, but nothing was actually written or underlined.”

  I said, “Are you sure you took out the same book you had returned, Mrs. Simpson? The library might have had two copies of it, or more.”

  She seemed startled. “I didn’t think of that.” She picked up the book and stared at it, then said, “No, it must be the same book. There’s that little ink mark just under the title. There was the same ink mark on the book I returned. There couldn’t be two like that.”

  “Are you sure?” I said. “About the ink mark, I mean.”

  “Yes,” she said flatly. “I suppose the paper fell out in the library, or someone took it out and probably threw it away. It doesn’t matter. I wouldn’t have the heart to start a big fight with the company with Oswald dead.—Though it would be nice not to have money troubles and to be able to send the children to college.”

  “Wouldn’t there be a pension from the company?”

  “Yes, the company’s good that way, but it wouldn’t be enough; not with inflation the way it is; and Oswald could never get any reasonable insurance with his history of heart trouble.”

  “Then let’s get you that piece of paper, and we’ll find you a lawyer, and we’ll get you some money. How’s that?”

  She sniffed a little as though she were trying to laugh. “Well, that’s kind of you,” she said, “but I don’t see how you’re going to do it. You can’t make the paper appear out of thin air, I suppose.”

  “Sure I can,” I said, though I admit I was taking a chance in saying so. I opened the book (holding my breath) and it was there all right. I gave it to her and said, “Here you are!”

  What followed was long drawn out and tedious, but the negotiations with the company ended well. Mrs. Simpson did not become a trillionaire, but she achieved economic security and both children are now college graduates. The company did well, too, for the microchip was on the way. Without me it wouldn’t have gotten the start it did and so, as I told you at the beginning, the credit is mine.

  And, to our annoyance, he closed his eyes.

  I yelled sharply, “Hey!” and he opened one of them.

  “Where did you find the slip of paper?” I said.

  “Where Simpson said it was. His last words were ‘Inside—inside—’”

  “Inside the book. Of course,” I said.

  “He didn’t say ‘Inside the book,’” said Griswold. “He wasn’t able to finish the phrase. He just said ‘Inside—’ and it was a library book.”

  “Well?”

  “Well, a library book has one thing an ordinary book does not have. It has a little pocket in which a library card fits. Mrs. Simpson described all the things she did, but she never mentioned the pocket. Well, I remembered Simpson’s last words and looked inside the pocket—and that’s where it was!”

  22

  Never Out of Sight

  Innumerable mysteries have involved the breaking of a “perfect alibi.” Dorothy Sayers once had the solution to a mystery depend on the meshing together of railroad timetables to make it possible for some character to be at a spot where it seemed he could not possibly be. It was one of her duller stories.

  Every other writer has attempted to produce ingenious ways of showing that a character supposed to be in one place could actually be in another. And that, in itself poses a pretty problem. Can a writer think of a way of breaking an alibi that has never been used? Not having read every mystery ever written, I can’t be sure I’ve found a new way, but certainly I have one that’s not like any I’ve ever come across. And here it is.

  I had arranged it with the other two, just to see what would happen. I walked into the Union Club library that Tuesday night with my copy of John Collier’s Fancies and Goodnights, which I was re-reading attentively with a view to sharpening my style. Jennings arrived next with copies of Time and of Newsweek, sat back, crossed his legs, and began to read in competition with me. Finally, Baranov showed up with a small chess set and took to working out combinations.

  Not one of us said a word. Neither did we acknowledge each other’s presence.

  Griswold was there before any of us arrived, of course, as he always was. (Sometimes I think he lives in that library.) He was already dosing, and his hand, holding its scotch and soda, was resting on the arm of his tall armchair.

  I watched out of the corner of my eye as he grew increasingly restless in the silence. There was no bet that he would speak, even though not one of us gave him a lead-in. We were all sure of that. The bet was: Which one of us would be the occasion?

  Finally, Griswold cleared his throat interminably, opened his piercing blue eyes wide, and said, in his deep voice, “Conducting espionage operations is, of course, like chess,” and Baranov won the five dollars.

  As agreed, we continued our silence and, as we were certain, that did not stop Griswold.

  As a case in point [said Griswold], we might consider the case of Sanford Brown. That is not his real name, of course, for I would not want to add to his troubles. He was a minor functionary in a particular government bureau, but even minor functionaries, by virtue of being on the spot, can become privy to matters that are not really for their eyes and ears, and can therefore become of interest to the other side.

  The claim made by those who later dealt with the case was that he was recruited by the other side. Exactly what it was that gave the other side its handle, I’m not certain. Brown was underpaid, naturally, as are most government employees. It was possible he had grievances against those he worked with. He was out of sympathy with many of the stands taken by the government, as are all of us. That, however, is all rationalization. You must also allow for impulse, and for the kind of motive that is best described by “I don’t know why I did it!”, which, often enough, is literally true.

  In any case, the Department put him under observation. Exactly what it was that first roused suspicion against Brown, I don’t know. I was never told and I never bestirred myself to find out, but agents began to investigate his background, to question in discreet fashion those who knew him, and to make sure they knew exactly where he was at all times and whom he talked to.

  It was about this time that the Department became aware of a new enemy agent, a woman who was quite attractive and who spoke English perfectly. They wondered if this were a matter of sexual recruitment. That happens, too. It became clear, however, that the two had not ever met and yet—they might possibly meet in the future.

  The Department went to great pains to give her full leeway, to make her seem free of all surveillance, but both were watched. And then Sanford Brown spent a day at an amusement park, which seemed out of character to him. The enemy agent entered the amusement park and, after a few hours, left the amusement park. It was difficult to keep both under constant watch at all times in the moving crowds and, although it was possible that the two had met, no one actually saw them together. However, she was arrested on emerging and she was not quick enough to destroy what she was carrying. It was microfilm that Brown was in a position to get and that she was otherwise in no position to have.

  Brown was suspended from his post and the enemy agent was ordered out of the country. Brown, of course, denied everything, and found himself in limbo. The Department could not prove wrongdoing. There was no real evidence the microfilm had been in his possession or that he had transferred it to the enemy agent, but the circumstances of the case were too strong to allow him to continue in his position.

  His lawyer came to visit me and brought with him a strikingly beautiful young woman, rather smolderingly Mediterranean in appearance.

  The lawyer was an old friend of mine and I felt I had to disabuse him at once. I said, “My friend, I have no influence with the Department. I am in their perennial bad book, even though they come to me in an occasional emergency. They have not done so in connection with your client.”

  The lawyer said, “I have not come to you for influence, but for advice. If this thing comes to trial, he cannot be convicted and the Department knows it, so they won’t bring him to trial. They will simply allow him to rest under suspicion and ruin his career and, quite possibly, his life. I want to prove his innocence.”

  “How? Is there someone else from whom the enemy agent could have obtained the microfilm, and can you demonstrate that?”

  “No, but I can prove that she could not have obtained it from Brown.”

  “How?”

  “This young lady is Carla Fuentes, and she is his fiancee. She was with him in the amusement park that day.”

  Carla spoke for the first time. Her soft voice had no accent, but rather the shadow of one. It sounded as though there were a faint, distant echo of Spanish that could not quite be heard by the ear. I found it exceedingly attractive. She said, “And I was with him all day. All day! He was never out of my sight.”

  “Indeed?” I said, “When did you enter the amusement park?”

  “At 10 A.M. when it opened.”

  “And how long were you there?”

  “Till about 8 P.M. We had lunch there and dinner there and then we left. We arrived together. We left together. In between arriving and leaving, we remained together.”

  “And in all this time, Mr. Brown never spoke to anyone else?”

  “He might say, ‘I beg your pardon,’ when we bumped someone, or ask, ‘Where is the shooting gallery?’, but I’m told that the person with whom he is suspected of having dealt was a fine-looking woman.”

  “I’ve heard that,” I said cautiously. “I haven’t seen her.”

  “Well, you can be quite certain, he spoke to no fine-looking woman. Had he done so, I assure you I would have been aware of it. From 10 A.M. to 8 P.M. he was never out of my sight and he spoke to no woman at all, especially no fine-looking woman.”

  “Tell me,” I said. “Why were you at an amusement park for ten hours? Is that a usual way of spending the day for either of you?”

  “Of course it isn’t—but we had just gotten engaged. We were in love. For a day, we were mad and we spent it madly—rides and games and trying to win foolish prizes and walking hand in hand and laughing our way through the tunnel of love. For one day we were children and it was marvelous. We would never have such a day again and on that day his life was blasted—” She looked uncommonly close to tears.

  I had to go on, however. “The tunnel of love. Darkness. Could it be that your fiance used the day for another purpose as well? A quick transfer in the dark? Something disposed on his person in such a way that his pocket might be picked?”

  The lawyer said quickly, “That is not likely. The government itself admits that the enemy agent and Mr. Brown had never met. She would have to identify herself. Brown, if he were guilty, could scarcely allow a transfer to anyone but a known and identified agent, and for that there was no opportunity.”

  “None,” said the young lady flatly. “I have asked for a lie-detector test and have passed.”

  “That is correct,” said the lawyer.

  “Then what is the problem?” I asked.

  “The government will not accept it,” said the lawyer. “Their attitude is that Miss Fuentes, as the accused man’s fiancee, is not a trustworthy witness; that she would lie to save him.”

  “Wouldn’t you?” I asked her point-blank.

  Her chin lifted. “Whether I would or would not is not in question. The fact is, I am telling the truth, and the lie detector bears me out.”

  The lawyer said, “If the matter came to trial, we are convinced the jury would believe Miss Fuentes. Her background, her character, her manner would all speak for her. We cannot force a trial, however. Mr. Brown is not being punished. He is merely being relieved of his position and is left under a cloud.”

  “That is punishment. You could sue, could you not?”

  “It would take years. The expense would be inordinate. Reinstatement by that means would come too late.”

  “What can I do?”

  “Griswold, you are a clever man. Can you think of no way that would convince the government that Miss Fuentes is telling the truth, that her account should be accepted, that Mr. Brown should be reinstated now?”

  I leaned back in my chair. My sympathies were entirely with Miss Fuentes. I believed that she was dreadfully in love and I envied young Brown, who (I felt very strongly) did not deserve her. I believe that she believed her story and that the he detector had correctly recorded her belief.

  But what could I do?

  I said, “Miss Fuentes, you were at the amusement park from 10 A.M. to 8 P.M.?”