The Scarlet Letters by Ellery Queen

paw her, and Martha shrieking back that she couldn’t stand it any more, nothing had happened in the world that any sane man could take exception to, and if he didn’t stop assaulting men who danced with her and turning perfectly nice house parties into waterfront free-for-alls, with the police having to be called and everything–and a lucky thing for him Hal Boyland knew that state trooper personally!–why, so help her God, she would have him committed to a mental hospital; and so on, far into the morning. They had wound up hurling crockery at each other, which terminated hostilities, since an egg cup caught Dirk on the temple and opened a streaming cut over an inch long, at which Martha fainted and Nikki crawled out of bed to tend the wounded and clean the battlefield.
    â€œI just looked in to see if they were dead or alive,” sighed Nikki, “and Dirk’s sleeping on the floor to one side of the bed and Martha’s sleeping on the floor on the other side. I guess they had a last-gasp fight as to who would not sleep in the bed with whom, and couldn’t settle even that. If it weren’t so tragic it would be hilarious.”
    Sunday was passed in a truce of silence, with Nikki the desperate mediator. On Sunday night Dirk apologized, and Martha accepted his apology; and on Monday and Tuesday Dirk resumed his old, almost obsolete, canine habits and followed her wherever she went with humility and adoration. Martha was cool, but she stuck to home, and toward evening on Tuesday she thawed.
    But on Wednesday morning the next letter came. D was the code designation, and the date and time were Friday at eight-fifteen P.M .
    Ellery was at one of Mr. Rose’s lonelier tables by seven-forty-five, hoping for an even break in the odds on Harrison’s table being within range. He was studying the menu with both elbows elevated when Van Harrison walked in at seven-fifty-eight and was ushered to a reserved table of even lonelier location, with the odds going crazy. Harrison sat down not a dozen feet away. Fortunately again he was in profile to Ellery, and Ellery could watch him and the approach from the entrance at the same time.
    Harrison ordered a cocktail.
    Women were turning to look at him. He was dressed in a suede cream-gray suit with a white carnation in the lapel; diamonds glittered at his cuffs, and he raised and lowered his cocktail glass with a ceremoniousness that did his cufflinks full justice. His tempered profile he used like a rapier, keeping it carefully poised, or flicking it this way or that ever so slightly, with a half-smile on his lips, at once kind and masterful.
    Didn’t he know they were bound to be seen? Or didn’t he care?
    Ellery watched the women. They were impressed and delighted. He shook his head.
    Then he realized that it was eight-twenty. Martha had not yet come.
    He wondered if his watch was right.
    But he saw Harrison glancing at his wristwatch, too, with a frown.
    Probably she was held up in traffic.
    At eight-thirty-five Ellery began to doubt his traffic theory.
    At eight-fifty he abandoned it.
    At nine o’clock he knew Martha wasn’t coming, and that was when he began to get the uneasy feeling that perhaps Dirk was.
    Harrison was annoyed. Harrison was more than annoyed–he was livid. The table was set for two, and it was apparent to his public that the empty chair was going to remain empty. Some of the women were tittering.
    At nine-five the actor summoned the maître and imperiously waved away the second chair and place-setting. His gestures and expression said that a stupid mistake had been made by the management. And a waiter ran up to take his food order.
    He ordered coldly, in a loud voice.
    Ellery rose and sought a phone.
    The receiver at the other end was snatched up halfway through the first ring.
    â€œHello?” It was Martha’s voice, dry, braced.
    Before Ellery could answer he heard Dirk explode in the background.