Fletch(16)
“No. Except that he’s a hell of a squash player. You have to be in pretty good shape to play that game. I tried it once. Twelve minutes and I was wiped out. Golf for me. Is there anything wrong with Stanwyk’s health?”
“Would it matter if there were?”
“It would matter a lot. I have already mentioned to you that there is a kind of middle-management crisis at Collins Aviation. The whole thing now rests on the shoulders of one Alan Stanwyk. Old John Collins could go back to work, I suppose, but he never was as good a businessman as Stanwyk. He was an inventor who had some luck. Collins now has to be run by a real pro—which Daddy John ain’t.”
“Would the stock market fall if word got around that Stanwyk was terminally ill?”
“Collins stock sure would. That sort of thing would be very upsetting to that company. Executive personnel would start jockeying for position. Some would leave outright. Things would have to be in a state of confusion for about as long as Stanwyk has been running the place.”
“I see. So if he were ill, I mean terminally ill, it would have to be kept a deep, dark secret.”
“Absolutely. Is he ill?”
“How would I know?”
“Oh, I forgot. You’re working on the insurance angle. Well, young Fletcher, I’ve told you everything I know about Alan Stanwyk. You see, we are not very close yet to the moneyless state you write about. There is still plenty of it around.”
“I guess so.”
“Stanwyk seems to be a competent, decent man who happened to marry the boss’s daughter. Okay? Mind if I go back and do my own work now?”
“I appreciate your help very much.”
“I’m just trying to prevent your writing one of your usual shitty pieces. Anything I could do would be worth that.”
7
Fletch sat on the desk of The Beauty in the Broad-Brimmed Hat, Mrs. Amelia Shurcliffe, Society Editor. He had never heard that there was a Mr. Shurcliffe. Working at her typewriter, her forearms quivered with Who was at the most recent party and Are they getting married.
She finally deigned to notice the one-hundred-sixty-pound object on her desk.
“Why, Fletch! Aren’t you beautiful! You always look just right. Faded jeans and T-shirt. Even no shoes. The Shoe Institute wouldn’t like my saying this, and of course I’d never write it, but that’s exactly what Style should be. Well, darling. Is.”
“You’re kidding, of course.”
“Darling, I’m not.”
“You should tell Clara Snow.”
“Clara Snow. What does she know? She used to write cooking, you know. And between us, darling, she was terrible at that. Did you ever try to put together one of her ‘Recommended Meals’?”
“Somehow, no.”
“Desperate, just desperate. The colors all clashed. We tried it once, just for fun, some friends and I at the cottage. We ended up with a Hollandaise sauce, and you know what kind of a yellow that is, and carrots and beets, purple beets, all on the same plate. It was so garish, darling, we had to look away. We ate with our eyes averted. The tastes of things didn’t go together either. I believe her cooking column was successful only with blind polar bears.”
“You know, she’s my editor now.”
“Yes, I do know, you poor darling. If she weren’t going to bed with Frank we would have upchucked her years ago. Of course Frank has very poor taste, too. Pink shirts and strawberry suspenders. Have you ever seen his wife?”
“Yes.”
“A dowdy old thing. She always reminds me of an Eskimo full of baked beans. I mean, she looks as if, if she ever got unfrozen, she would evaporate in one enormous fart.”
“Have you ever told her so?”
“Oh, no, darling, I wouldn’t. I can’t go to bed with her husband, being both overage and overweight, but that doesn’t mean I can insult his wife. Somehow it all doesn’t matter to me. Frankly, darling, I find Frank as attractive as a hangover. You’re much more my type: lean, healthy, stylish.”
“I’m horrified at the thought that you think I’m stylish.”
“But I do, darling, sincerely. Your style is exactly what Beau Brummel did in his time. All Brummel did, you know, was to bring the lean, simple country style into the city.”
“No, I didn’t know.”
“You should talk with Amelia Shurcliffe more. You see how simple your clothes are; how clean the lines: jeans and T-shirt. Blue and white. The lines couldn’t be cleaner. You’re not wearing shoes in the newspaper office, which is about as downtown as one can get. Here you can feel the whole city throbbing around you. And you’re dressed as if in the middle of a hayloft. Delightful style. Just right.”