Rex Stout_Nero Wolfe 07

by Over My Dead Body

  I stayed on the stoop long enough to be absolutely sure of that, knowing as I did the lengths a cop will sometimes go to on account of his passion for law and order, and was about to check it off and go back in when a big black town car rolled to the curb there below me. A chauffeur jumped out and opened the door, and touched his cap when one of the two men who emerged said something to him. They started up the steps, and I recrossed the threshold and turned to welcome two generations of Barretts. I asked them to wait there a minute and went to the office and told Wolfe:

  “Father and son.”

  “Bring them in.”

  I did that. John P., who hadn’t changed his clothes, took the chair Neya had occupied. His face was all tightened up, and the glance that he shot first at Cramer and then at Wolfe was not what I would call conciliatory. I moved up another chair for Donald. He looked so fierce and truculent that I had a notion to go get him a hunk of raw meat. Nobody had seemed to have any inclination to shake hands like gentlemen.

  Wolfe said, “Fred, wait in front.”

  Fred went.

  “Archie, take your notebook.”

  I took it.

  John P. asked, “Are you Police Inspector Cramer?”

  “Yes, sir,” Cramer told him. “Of the Homicide Bureau.”

  John P. said to Wolfe, “That’s ridiculous. This is a confidential business matter. And telling your man to take his notebook.”

  Wolfe leaned back and pressed his five right finger tips against his five left ones. “No,” he said, “I wouldn’t call it ridiculous. Mr. Cramer’s presence is surely appropriate, since one of the things you’ll want to do is to try to arrange it so that your son will escape an indictment for first-degree murder.”

  Cramer’s head jerked around. Donald gawked, and some of the color leaving his face made him look a little less fierce. John P. betrayed no sign whatever of having heard anything more provocative than a remark about the weather. But he clipped off words and lunged with them:

  “That’s worse than ridiculous. And more dangerous. That’s actionable.”

  “So it is.” Wolfe’s tone sharpened. “I’m coming right out with it, Mr. Barrett. My dinner’s in an hour, and I don’t want to waste time flopping around in a mire of inanities. I hold the cards and I don’t have to finesse. Your deal with the Donevitch gang is done for. Accept that. Swallow it. I want to go on from that—”

  “I’d like to see you alone.” John P. stood up. “Get them out of here or take me—”

  “No. Sit down.”

  “Sit down for what? You say the deal’s done for. Whether it is or isn’t, I’m not talking on that basis. There’s nothing to talk about. Come, Donald.”

  He started off. Wolfe’s words hit him in the back:

  “Within an hour a warrant will issue charging your son with murder! It will be too late to talk to me then!”

  Donald was up and following his leader. But his leader suddenly wheeled, strode back to confront Cramer, and demanded:

  “You’re a responsible police officer. This blackmailing threat is made in your presence. Do you know who I am? … Well?”

  That was a fizzle, in spite of the fact that Cramer hadn’t the faintest idea of what was going on. I wouldn’t have given an unconditioned guarantee on his brains, but there was nothing wrong with his guts.

  “Yeah, I know who you are,” he said calmly. “Sit down and give him rope. He owns this house and about a million dollars’ worth of orchids. It’s a good thing you’ve got me here as a witness in case you try for damages.”

  Wolfe snorted irritably. “Get out if you want to and take the consequences. You’re acting like a schoolgirl in a pet. Can’t you see I’ve got something to say and the best of your alternatives is to sit down and listen to it? Do you take me for a maudlin blatherskite?”

  Donald blurted, “He’s a goddam bluffer—”

  A look from his father cut him off, and a jerk of his father’s head ordered him back to his chair. Donald sat down. John P. did the same and told Wolfe curtly:

  “Say it.”

  “That’s better.” Wolfe got his finger tips together again. “I’ll make it as brief as I can since you already know it and all Mr. Cramer needs at present is the outline.” He gave the inspector his eyes. “You might as well have the name of the murderer to begin with. I promised you that. The Princess Vladanka Donevitch.”

  Cramer grunted. “I don’t know her.”

  “Yes you do. We’ll get to that. Her home is in Zagreb, Croatia—Yugoslavia. She is the wife of young Prince Stefan. They like the Nazis. Most Croats don’t. The Donevitch family agree with other Croats in their hatred of Belgrade. Belgrade is trying to make up its mind whether to be dominated by Germany, Italy, France, or England. Germany, Italy, France, and England are doing all they can to hasten the process. The attitude of the Croats is Germany’s biggest obstacle. She is trying to buy them, with the Donevitch gang as selling agents. The other countries are competing—”

  Cramer growled, “I’m a New York cop.”

  “I know, and most of the money in the world is in New York, or controlled from here. That’s why people come here from all directions with things like this.” Wolfe reached in to his breast pocket, pulled out a paper and extended it to Cramer. “Keep that; it’s evidence. You can’t read it. It is signed by Prince Stefan Donevitch and it empowers the princess, his wife, to conclude certain transactions in his name—”

  John P.’s lips twitched. “Where did you get that?”

  “That doesn’t matter, Mr. Barrett. Not now.” Wolfe went on to Cramer, “Specifically, transactions regarding concessions of Bosnian forests and the transfer of credits held by a firm of international bankers, Barrett & De Russy. The princess came to New York incognito, under an alias, and started negotiations. Because secrecy was essential on account of American restrictions regarding the export of capital in the form of loans, and I suspect other skulduggery besides the violation of those restrictions, she even went to the trouble of pretending to be an immigrant and getting a job in a fencing school. I don’t suppose many persons were aware of her true identity, but certainly three were: Mr. Barrett here and his son, and a man named Rudolph Faber who was assisting in the negotiations as a secret agent of the Nazi government. You see, Barrett & De Russy have financial relations with the Nazis.”

  Donald began explosively, “We merely act—” but a glance from his father shut him up again.

  Wolfe nodded. “I know. Money and morals don’t speak … But a British agent named Ludlow got onto it. He not only got onto the princess and what she was up to, he even threatened—I don’t know how, but possibly by informing the American government—to ruin the deal. And that just at the moment when all details had been decided and it was ready for consummation. So she killed Ludlow. I want to make it plain that the princess did that herself. A friend, another young woman, had come from Zagreb with her, also under an alias, but she had no part in the murder. You understand that, Mr. Cramer?”

  Cramer muttered, “Go on.”

  “There isn’t a lot to go on with. Rudolph Faber knew what the princess had done and he blackmailed her. Up to last evening he had been merely a negotiator, a bidder; that made him boss. He imposed terms on her, and I imagine they weren’t generous; he didn’t strike me as a generous man. He forced her to tell where that paper was and he tried to get it. The paper was of course vital. I presume, Mr. Barrett, it was to be attached to the agreement you were drawing up, to validate it?”

  John P. didn’t answer.

  Wolfe shrugged. “So she killed Faber. She made an appointment to meet him in her own apartment and stabbed him. God only knows what she thought she was going to do next. There is no way of telling what goes on in that kind of a head. She seems to be as heedless and harebrained as a lunatic. She may have counted on the taciturnity of governments and international financiers regarding their privy intrigues, but what the devil did she take me for, a goat on a chain? A creature like that is outs
ide the realm of calculation. I wouldn’t have been surprised if she had tried to stab me. Were you able to deal with her on a rational basis, Mr. Barrett?”

  John P. was regarding him steadily. “I’m waiting for you to say something.”

  “That’s about all there is.”

  “Bah. You’ve made a lot of loose accusations, with nothing to support them.”

  “There’s that paper.”

  “You stole it.”

  “I didn’t, but what if I did? There it is, for evidence.”

  “Damn flimsy evidence for two murders.”

  “I know.” Wolfe wiggled a finger at him. “See here, Mr. Barrett, you’re making a blunder. I made a serious threat. I said that a warrant would issue charging your son with murder. I meant, of course, as accessory, which is the same thing. It’s obvious that he knew the Princess Vladanka had killed Ludlow. You probably knew it too, but I have no proof that you tried actively to cheat the law. I have got proof that your son did, and three witnesses: Belinda Reade, Madame Zorka, and Mr. Goodwin, my assistant.”

  “That was only—”

  “Quiet, son.” John P. didn’t move his eyes from Wolfe. “What else?”

  “Nothing to stun you with, I’m afraid. Frankly, sir, I have no bomb to explode under you. But the point is this. Mr. Cramer here doesn’t like murder. He doesn’t like to see it practiced with impunity under any circumstances whatever, but in this case he was impeded by a wall of reluctance which he couldn’t possibly have breached. By luck I had made a hole in the wall and I’ve let him through, and if you knew him as I do you would realize that he can’t be chased out again. He has it now and he’ll hang onto it, unless you can get him ditched, which I doubt. He has that paper and he’ll arrest the princess, so your deal’s off anyway. He has enough to take your son as a material witness. With that paper, he can get a court order to examine your records and correspondence. But you know as well as I do what this will mean if you try to fight it. If you try to shield a murderer from the penalty she has earned. The fact is—”

  I missed some then because I had to answer the doorbell. It was Charlie Heath. He started for the office as if he owned the place, but I blocked him off and demanded, “Would you mind explaining what it was that took so long?”

  “I’ll report to the inspector.”

  “He’s busy and you’ll wait in here.” I opened the door to the front room, where Fred Durkin was sitting with a magazine. “What used up all the time?”

  “Nothing used it up. I mean I got back ten minutes ago. I’ve been out front.”

  “You have.”

  “I have.”

  “Okay. Wait here.”

  I went back to the office and ran into a scowling match, and took advantage of it to report the return of Heath. All Cramer did was to favor me with five seconds of his share of the scowl. Wolfe didn’t even look at me. Apparently he was still trying to undermine Barrett without a bomb and was finding it hard digging.

  “No,” he said, “I wouldn’t expect that. We don’t expect much from you, Mr. Barrett, in any event. But you seem to have overlooked one thing, at least. You seem to be ignoring the existence of a person who knows as much about all this as the princess herself does. Including your part in it, and your son’s part. I mean, of course, the friend who came here with the princess from Zagreb.”

  “Maybe he’s ignoring it,” Cramer put in, “but I’m not. And you let her go, and gave her money to go with. That was cute.”

  “No,” Wolfe asserted, “I did not.”

  Cramer stared. Wolfe said, “Archie, get that package from the safe and give it to Mr. Cramer.”

  I went and got it and handed it over. Cramer started to unfold it.

  “That,” Wolfe said, “Is the photograph of the Princess Vladanka Donevitch, radioed from London. If I had only got it this morning—”

  Cramer jumped up, sputtering, “What kind of a goddam run-around—this is that Tormic—”

  “Now, please!” Wolfe pushed a palm at him. “Yes, it is Miss Tormic. I agreed—”

  “And she’s—and by God, you had one of my men take her and turn her loose—”

  “I did. What else could I do? She was sitting here in my office, thinking she was my client, under my protection. I didn’t agree to catch the murderer for you, I agreed to disclose the identity and the motive. If you’ll take my advice, the simplest way to get her—”

  But Cramer wasn’t taking advice. He nearly knocked me out of my chair, getting at the phone. Father and son sat tight. Wolfe looked up at the clock and heaved a sigh. Cramer got his number and began spouting orders to someone. I picked up the radiophoto of the princess and laid it on Wolfe’s desk, and gathered up the wrapping paper and put it in the wastebasket.

  Cramer finished and stood up and yapped at Wolfe, “If we don’t get her I’ll—”

  “It was a bargain,” Wolfe snapped.

  “One hell of a bargain.” He moved for the door, turned, and spoke to the Barretts, “I’ll want to see you. If you try setting a fire under me, I’ll give you all I’ve got.” He went and I was right behind him. While he grabbed his coat and hat I got Heath from the front room, always glad to get cops out of the house, from flatfoots on up. I followed them out to the stoop, leaving the door ajar, and watched the army that had been surrounding the house being called into action. Cramer waved them in and gave them curt and crackling orders. His own car had to back up a few feet before it could nose around the rear of the Barrett town car. The taxi down the street rolled up, then it and Heath’s car sped away. Cramer’s car started, then stopped, and my name was called:

  “Hey, Goodwin, come here!”

  I trotted down the steps and past Barrett’s car on over to him. Cramer leaned from the window:

  “I want that picture. Understand?”

  “Sure we’re through with it,” I told him obligingly, and stood at the curb and watched their tail light as they headed for the corner.

  I watched them too long.

  What happened, happened quick, but even so I might have headed her off if I had turned two seconds sooner. She came from inside the tonneau of Barrett’s car, leaping out, and went like a bat out of hell across the sidewalk, up the steps and through the door I had left ajar. I was after her, and I am not old enough to be incapable of rapid movement. I was starting up the steps as she hurtled through the door, and by the light in the hall I saw a glittering streak from something she had in her hand. I gave it all I had then, but I couldn’t catch lightning. When I was at the door she was swerving into the office. As I made the office she was halfway across it and her hand was up with the shining blade, and Wolfe was there in his chair with no time to move, and I had no gun, and all I could do was yell and keep going.

  I do not know how Wolfe did it and I never will know, though he has kindly explained it to me several times. He says that when he heard the commotion in the hall he stiffened into attention, which is the most incredible part of it; that when he saw her leaping in with the dagger flashing he grabbed a beer bottle with each hand; that when she was upon him he struck simultaneously with both hands, with his left at her descending wrist and with his right at anything at all. I don’t know. I do know that something broke her right wrist and something cracked her skull.

  When I reached them he was still sitting in his chair with a beer bottle in each hand and she was on the floor back of his chair, flat on the floor, with her legs twitching spasmodically. I looked at him for blood and didn’t see any. Fred Durkin busted in from the front room. Fritz came running from the kitchen. Father and son stood there white and speechless. I couldn’t see anything wrong with Wolfe, but I asked him in a voice that sounded funny to me:

  “Did she get you?”

  “No!” he bellowed. He couldn’t get up because her body against his chair kept him from shoving it back to make room.

  I knelt down to take a look at her. Her legs had stopped twitching. I couldn’t feel any heart. It was close quarters, wi
th her there between Wolfe’s chair and the wall, and I squirmed around to get on the other side of her. As I did so I heard a voice from the middle of the room:

  “Excuse me for walking right in, Mr. Wolfe, but the door was standing open. I was on my way uptown and I dropped in to say that we may expect a ruling from the attorney general on that point in about a week—the matter of registration as the agent of a foreign principal when the—”

  I raised myself up enough to see the face of Stahl the G-man looking polite but stern. Then I sat back on my heels and howled with laughter.

  Chapter 19

  Wolfe said in a tone of exasperation, “Fritz tells me nothing on your tray was touched. Confound it, you have to eat something!”

  Carla shook her head. “I can’t. I’m sorry. I can’t.”

  I had brought her down to the office. The clock on the wall said 11:20. The chairs were back in place.

  Wolfe sighed. “It’s nearly midnight. Mr. Goodwin is yawning. You may go now whenever you want to. Or I’ll ask one or two questions if you feel like telling the truth.”

  “I can tell the truth—now.”

  “It would have been just as well …”His massive shoulders went up a sixteenth of an inch and down again. “I would like to know if you were aware that that woman was a maniac.”

  “But she wasn’t—” Carla stopped for repairs to her voice. “I never had any idea …” Her hand fluttered and dropped again to her lap.

  “Were you in fact her friend?”

  “Not—no, not her friend. It wasn’t like that. When Mrs. Campbell died I was left dependent on the Donevitch family. Then Prince Stefan married her and she came there and in no time she was head of things. She treated me as well as I could expect, since I was not a Donevitch. I didn’t dislike her. I was a little afraid of her and so was everybody else, even Prince Stefan. When she decided to come to America she selected me to come with her, and I thought then that the reason she did that was because she knew about you and she thought she might need to use you. One reason I thought that was because she told me to bring that adoption paper along—”