Authors: Ellery Queen
QED
QED
Queen's Experiments in Detection
Ellery Queen
MYSTERIOUSPRESS.COM
Contents
CONTEMPORARY PROBLEMS IN DEDUCTION
Q
.
B
.
I
:
QUEEN
'
S BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION
Gambling Dept.: The Lonely Bride
Spy Dept.: Mystery at the Library of Congress
Anonymous Letters Dept.: Eve of the Wedding
Probate Dept.: Last Man to Die
DYING MESSAGE NOVELETTE
Mum Is the Word
December 31, 1964
: The birthday of the new year and the old man became a fact at midnight. The double anniversary was celebrated in the high-ceilinged drawing room of Godfrey Mumford's house in Wrightsville with certain overtones not in the tradition. Indeed, in accepting the offerings of his family and his friend, old Godfrey would have been well advised to recall the warning against gift-bearing Greeks (although there had never been a Greek in Wrightsville, at least none of Godfrey's acquaintance; the nearest to one had been Andy Birobatyan, the florist, who was of Armenian descent; Andy had shared the celebrated Mumford green thumb until the usual act of God severed it).
The first Greek to come forward with her gift was Ellen Mumford Nash. Having gone through three American husbands, Godfrey's daughter had just returned from England, where she was in the fifth year of a record run with number four, an Egyptologist connected with the British Museumâthe prodigal daughter home for a visit, her nostrils flaring as if she smelled something unpleasant.
Nevertheless, Ellen said sweetly to her father, “Much happiness, darling. I do hope you find these useful.”
As it developed, the hope was extravagant. Her gift to him was a gold-plated cigaret case and lighter. Godfrey Mumford had given up smoking in 1952.
Christopher's turn came next. A little less than thirty years before, Christopher had followed Ellen into the world by a little less than thirty minutes. (Their father had never allowed himself to be embittered by the fact that their birth had killed their mother, although he had had occasional reason to reflect on the poor exchange.)
Ellen, observing her twin over the champagne they were all sharing, was amused by his performance. How well he did the loving-son bit! With such talent it seemed remarkable that dear Chris had never risen above summer stock and walk-ons off Broadway. The reason, of course, was that he had never worked very hard at his chosen profession; but then he had never worked very hard at anything.
“A real swinger of a birthday, father,” Christopher was saying with passionate fondness. “And a hundred more to come.”
“I'll settle for one at a time, son. Thanks very much.” Godfrey's hair was gray but still vigorous; his big body tended toward gauntness now, but after seventy years he carried himself straight as a dancer. He was examining a silver-handled walking stick. “It's really handsome.”
Christopher sidled stage right, smiling sincerely; and Godfrey set the stick aside and turned to the middle-aged woman standing by. She was small, on the dumpling side; the hands holding the gift had the stub nails and rough skin of habitual housework. Her face under the snowy hair lay quiet as a New England garden.
“You shouldn't have gone to all this trouble, Mum,” the old man protested, “with the work you have to do around here.”
“Goodness, Godfrey, it was no trouble. I wish it could have been more.”
“I'm trying to remember the last time I had a hand-knit sweater.” Godfrey's voice was gruff as he fingered it. “It's just what I need to wear to the greenhouse these days. When on earth did you find the time?”
The sun came through to shine on the garden. “It's not very elegant, Godfrey, but it will keep you warm.”
It was over twenty-eight years since Margaret Caswell had come to Wrightsville to nurse her sister LouiseâGodfrey's wifeâin Louise's fatal pregnancy. In that time she had brought into the world a child of her own, buried her husband, become “Mum” to the three children growing up in the householdâGodfrey's two and her oneâand planned (she had recently figured it out) more than thirty thousand meals. Well, Godfrey Mumford had earned her devotion; he had been a second father to her child.
She sometimes felt that Godfrey loved her Joanne more than his own twins; she felt it now, in the drawing room. For Godfrey was holding in his hands a leather desk set decorated with gold-leaf chrysanthemums, and his shrewd blue eyes were glittering like January ice. The set was the gift of Joanne, who was watching him with a smile.
“You're uncanny, Jo,” Godfrey said. “It's taking advantage of an old man. This is beautiful.”
Jo's smile turned to laughter. “With most men it's supposed to be done with steak and potatoes. You're a pushover for chrysanthemums. It's very simple.”
“I suppose people think
I'm
very simple. A senile delinquent,” Godfrey said softly.
A frail little man with a heavy crop of eyebrows above very bright eyes hooted at this. He was Godfrey Mumford's oldest friend, Wolcott Thorp, who had formerly taught anthropology at Merrimac University in Connhaven. For the past few years Thorp had been serving as curator of the Merrimac University Museum, where he had been developing his special interest, the cultural anthropology of West Africa.
“I'll contribute to your delinquency, too,” Wolcott Thorp chuckled. “Here's something, Godfrey, that will help you waste your declining years.”
“Why, it's a first edition of an eighteenth-century compendium on mums!” Godfrey devoured the title page. “Wolcott, this is magnificent.”
The old man clutched the tome. Only Jo Caswell sensed the weariness in his big body. To Wrightsville and the horticultural world he was the breeder of the celebrated Mumford's Majestic Mum, a double bloom on a single stem; he was a member of the Chrysanthemum Society of America and of chrysanthemum clubs in England, France, and Japan; his correspondence with fellow breeders and aficionados encompassed the globe. To Jo he was a gentle, kind, and troubled man, and he was dear to her heart.
“I'm grateful for all these kindnesses,” Godfrey Mumford said. “It's a pity my response has to be to give you bad news. It's the wrong occasion, but I don't know when I'll have you all together under this roof again. Forgive me for what I'm about to tell you.”
His daughter Ellen had an instinct for the quality and degree of trouble. By the flare of her nostrils she had sensed that what was coming was bad news indeed.
“Fatherâ” she began.
But her father stopped her. “Let me tell this without interruption, Ellen. It's hard enough ⦠When I retired in 1954, my estate was worth about five million dollars; the distribution in my will was based on that figure. Since that time, as you all know, I've pretty well neglected everything else in experimenting with the blending and hybridizing of mums.”
Godfrey paused, took a deep breath. “I recently found out that I'm a fool. Or maybe it was fated. Anyway, the result is the same.”
He glanced at the old book in his hands as if surprised to find it still there. Then he set it carefully on the coffee table and sat down on the crewel-fringed couch.
“I had put all my financial affairs in the hands of Truslow Addison's law firm. Where I made my mistake was in sticking with the status quo when Tru died and his son took over the practice. I should have known better. You remember, Christopher, what a wild youngster Tru Junior wasâ”
“Yes,” said Christopher Mumford. “Father, you don't meanâ”
“I'm afraid so,” the old man said. “After young Tru died in that auto accident last May, the affairs of the law firm were found to be like a basket of broken eggs. You couldn't even make an omelet of them. Some of the funds in his trust he had simply gambled away; the rest vanished because of bad business judgment, stupid speculations, investments without rhyme or reason ⦔
His voice trailed away, and after a while the silence was cracked by the voice of Ellen Mumford Nash. Her slim and elegant figure was stiff with outrage.
“Are you saying, father, that you're without a
shilling?
”
Behind her Christopher made an abrupt move, extending his arm in a sort of forensic gesture, as if he were trying to argue away a legal point that threatened his whole case.
“You're joking, father. It can't be that bad. There's got to be something left out of so much loot.”
“Hear me out,” his father said heavily. “By liquidating assets I've managed to pay off all the creditors. This house and the property are mortgaged; there's not very much equity. I have an old annuity that will let Mum and Joanne and me live here decently, but on my death the income from it stops. I'll have to cut down my mums operationâ”
Ellen broke in, bitter as the cold outside. “Damn your mums! If you'd stuck to growing seeds, the way you started, father, none of this would have happened. Left without a farthing! After all these years.”
Godfrey had gone pale at her curse; otherwise his face showed nothing. He had apparently prepared himself well for the ordeal. “Your brother was right in one respect, Ellen. There is something valuable leftâsomething that no one's known about. I want to show it to you.”
Mumford rose and went over to the wall behind him. He pushed aside an oil painting of a vaseful of chrysanthemums, exposing a square-doored wall safe. His silent audience heard the faint clickingâmore like a swishingâof a dial. He removed something, shut the door of the safe, and came back.
Ellen's breath came out in a whinny.
Her father's hand was holding up a magnificent pendant.
“You'll recall,” the old man said, “that on my retirement I took a trip to the Far East to bone up on Oriental mums. Well, while I was in Japan I managed to get my hands on this beauty. I paid nowhere near what it's worth, although it cost me a lot of money. How could I pass this up? There are records authenticating it as a royal gift from the Emperor Komei, father of Meiji. It's known as the Imperial Pendant.”
The gold links of the chain were exquisitely carved in the shape of tiny, intricate chrysanthemums; the pendant itself was a chrysanthemum, with an enormous diamond in the center surrounded by sixteen diamond petals. The superb gems, deep yellow in color, gathered the light in the room and cast it back in a shattering explosion.