Corpus Corpus

corpus corpus.Copyright © 1998 by H. Paul Jeffers. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Jeffers, H. Paul (Harry Paul)

Corpus corpus: a Sergeant John Bogdanovic mystery / by H. Paul Jeffers.—1st ed. p.   cm. ISBN 0-312-18558-8 I. Title. PS3560.E36C6   1998

813'.54—dc21 98-14625

CIP

First Edition: August 1998 

For my nephew Robert Devonshire

and with gratitude to Rex Todhunter Stout, creator of Nero Wolfe;

the late William S. Baring-Gould, author of Nero Wolfe of West Thirty-Fifth Street; and Kevin Gordon for his insights into the Wolfe Pack. 

Very few people like lawyers.

                           —Nero Wolfe 

Wiggins awoke in the middle of a steamy July night with an exciting brainstorm. Margaret Dane would present the Nero Wolfe Award to Theodore Janus! What a publicity coup it would be for the Wolfe Pack were he to bring together at this year's Black Orchid Banquet the lawyers whose courtroom sparring had enthralled the country for nearly a year. But when he offered the proposal to the steering committee there was a terrible row, proving the Nero Wolfe maxim that one man's flower is another man's weed.

Himself an attorney and a former district attorney, James Hamilton railed, "Theo Janus is just as bad as the gangsters he defends. Instead of getting such an honor, the bastard ought to be disbarred and run out of town on a rail."

Oscar Pendelton answered, "I appreciate that you still have the taste of sour grapes on your tongue because Janus has beaten you in court, not once but twice, but personal feelings should be set aside. We will not be honoring Theodore Janus the lawyer. We are recognizing his contribution to the cause of Nero Wolfe."

"Such hypocrisy," Hamilton retorted. "Why am I not allowed personal feelings but it's okay for a vote in favor of this from you, the very man who published Janus's book? And, I might add, the novels authored by our chairman."

"Are you suggesting I put Wiggins up to this?" Pendelton demanded. "If so, where is your evidence?"

Hamilton shrugged. "It's purely circumstantial."

The sweet voice of Marian Pickering Henry cut in with, "The essence of democracy, James, is that a person is free to cast a ballot for or against something or someone for whatever reason he or she chooses and not be called on to justify that vote."

"I take that to mean, Marian, that America's most popular writer of thrillers is joining with the man who also happens to be your publisher. Am I to be the only one to say 'nay' to this preposterous idea?"

"You do not stand alone in opposition, James," thundered Judge Reginald Simmons. "Theodore Janus is a national disgrace!"

"You are hardly objective, Judge," said Wiggins. "You have your own score to settle with Janus."

"Excuse me," said Harold Randolph meekly, "but may we debate Wiggins's proposal without all these harsh adjectives? I have no great love for Janus, either, but for reasons Marian Henry has so eloquently stated, and because I agree that Janus has earned this coveted award on the basis of his scholarship, I shall cast my vote in favor of the motion."

Nicholas Stamos pleaded, "Mr. Chairman, may we dispense with further discussion? Please call the roll on your nomination of Janus so that we can move on to other business. I vote nay."

Pendelton all but shouted. "I vote aye."

"As do I," said Marian Pickering Henry, quiedy.

"No, no," bellowed Hamilton, thumping a fist on the table. "And if this motion carries, I may be left with no choice but to resign from the committee, and perhaps from the Wolfe Pack."

Wiggins turned to the sixth member. "Admiral Home, with two in favor and two opposed and the chairman not eligible to vote except in a tie, it's up to you."

As tall and stately as the mast of his prized yacht, Trevor Home had spent thirty years in the navy and had adopted a way of seasoning his speech with sea salt. "I know we're not supposed to discuss this anymore," he said, "but as I see it, we could run into heavy weather if we set sail into these uncharted waters. If we give our highest award to this notorious shyster for whom I bear personal animus because he filed a meritless law suit against me, we risk not only Hal's resignation, but perhaps being swamped in an ocean of resignations! But on the other hand,Janus's yeoman work in compiling the Wolfe encyclopedia can't be overlooked."

"If you are reluctant to vote in the affirmative," Wiggins said, "may I suggest you consider Nero Wolfe's maxim that it is always wiser, where there is a choice, to trust to inertia."

After several moments of deliberation, Home said, "Yes, I must abstain."

Wiggins beamed. "The chairman votes aye."

During the long and sensational murder trial that had held the whole country spellbound and left the majority of the people outraged at the acquittal, commentators had invoked many adjectives to describe the man who led the team of defense attorneys. He had been called gaudy, flamboyant, a dude, and the courtroom cowboy. Yet these terms had failed miserably in preparing Peter Burford for the effect of seeing Theodore R. Janus in person.

He wore a white western-style Stetson hat, a three-quarter-length shearling jacket, a red-and-black plaid flannel shirt, a yellow neck bandana, and gleaming brown and white cowboy boots. Chocolate brown jeans cinched by a wide black belt cried out to support a holster and a Colt .45 Peacemaker six-shooter. The only indication that Janus was a lawyer was his bulky brown leather briefcase, which looked so shabby it was reasonable to suppose the silver-haired character who carried it into the office had picked up a far less successful attorney's by mistake.

"Back so soon, Mr. Janus," said Burford. Long and sinewy in mechanics' coveralls and with a well-worn gray Cessna Aircraft baseball cap cocked jauntily backward on a head of thinning blond hair, he stood at a combination counter and display case. With shelves cluttered by gauges, meters, oil pumps, and other aeronautical gadgets, it would be to an untrained eye as mysterious as the shelves of fat volumes of criminal and civil codes might appear to the clients of Janus's law firm. There the visitor invariably found wood-paneled walls festooned with expensively framed diplomas and certificates and quaint old prints of wigged and robed English barristers that had become familiar in British courtroom dramas of movies and on television in the form of Rumpole of the Bailey.

In Burford's realm, as in numberless small private aviation airports, airfields, and landing strips to which Janus had flown in the thirty-five years since earning his pilot's license, the attorney found the floor-to-ceiling sheets of faux wood paneling decorated with dime-store framed photographs of classic aircraft from double-winged and kitelike planes of the barnstorming era to sleek corporate jets of a world when travel had been measured in miles not time. Except for these, the office and the young man behind the counter might have been familiar to Charles A. Lindbergh.

Burford said, "Your Mooney's all fueled up, sir."

"Thank you. What do I owe you?"

"Fuel and topping off the oil came to fifty-eight dollars."

"And the car rental?"

"Did you happen to check your mileage?"

"Seventy-four."

"The first hundred's included in the day rate, so that'll be thirty-six dollars," the young man said as he entered the mileage on the rental form.

From his wallet Janus drew a gold credit card and slapped it on the counter.

"You had no problem finding the prison, I hope, Mr. Janus." "Your directions were excellent."

"I live not far from it, so I'm familiar with the route. And we often get people stopping to ask for directions, although most of the folks who come to Watertown to visit the prison don't fly in on their own planes."

"No, I'm sure," Janus said as he stuffed the receipt for the fuel and oil and a copy of the rental form into the bulging lackluster bag.

"I watched 'em build that place, you know," Burford went on. "That land used to be the site of a Nike missile base back in the old days when we worried about the damn Russians sending rockets across Canada en route to New York. I don't know what's a sadder comment on things, the need to build a missile defense against foreigners or us having to build prisons to protect us against our own people. Of course, nowadays they're not prisons. It's the Watertown Correctional Facility. I say we ought to forget about correcting those creeps. They're guilty. Let 'em rot in prison."

Janus smiled tightly. "You're quite the philosopher, sir." "I hope you didn't take that personal. If I ever got in a mess I'd want the best mouthpiece in the country, which is you." "You're very generous."

"Like everybody else in the whole country, I watched you on television during the big trial out in Los Angeles. You and your associates did an amazing job getting that guy off, even though I did think he was guilty as sin and walked away only on account of he had plenty of money to afford to hire the likes of you."