Free A Fine and Private Place by Ellery Queen

Importuna. That’s what I have to find out.”
    Ellery was taking the opportunity to evaluate the man in the gym tights. Where Nino was squat and powerful, and Julio had been large and soft, the middle brother was slight, weak boned, almost phthisical. His olive skin had a bleached look, as if it had been too long deprived of sun. There were deep anxiety lines around his mouth and bloodshot eyes.
    Marco Importunato was evidently a neurotic, with a dependency on his eldest brother that must reach into many areas of his existence. Observing the sallow, sunken face lacerated with grief and fear, yet relieved at his brother’s proximity, Ellery caught himself thinking of a terrified child wrapping his legs about his father. Instant analysis it might be, and consequently suspect, but it was after all the universality of such relationships that made them trite. The next moment he was not so sure. He glanced from clutcher to clutched and thought he detected on the older, heavier face the faintest expression of affectionate contempt. And that would follow, too. Nino Importuna did not seem to him the sort of man who could respect a weakness, especially in one of his own blood. It struck too close to home.
    Importuna signaled Ennis, and the secretary sprang forward again to help deposit Marco in the chair. The squat man went behind the bar, poured out most of the contents of the highball glass, and brought his brother the little that remained. Marco took a shaky swallow. Then he nodded at something Importuna said to him in an undertone.
    â€œHe can talk now,” the multimillionaire said, and he took the glass away.
    â€œMr. Importunato,” Inspector Queen said immediately, “do you recall early today being shown a gold button with an anchor-and-rope design and the monogram MI on it?”
    Marco muttered something about button, button?
    â€œAssistant Chief Inspector Mackey of Manhattan North showed it to you, Mr. Importunato, and you identified it at that time as your property. Don’t you remember that?”
    â€œOh. Sure. Sure thing. Came off a yachting jacket of mine. ’Swhat I told him, all right. Nice old bird. Terrible case of bad breath, though. His best friend ought to tell him.”
    â€œMarco,” the elder brother said.
    â€œ Sì. Sì bene, Nino .”
    â€œDo you know where your button was found?”
    Marco’s head wobbled.
    â€œIt was found on the floor of your brother Julio’s library.”
    â€œYou don’t say.”
    â€œCan you explain how it got there, Mr. Importunato? And when?”
    Marco Importunato blinked through the fog.
    Inspector Queen went to the trampoline, pulled it over near the chair, and sat down. He tapped the half-naked man’s hairy knee in a friendly way. “I’m going to break one of the rules of police interrogation, Marco—you don’t mind if I call you Marco?—and tell you just what else we’ve found out about that gold button of yours. Are you paying attention, Marco?”
    â€œ Sì . I mean yes.”
    â€œAt first we thought that you were the man who’d had the battle with Julio, and that in the scrap he yanked the button off your jacket.”
    â€œUhn-uhn,” Marco said with an almost vigorous shake of his head.
    â€œBut on closer examination we saw that the button hadn’t been pulled off your jacket, it was snipped off, most likely by a scissors. So we decided somebody’d tried to frame you for the murder of your brother. Do you understand me, Marco?”
    â€œSure I understand you,” Marco replied with dignity “And you know what I say to you? Ri … die … u … lous!”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œI can tell you who cut that button off my coat.”
    â€œYou can? Who?”
    â€œMe.”
    â€œ You ?”
    â€œCut it off, snip-snip, and that’s it. With my bathroom scissors. Was hanging loose and I didn’t want to