by Rex Stout
“How dead is he?”
“I have told you he is dead.”
“Okay. You ought to know better. You do know better. We’re stuck. They wouldn’t ask us questions at home, they’d haul us back out here. They’d be waiting for us on the stoop and you wouldn’t get inside the house.” I returned the keys to my pocket. “Running out when you’re next on the program, that would be nice. The only question is do we report it now or do you make your speech and let someone else find it, and you can answer that.”
He had stopped glaring. He took in a long, deep breath, and when it was out again he said, “I’ll make my speech.”
“Fine. It’d be a shame to waste it. A question. Just now when you lifted the flap to come out I didn’t see you untie the tape fastening. Was it already untied?”
“Yes.”
“That makes it nice.” I turned and went to the steps, mounted, raised the flap for him, and followed him into the tent. He crossed to the front and on out, and I stepped to the cot. Philip Holt lay facing the wall, with the blanket up to his neck, and I pulled it down far enough to see the handle of the knife, an inch to the right of the point of the shoulder blade. The knife blade was all buried. I lowered the blanket some more to get at a hand, pinched a fingertip hard for ten seconds, released it, and saw it stay white. I picked some fluff from the blanket and dangled it against his nostrils for half a minute. No movement. I put the blanket back as I had found it, went to the metal box on the table and lifted the lid, and saw that the shortest knife, the one with the six-inch blade, wasn’t there.
As I went to the rear entrance and raised the flap, Dick Vetter’s lather or whipped cream, whichever you prefer, came to an end through the loudspeakers, and as I descended the five steps the meadowful of picnickers was cheering.
Our sedan was the third car on the right from the foot of the steps. The second car to the left of the steps was a 1955 Plymouth, and I was pleased to see that it still had an occupant, having previously noticed her-a woman with careless gray hair topping a wide face and a square chin, in the front seat but not behind the wheel.
I circled around to her side and spoke through the open window. “I beg your pardon. May I introduce myself?”
“You don’t have to, young man. Your name’s Archie Goodwin, and you work for Nero Wolfe, the detective.” She had tired gray eyes. “You were just out here with him.”
“Right. I hope you won’t mind if I ask you something. How long have you been sitting here?”
“Long enough. But it’s all right, I can hear the speeches. Nero Wolfe is just starting to speak now.”
“Have you been here since the speeches started?”
“Yes, I have. I ate too much of the picnic stuff and I didn’t feel like standing up in that crowd, so I came to sit in the car.”
“Then you’ve been here all the time since the speeches began?”
“That’s what I said. Why do you want to know?”
“I’m just checking on something. If you don’t mind. Has anyone gone into the tent or come out of it while you’ve been here?”
Her tired eyes woke up a little. “Ha,” she said, “so something’s missing. I’m not surprised. What’s missing?”
“Nothing, as far as I know. I’m just checking a certain fact. Of course you saw Mr. Wolfe and me come out and go back in. Anyone else, either going or coming?”
“You’re not fooling me, young man. Something’s missing, and you’re a detective.”
I grinned at her. “All right, have it your way. But I do want to know, if you don’t object.”
“I don’t object. As I told you, I’ve been right here ever since the speeches started, I got here before that. And nobody has gone into the tent, nobody but you and Nero Wolfe, and I haven’t either. I’ve been right here. If you want to know about me, my name is Anna Banau, Mrs. Alexander Banau, and my husband is a captain at Zoller’s-”
A scream came from inside the tent, an all-out scream from a good pair of lungs. I moved, to the steps, up, and past the flap into the tent. Flora Korby was standing near the cot with her back to it, her hand covering her mouth. I was disappointed in her. Granting that a woman has a right to scream when she finds a corpse, she might have kept it down until Wolfe had finished his speech.
Chapter 3
IT WAS A LITTLE after four o’clock when Flora Korby screamed. It was 4:34 when a glance outside through a crack past the flap of the tent’s rear entrance, the third such glance I had managed to make, showed me that the Plymouth containing Mrs. Alexander Banau was gone. It was 4:39 when the medical examiner arrived with his bag and found that Philip Holt was still dead. It was 4:48 when the scientists came, with cameras and fingerprint kits and other items of equipment, and Wolfe and I and the others were herded out to the extension, under guard. It was 5:16 when I counted a total of seventeen cops, state and county, in uniform and out, on the job. It was 5:30 when Wolfe muttered at me bitterly that it would certainly be all night. It was 5:52 when a chief of detectives named Baxter got so personal with me that I decided, finally and definitely, not to play. It was 6:21 when we all left Culp’s Meadows for an official destination. There were four in our car: one in uniform with Wolfe in the back seat, and one in his own clothes with me in front. Again I had someone beside me to tell me the way, but I didn’t put my arm across his shoulders.
There had been some conversing with us separately, but most of it had been a panel discussion, open air, out on the platform extension, so I knew pretty well how things stood. Nobody was accusing anybody. Three of them-Korby, Rago, and Griffin-gave approximately the same reason for their visits to the tent during the speechmaking: that they were concerned about Philip Holt and wanted to see if he was all right. The fourth, Dick Vetter, gave the reason I had guessed, that he thought Griffin might bring Holt out to the platform, and he intended to stop him. Vetter, by the way, was the only one who raised a fuss about being detained. He said that it hadn’t been easy to get away from his duties that afternoon, and he had a studio rehearsal scheduled for six o’clock, and he absolutely had to be there. At 6:21, when we all left for the official destination, he was fit to be tied.
None of them claimed to know for sure that Holt had been alive at the time he visited the tent; they all had supposed he had fallen asleep. All except Vetter said they had gone to the cot and looked at him, at his face, and had suspected nothing wrong. None of them had spoken to him. To the question, “Who do you think did it and why?” they all gave the same answer: someone must have entered the tent by the rear entrance, stabbed him, and departed. The fact that the URWA director of organization had got his stomach into trouble and had been attended by a doctor in the tent had been no secret, anything but.
I have been leaving Flora out, since I knew and you know she was clear, but the cops didn’t. I overheard one of them tell another one it was probably her, because stabbing a sick man was more like something a woman would do than a man.
Of course the theory that someone had entered by the back door made the fastening of the tent flap an important item. I said I had tied the tape before we left the tent, and they all agreed that they had seen me do so except Dick Vetter, who said he hadn’t noticed because he had been helping to arrange the blanket over Holt; and Wolfe and I both testified that the tape was hanging loose when we had entered the tent while Vetter was speaking. Under this theory the point wasn’t who had untied it, since the murderer could have easily reached through the crack from the outside and jerked the knot loose; the question was when. On that none of them was any help. All four said they hadn’t noticed whether the tape was tied or not when they went inside the tent.
That was how it stood, as far as I knew, when we left Culp’s Meadows. The official destination turned out to be a building I had been in before a time or two, not as a murder suspect-a county courthouse back of a smooth green lawn with a couple of big trees. First we were collected in a room on the ground floor, and, after a long wait, were escorted up one flig
ht and through a door that was inscribed DISTRICT ATTORNEY.
At least 91.2 percent of the district attorneys in the State of New York think they would make fine tenants of the governor’s mansion at Albany, and that should be kept in mind in considering the conduct of DA James R. Delaney. To him at least four of that bunch, and possibly all five, were upright, important citizens in positions to influence segments of the electorate. His attitude as he attacked the problem implied that he was merely chairing a meeting of a community council called to deal with a grave and difficult emergency-except, I noticed, when he was looking at or speaking to Wolfe or me. Then his smile quit working, his tone sharpened, and his eyes had a different look.
With a stenographer at a side table taking it down, he spent an hour going over it with us, or rather with them, with scattered contributions from Chief of Detectives Baxter and others who had been at the scene, and then spoke his mind.
“It seems,” he said, “to be the consensus that some person unknown entered the tent from the rear, stabbed him, and departed. There is the question, how could such a person have known the knife would be there at hand? but he need not have known. He might have decided to murder only when he saw the knives, or he might have had some other weapon with him, and, seeing the knives, thought one of them would better serve his purpose and used it instead. Either is plausible. It must be admitted that the whole theory is plausible, and none of the facts now known are in contradiction to it. You agree, Chief?”
“Right,” Baxter conceded. “Up to now. As long as the known facts are facts.”
Delaney nodded. “Certainly. They have to be checked.” His eyes took in the audience. “You gentleman, and you, Miss Korby, you understand that you are to remain in this jurisdiction, the State of New York, until further notice, and you are to be available. With that understood, it seems unnecessary at present to put you under bond as material witnesses. We have your addresses and know where to find you.”
He focused on Wolfe, and his tone changed. “With you, Wolfe, the situation is somewhat different. You’re a licensed private detective, and so is Goodwin, and the record of your high-handed performances does not inspire confidence in your-uh-candor. There may be some complicated and subtle reasons why the New York City authorities have stood for your tricks, but out here in the suburbs we’re more simpleminded. We don’t like tricks.”
He lowered his chin, which made his eyes slant up under his heavy brows. “Let’s see if I’ve got your story straight. You say that as Vetter started to speak you felt in your pocket for a paper on which you had made notes for your speech, found it wasn’t there, thought you had left it in your car, went to get it, and when, after you had entered the tent, it occurred to you that the car was locked and Goodwin had the keys, you summoned him and you and he went out to the car. Then Goodwin remembered that the paper had been left on your desk at your office, and you and he returned to the tent, and you went out to the platform and resumed your seat. Another item: when you went to the rear entrance to leave the tent to go out to the car, the tape fastening of the flap was hanging loose, not tied. Is that your story?”
Wolfe cleared his throat. “Mr. Delaney. I suppose it is pointless to challenge your remark about my candor or to ask you to phrase your question less offensively.” His shoulders went up an eighth of an inch, and down. “Yes, that’s my story.”
“I merely asked you the question.”
“I answered it.”
“So you did.” The DA’s eyes came to me. “And of course, Goodwin, your story is the same. If it needed arranging, there was ample time for that during the hubbub that followed Miss Korby’s scream. But with you there’s more to it. You say that after you and Wolfe re-entered the tent, and he continued through the front entrance to the platform, it occurred to you that there was a possibility that he had taken the paper from his desk and put it in his pocket, and had consulted it during the ride, and had left it in the car, and you went out back again to look, and you were out there when Miss Korby screamed. Is that correct?”
As I had long since decided not to play, when Baxter had got too personal, I merely said, “Check.”
Delaney returned to Wolfe. “If you object to my being offensive, Wolfe, I’ll put it this way: I find some of this hard to believe. Anyone as glib as you are needing notes for a little speech like that? And you thinking you had left the paper in the car, and Goodwin remembering it had been left at home on your desk and then thinking it might be in the car after all? Also there are certain facts. You and Goodwin were the last people inside the tent before Miss Korby entered and found the body. You admit it. The others all state that they don’t know whether the tape was tied or not when they visited the tent; you and Goodwin can’t very well say that, since you went out that way, so you say you found it untied.”
He cocked his head. “You admit you had had words with Philip Holt during the past year. You admit he had become obnoxious to you-your word, obnoxious-by his insistence that your personal chef must join his union. The record of your past performances justifies me in saying that a man who renders himself obnoxious to you had better watch his step. I’ll say this, if it weren’t for the probability that some unknown person entered from the rear, and I concede that it’s quite possible, you and Goodwin would be held in custody until a judge could be found to issue a warrant for your arrest as material witnesses. As it is, I’ll make it easier for you.” He looked at his wristwatch. “It’s five minutes to eight. I’ll send a man with you to a restaurant down the street, and we’ll expect you back here at nine-thirty. I want to cover all the details with you, thoroughly.” His eyes moved. “The rest of you may go for the present, but you are to be available.”
Wolfe stood up. “Mr. Goodwin and I are going home,” he announced. “We will not be back this evening.”
Delaney’s eyes narrowed. “If that’s the way you feel about it, you’ll stay. You can send out for sandwiches.”
“Are we under arrest?”
The DA opened his mouth, closed it, and opened it again. “No.”
“Then we’re going.” Wolfe was assured but not belligerent. “I understand your annoyance, sir, at this interference with your holiday, and I’m aware that you don’t like me-or what you know, or think you know, of my record. But I will not surrender my convenience to your humor. You can detain me only if you charge me, and with what? Mr. Goodwin and I have supplied all the information we have. Your intimation that I am capable of murdering a man, or of inciting Mr. Goodwin to murder him, because he has made a nuisance of himself, is puerile. You concede that the murderer could have been anyone in that throng of thousands. You have no basis whatever for any supposition that Mr. Goodwin and I are concealing any knowledge that would help you. Should such a basis appear, you know where to find us. Come, Archie.”
He turned and headed for the door, and I followed. I can’t report the reaction because Delaney at his desk was behind me, and it would have been bad tactics to look back over my shoulder. All I knew was that Baxter took two steps and stopped, and none of the other cops moved. We made the hall, and the entrance, and down the path to the sidewalk, without a shot being fired; and half a block to where the car was parked. Wolfe told me to find a phone booth and call Fritz to tell him when we would arrive for dinner, and I steered for the center of town.
As I had holiday traffic to cope with, it was half past nine by the time we got home and washed and seated at the dinner table. A moving car is no place to give Wolfe bad news, or good news either for that matter, and there was no point in spoiling his dinner, so I waited until after we had finished with the poached and truffled broilers and broccoli and stuffed potatoes and herbs, and salad and cheese, and Fritz had brought coffee to us in the office, to open the bag. Wolfe was reaching for the remote-control television gadget, to turn it on so as to have the pleasure of turning it off again, when I said, “Hold a minute. I have a report to make. I don’t blame you for feeling self-satisfied, you got us away very neatly,
but there’s a catch. It wasn’t somebody that came in the back way. It was one of them.”
“Indeed.” He was placid, after-dinner placid, in the comfortable, big made-to-order chair back of his desk. “What is this, flummery?”
“No, sir. Nor am I trying to show that I’m smarter than you are for once. It’s just that I know more. When you left the tent to go to the car your mind was on a quick getaway, so you may not have noticed that a woman was sitting there in a car to the left, but I did. When we returned to the tent and you went on out front, I had an idea and went out back again and had a talk with her. I’ll give it to you verbatim, since it’s important.”
I did so. That was simple, compared with the three-way and four-way conversations I have been called on to report word for word. When I finished he was scowling at me, as black as the coffee in his cup.
“Confound it,” he growled.
“Yes, sir. I was going to tell you, there when we were settling the details of why we went out to the car, the paper with your notes, but as you know we were interrupted, and after that there was no opportunity that I liked, and anyway I had seen that Mrs. Banau and the car were gone, and that baboon named Baxter had hurt my feelings, and I had decided not to play. Of course the main thing was you, your wanting to go home. If they had known it was one of us six, or seven counting Flora, we would all have been held as material witnesses, and you couldn’t have got bail on the Fourth of July, and God help you, I can manage in a cell, but you’re too big. Also if I got you home you might feel like discussing a raise in pay. Do you?”
“Shut up.” He closed his eyes, and after a moment opened them again. “We’re in a pickle. They may find that woman any moment, or she may disclose herself. What about her? You have given me her words, but what about her?”