When I first set eyes on Mira Holt, as I opened the front door and she was coming up the seven steps to the stoop, she was a problem, though only a minor one compared to what followed.
At the moment I was unemployed. During the years I have worked for Nero Wolfe and lived under his roof, I have quit and been fired about the same number of times, say thirty or forty. Mostly we have been merely letting off steam, but sometimes we have meant it, more or less, and that Monday evening in September I was really fed up. The main dish at dinner had been pork stewed in beer, which both Wolfe and Fritz know I can get along without, and we had left the dining room and crossed the hall to the office, and Fritz had brought coffee and Wolfe had poured it, and I had said, “By the way, I told Anderson I’d phone and confirm his appointment for tomorrow morning.”
And Wolfe had said, “No. Cancel it.” He picked up the book he was on, John Gunther’s Inside Russia Today.
I sat in my working chair and looked across his desk at him. Since he weighs a seventh of a ton he always looks big, but when he’s being obnoxious he looks even bigger. “Do you suppose it’s possible,” I asked, “that that pork has a bloating effect?”
“No indeed,” he said, and opened the book.
If I had been a camel and the book had been a straw you could have heard my spine crack. He knew darned well he shouldn’t have opened it until we had finished with coffee. I put my cup down. “I am aware,” I said, “that you are sitting pretty. The bank balance is fat enough for months of paying Fritz and Theodore and me, and buying pork and beer in car lots, and adding more orchids to the ten thousand you’ve already got. I’ll even grant that a private detective has a right to refuse to take a case with or without a reason. But as I told you before dinner, this Anderson is known to me, and he asked me as a personal favor to get him fifteen minutes with you, and I told him to come at eleven o’clock tomorrow morning. If you’re determined not to work because your tax bracket is already too high, okay, all you have to do is tell him no. He’ll be here at eleven.”
He was holding the book open and his eyes were on it, but he spoke. “You know quite well, Archie, that I must be consulted on appointments. Did you owe this man a favor?”
“I do now that he asked for one and I said yes.”
“Did you owe him one before?”
“No.”
“Then you are committed but I am not. Since I wouldn’t take the job it would waste his time and mine. Phone him not to come. Tell him I have other engagements.”
So I quit. I admit that on some other occasions my quitting had been merely a threat, to jolt him into seeing reason, but not that time. When a mule plants its feet a certain way there’s no use trying to budge it. I swiveled, got my memo pad, wrote on it, yanked the sheet off, got up and crossed to his desk, and handed him the sheet.
“That’s Anderson’s number,” I told him. “If you’re too busy to phone him not to come, Fritz can. I’m through. I’ll stay with friends tonight and come tomorrow for my stuff.”
His eyes had left the book to glare at me. “Pfui,” he said.
“I agree,” I said. “Absolutely.” I turned and marched out. I do not say that as I got my hat from the rack in the hall my course was clearly mapped for the next twenty years, or even twenty hours. Wolfe owned the house but not everything in it, for the furniture in my room on the third floor had been bought and paid for by me. That would have to wait until I found a place to move it to, but I would get my clothes and other items tomorrow, and would I come for them before eleven o’clock and learn from Fritz whether a visitor named Anderson was expected, or would it be better strategy to come in the afternoon and learn if Anderson had been admitted and given his fifteen minutes? Facing that problem as I pulled the door open, I was immediately confronted by another one. A female was coming up the seven steps to the stoop.
II
I couldn’t greet her and ask her business, since it was a cinch she would say she wanted to see Nero Wolfe and I couldn’t carry on with a job I no longer held by returning to the office to ask Wolfe if he would receive a caller. Anyway I wouldn’t. I couldn’t step aside and let her enter by the door I had opened with no questions asked, since there was a possibility that she was one of the various people who had it in for Wolfe, and while I might have considered shooting him myself I didn’t want to get him plugged by a total stranger. So I crossed the sill, pulled the door shut, sidestepped to pass her, and was starting down the steps when my sleeve was caught and jerked.
“Hey,” she said, “aren’t you Archie Goodwin?”
My eyes slanted down to hers. “You’re guessing,” I said.
“I am not. I’ve seen you at the Flamingo. You’re not very polite, shutting the door in my face.” She spoke in jerks, as if she wasn’t sure she had enough breath. “I want to see Nero Wolfe.”
“This is his house. Ring the bell.”
“But I want to see you too. Let me in. Take me in.”
My eyes had adjusted enough to the poor light to see that she was young, attractive, and hypped. She had on a cap with a beak. In normal circumstances it would have been a pleasure to escort her into the front room and go and badger Wolfe into seeing her, but as things stood I didn’t even consider it. “I’m sorry,” I said, “but I don’t work here any more. I just quit. I am now on my way to bum a bed for the night. You’ll have to ring the bell, but I should warn you that in Mr. Wolfe’s present mood there’s not a chance. You might as well skip it. If your trouble is urgent you ought to—”
“I’m not in trouble.”
“Good. You’re lucky.”
She touched my sleeve. “I don’t believe it. That you’ve quit.”
“I do. Would I say so if I hadn’t? Running the risk that you’re a journalist and tomorrow there will be a front-page spread, ‘Archie Goodwin, the famous private detective, has severed his connection with Nero Wolfe, also a detective, and it is thought—”’
“Shut up!” She was close to me, gripping my arm. She let loose and backed up a step. “I beg your pardon. I seem to be … you think Nero Wolfe wouldn’t see me?”
“I don’t think. I know.”
“Anyway I want to see you too. For what I want I guess you would be better than him. I want some advice—no, not advice exactly, I want to consult you. I’ll pay cash, fifty dollars. Can’t we go inside?”
Naturally I was uplifted. Since I had left Wolfe, and since there was no other outfit in New York I would work for, my only possible program was to set up for myself, and before I even got down to the sidewalk here was a pretty girl offering me fifty bucks just for consultation.
“I’m afraid not,” I told her, “since I no longer belong here. If that’s your taxi waiting that will do fine, especially with the driver gone.” A glance had shown me that there was no one behind the wheel of the cab at the curb. Probably, having been told to wait for her, he had beat it to Al’s diner at the corner of Tenth Avenue, which was popular with hackies.
She shook her head. “I don’t—” she began, and let it hang. She glanced around. “Why not here? It shouldn’t take very long—I just want you to help me win a bet.” She moved, descended two steps, and sat on the landing, swaying a little as she bent. “Have a seat.”
We were still on Wolfe’s premises, but he rarely used the outdoors part, and after she paid me I could slip a buck under the door for rent. I sat down beside her, not crowding. I had often sat there watching the neighborhood kids at stoop ball.
“Do I pay in advance?” she asked.
“No, thanks, I’ll trust you. What’s the bet about?”
“Well …” She was squinting at me in the dim light. “I had an argument with a friend of mine. She said there were ninety-three women cab drivers in New York, and she thought it was dangerous because sometimes things happen in cabs that it takes a man to handle, and I said things like that can happen anywhere just as well as in cabs, and we had an argument, and she bet me fifty dollars she could prove that something dangerous could happe
n in a cab that couldn’t happen anywhere else. She thought up some things, but I made her admit they could happen other places too, and then she said what if a woman cab driver left her empty cab to go into a building for something, and when she came back there was a dead woman in the cab? She claimed that won the bet, and the trouble was I didn’t know enough about what you’re supposed to do when you find a dead body. That’s what I want you to tell me. I’m sure she’s wrong. And I’ll pay you the fifty dollars.”
I was squinting back at her. “You don’t look it,” I stated.
“I don’t look what?”
“Loony. Two things. First, the same thing could happen if she were driving a private car instead of a cab, and why didn’t you tell her that? Second, where’s the danger? She merely finds a phone and notifies the police. It would be a nuisance, but you said dangerous.”
“Oh. Of course.” She bit her lip. “I left something out. It’s not her cab. She has a friend who is a cab driver, and she wanted to see what driving a cab was like, and her friend let her take it. So she can’t notify the police because her friend broke some law when she let her take the cab, and she broke one too, driving a cab without a license, so it wouldn’t have been the same if she had been driving a private car. And the only way I can win the bet is to prove that it wouldn’t be dangerous. She doesn’t know how the dead woman got in the cab or anything about it. All she has to do is get the body out of the cab, but that might be dangerous unless she did it just right, and that’s what I want you to tell me so I won’t make some awful mistake—I mean when I tell my friend why it wouldn’t be dangerous. Things like where would she go to—to take it out of the cab, and would she have to wait until late at night, and how would she make sure there was no traces left in the cab.” She bit her lip again, and her fingers were curled to make fists. “Things like that.”
“I see.” I had stopped squinting. “What’s your name?”
She shook her head. “You don’t have to know. I’m just consulting you.” She stuck her fingers in the pocket of her jacket, a grayish number with pointed lapels that had seen wear, came out with a purse, and opened it.
I reached to snap it shut. “That can wait. I certainly wouldn’t take your money without knowing your name. Of course you can make one up.”
“Why should I?” She gestured. “All right. My name is Mira Holt. Mira with an I.” She opened the purse again.
“Hold it,” I told her. “A couple of questions. The dead woman she finds in the cab—does she recognize her?”
“No, how could she?”
“She could if she knew her when she was alive.”
“She didn’t.”
“Good. That helps. You say she left her empty cab to go into a building for something. For what?”
“Oh, just anything. I don’t know. That doesn’t matter.”
“It might, but if you don’t know you can’t tell me. I want to make it clear, Miss Holt, that I accept without question all that you have told me. Since I am a trained detective I am chronically suspicious, but you are so frank and intelligent and pleasing to look at that I wouldn’t dream of doubting you. A man who was sap enough to size you up wrong might even suspect you of feeding him a phony, and go and take a look in that taxi, but not me. I don’t even ask you where the driver is, because I assume he has gone to the corner for a ham on rye and a cuppa coffee. In short, I trust you fully. That’s understood?”
Her lips were tight. She was probably frowning, but the beak of her cap screened her brow. “I guess so.” She wasn’t at all sure. “But maybe—if that’s how you feel—maybe it would be better just to—”
“No. It’s better like this. Much better. About this situation your friend thought up and claims she won the bet, it has many aspects. You say you didn’t know enough about what you’re supposed to do when you find a dead body. First and foremost, you’re supposed to notify the police immediately. That goes for everybody, but it’s a must for a private detective—me, for instance—if he wants to keep his license. Is that clear?”
“Yes.” She nodded. “I see.”
“Also you’re not supposed to touch the body or anything near it. Also you’re not supposed to leave it unguarded, but that’s not so important because you may have to in order to call a cop. As for your idea that all she has to do is get the body out of the cab, and where would she go to ditch it, and would she have to wait until late at night, and so on, I admit it has possibilities and I could make a lot of practical suggestions. But you have to show that it could be done without danger, and that’s too big an order. That’s what licks you. Forget it. However, your friend hasn’t won the bet. She was to produce a situation showing that a woman cab driver runs special risks as a hackie, and in this case the danger comes from the fact that she was not driving the cab. So your friend—”
“That’s no help. You know very well—”
“Shut up. I beg your pardon.”
Her fingers were curled into fists again. “You said you could make some practical suggestions.”
“I was carried away. The idea of disposing of a dead body is fascinating as long as it’s only an idea. By the way, I took one thing for granted that I shouldn’t have—that your friend specified that the woman had died by violence. If she could have died of natural causes—”
“No. She had been stabbed. There was a knife, the handle of a knife. …”
“Then it’s impossible. A hackie letting someone else drive his cab is a misdemeanor, and so is driving a cab without a license, but driving off with a dead body with a knife sticking in it, and dumping it somewhere, and not reporting it—that’s a felony. Good for at least a year and probably more.”
She opened a fist to grip my arm, leaning to me. “But not if she did it right! Not if no one ever knew! I told you one thing wrong—she did recognize her! She did know her when she was alive! So she can’t—”
“Hold it,” I growled. “Give me some money quick. Pay me. A dollar bill, five—don’t sit and stare. See that police car? If it goes on by—no, it’s stopping—pay me!”
She was going to panic. She started up, but my hand on her shoulder stopped her and held her down. She opened the purse and took out folded bills without fumbling, and I took them and put them in my pocket. “Staring is okay,” I told her, not too loud. “People stare at police cars. Stay put and keep your mouth shut. I’m going to take a look. Naturally I’m curious.”
That was perfectly true. I was curious. The prowl car had stopped alongside the taxi, and a cop, not the one who was driving, had got out and circled around to the door of the taxi on his side and was opening it as I reached the sidewalk. When you have a reputation for cheek you should live up to it, so I crossed to the door on my side and pulled it open. The seat was empty, but in front of it was a spread of brown canvas held up by whatever was under it. The cop, lifting a corner of the canvas, snarled at me, “Back up, you,” and I retreated half a step, but he hadn’t said to close the door, so I had a good view when he pulled the canvas off. More light would have helped, but there was enough to see that it was a woman, or had been, and that the knife whose handle was perpendicular to her ribs was all the way in.
“My God,” I said with feeling.
“Shut that door!” the cop barked. “No, don’t touch it!”
“I already have.”
“I saw you. Beat it! No! What’s your name?”
“Goodwin. Archie Goodwin. This is Nero Wolfe’s house, and—”
“I know it is. And I know about you. Is this your cab?”
“Certainly not. I’m not a hackie.”
“I know you’re not. I mean—” He stopped. Apparently he had realized that the function of a prowl cop on finding a corpse is not to argue with onlookers. His head jerked around. “Climb out, Bill. DOA. I’ll call in.” The cop behind the wheel wiggled out, and the one in command wiggled in, and I mounted the stoop and sat down beside my client, noting that she had removed the cap and apparently had stashed
it.
I kept my voice low, though it wasn’t necessary since the cop was talking on his radio. “In about eight minutes,” I said, “experts will begin arriving. They will not be strangers to me. Since as far as I know you merely came to get me to tell you how to win a bet, when they start asking questions I’ll be glad to answer them if you want to leave it to me. I’ve had practice answering questions.”
She was gripping my arm again. “You looked in. You saw—”
“Shut up, and I don’t beg your pardon. You talk too much. Even if I still lived and worked here we wouldn’t go inside because it wouldn’t be natural, with cops in a prowl car finding a corpse in a taxi parked at the curb—oh, I haven’t mentioned that, that there’s a dead woman in the taxi. I mention it now because naturally I would, and naturally I would stick around to watch developments. I’m talking to keep you from talking, since naturally we would talk. Not only have I had practice answering questions, but I know some of the rules. There are only three methods that are any good in the long run. You have strong fingers.”
“I’m sorry.” Her grip relaxed a little, but she held on. “What are the three methods?”
“One. Button your lip. Answer nothing whatever. Two. Tell the truth straight through. The works. Three. Tell a simple basic lie with no trimmings, and stick to it. If you try a fancy lie, or a mixture of truth and lies, or part of the truth but try to save some, you’re sunk. Of course I’m just talking to pass the time. In the present situation, as far as I know, there is no reason why you shouldn’t just tell the truth.”
“You said to leave it to you.”
“Yes, but they won’t. There are very few people in their jurisdiction they wouldn’t rather leave it to than me, on account of certain—here they come. We can stop talking. Naturally we would watch.”
An official car I had seen before rolled to a stop behind the prowl car, and Inspector Cramer of Homicide West climbed out.
III
If you are surprised that an inspector had come in response to a report that a corpse had been found, I wasn’t. The report had of course given the location, in front of 918 West 35th Street, and that address held memories, most of them sour, for the personnel at Homicide West, from Cramer down. A violent death that was in any way connected with Nero Wolfe made them itch, and presumably the report had included the item that Archie Goodwin was present and had stuck his nose in.
Rex Stout - Nero Wolfe Page 8