“It also shows,” I went on, “that they haven’t got any real stopper to cork it, like prints from the car or localizing the scissors or anything they found on the corpse. They sure want Carl and Tina, and you know what happens when they get them, but they’re still short on exhibits. If you like your suggestion to keep our guests here until Cramer and Stebbins get their paws on the right guy it might work fine as a long-term policy, but you’re against the idea of women living here, or even a woman, and after a few months it might get on your nerves.”
“It is no good,” Tina said, back to her gasping whisper again. “Just let us go! I beg you, do that! We’ll find our way to the country, we know how. You are wonderful detectives, but it is no good!”
Wolfe ignored her. He leaned back, closed his eyes, and heaved a deep sigh, and from the way his nose began to twitch I knew he was coercing himself into facing the hard fact that he would have to go to work—either that or tell me to call Purley, and that was ruled out of bounds by both his self-respect and his professional vanity. The Vardas family sat gazing at him, not in hope, but not in utter despair either. I guess they had run out of despair long ago and had none left to call on. I watched Wolfe too, his twitching nose until it stopped, and then his lips in their familiar movement, pushed out and then pulled in, out and in again, which meant he had accepted the inevitable and was getting the machinery going. I had seen him like that for an hour at a stretch, but this time it was only minutes.
He sighed again, opened his eyes, and rasped at Tina, “Except for Mr. Fickler, that man questioned you first. Is that right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Tell me what he said. What he asked. I want every word.”
I thought Tina did pretty well under the circumstances. Convinced that her goose was cooked and that therefore what Wallen had asked couldn’t affect her fate one way or the other, she tried to play ball anyway. She wrinkled her brow and concentrated, and it looked as if Wolfe got it all out of her. But she couldn’t give him what she didn’t have.
He kept after it. “You are certain he produced no object, showed you no object whatever?”
“Yes, I’m sure he didn’t.”
“He asked about no object, anything, in the shop?”
“No.”
“He mentioned no object at all?”
“No.”
“He took nothing from his pocket?”
“No.”
“The newspaper he had. Didn’t he take that from his pocket?”
“No, like I said, he had it in his hand when he came in the booth.”
“In his hand or under his arm?”
“In his hand. I think—yes, I’m sure.”
“Was it folded up?”
“Well, of course newspapers are folded.”
“Yes, Mrs. Vardas. Just remember the newspaper as you saw it in his hand. I’m making a point of it because there is nothing else to make a point of, and we must have a point if we can find one. Was the newspaper folded up as if he had had it in his pocket?”
“No, it wasn’t.” She was trying hard. “It wasn’t folded that much. Like I said, it was a News. When he sat down he put it on the table, at the end by his right hand—yes, that’s right, my left hand; I moved some of my things to make room—and it was the way it is on the newsstand, so that’s all it was folded.”
“But he didn’t mention it?”
“No.”
“And you noticed nothing unusual about it? I mean the newspaper?”
She shook her head. “It was just a newspaper.”
Wolfe repeated the performance with Carl and got more of the same. No object produced or mentioned, no hint of any. The only one on exhibit, the newspaper, had been there on the end of the table when Carl, sent by Fickler, had entered and sat, and Wallen had made no reference to it. Carl was more practical than Tina. He didn’t work as hard as she had trying to remember Wallen’s exact words, and I must say I couldn’t blame him.
Wolfe gave up trying to get what they didn’t have. He leaned back, compressed his lips, closed his eyes, and tapped with his forefingers on the ends of his chair arms. Carl and Tina looked at each other a while, then she got up and went to him, started combing his hair with her fingers, saw I was looking, began to blush, God knows why, and went back to her chair.
Finally Wolfe opened his eyes. “Confound it,” he said peevishly, “it’s impossible. Even if I had a move to make I couldn’t make it. If I so much as stir a finger Mr. Cramer will start yelping, and I have no muzzle for him. Any effort to—”
The doorbell rang. During lunch Fritz had been told to leave it to me, so I arose, crossed to the hall, and went front. But not all the way. Four paces short of the door I saw, through the one-way glass panel, the red rugged face and the heavy broad shoulders. I wheeled and returned to the office, not dawdling, and told Wolfe, “The man to fix the chair.”
“Indeed.” His head jerked up. “The front room.”
“I could tell him—”
“No.”
Carl and Tina, warned by our tone and tempo, were on their feet. The bell rang again. I moved fast to the door to the front room and pulled it open, telling them, “In here quick. Step on it.” They obeyed without a word, as if they had known me and trusted me for years, but what choice did they have? When they has passed through I said, “Relax and keep quiet,” shut the door, glanced at Wolfe and got a nod, went to the hall and to the door, opened it, and said morosely, “Hello. What now?”
“It took you long enough,” Inspector Cramer growled, crossing the threshold.
IV
WOLFE can move when he wants to. I have seen him prove it more than once, as he did then. By the time I was back in the office, following Cramer, he had scattered in front of him on his desk pads of paper, pencils, and a dozen folders of plant germination records for which he had had to go to the filing cabinet. One of the folders was spread open, and he was scowling at us above it. He grunted a greeting but not a welcome. Cramer grunted back, moved to the red leather chair, and planted himself in it.
I got myself at my desk. I was wishing I wasn’t involved so I could just enjoy it. If Wolfe succeeded in keeping Cramer’s claws off of the Vardas family and at the same time kept himself out of jail I would show my appreciation by not hitting him for a raise for at least a month.
Fritz entered with a tray, so Wolfe had found time to push a buttom too. It was the fixed allotment, three bottles of beer. Wolfe, getting the opener from his drawer, told Fritz to bring another glass, but Cramer said no thanks.
Suddenly Cramer looked at me and demanded, “Where did you go when you left the barber shop?”
My brows went up. “Just like that?”
“Yes.”
“Well, then. If you really cared you could have put a tail on me. If you didn’t care enough to put a tail on me you’re just being nosy, and I resent it. Next question.”
“Why not answer that one?”
“Because some of the errands I get sent on are confidential, and I don’t want to start a bad habit.”
Cramer turned abruptly to Wolfe. “You know a police officer was killed this morning there in that shop.”
“Yes.” Wolfe halted a foaming glass on its way to his mouth. “Archie told me about it.”
“Maybe he did.”
“Not maybe. He did.”
“Okay.” Cramer cocked his head and watched Wolfe empty the glass and use his handkerchief on his lips. Then he said, “Look. This is what brought me here. I have learned over a stretch of years that when I find you within a mile of a murder, and Goodwin is a part of you, something fancy can be expected. I don’t need to itemize that; your memory is as good as mine. Wait a second, let me finish. I don’t say there’s no such thing as a coincidence. I know you’ve been going to that shop for two years, and Goodwin for six years. It wouldn’t be so remarkable if he happened in there this particular day, two hours after a murder, if it wasn’t for certain features. He told Graboff, his barb
er, that he needed an emergency shave to go to an appointment. Incidentally, it couldn’t have been much of an emergency, since he waited nearly half an hour while Graboff finished with a customer, but I might concede that. The point is that Graboff and Fickler both say that in the six years Goodwin has been going there he has never gone just for a shave. Not once. He goes only for the works, haircut, scalp massage, shampoo, and shave. That makes it too remarkable. Just one day in six years an emergency sends him there for a shave, and this is the day. I don’t believe it.”
Wolfe shrugged. “Then you don’t. I’m not responsible for your credulity quotient, Mr. Cramer. Neither is Mr. Goodwin. I don’t see how we can help you.”
“Nobody would believe it,” Cramer said stubbornly, refusing to get riled. “That’s why I’m here. I do believe that Goodwin went to that shop because he knew a man had been murdered there.”
“Then you believe wrong,” I told him. “Your credulity quotient needs an overhaul. Until I got there I hadn’t the slightest idea or suspicion that a man had been murdered, there or anywhere else.”
“You have been known to lie, Goodwin.”
“Only within limits, and I know what they are. I will state that in an affidavit. Write it out, and there’s a notary at the corner drugstore. That would be perjury, which I’m allergic to.”
“Your going there had nothing whatever to do with the murder?”
“Put it that way if you prefer it. It did not.”
Wolfe was pouring beer. “How,” he inquired, not belligerently, “was Mr. Goodwin supposed to have learned of the murder? Had you fitted that in?”
“I don’t know.” Cramer gestured impatiently. “I didn’t come here with a diagram. I only know what it means, what it always has meant, when I’m on a homicide, which is what I work at, and suddenly there you are, or Goodwin. And there Goodwin was, two hours after it happened, and I asked some questions and I can take only so much coincidence. Frankly I have no idea where you come in. You work only for big money. That hit-and-run driver could be a man with money, but if so it couldn’t be someone who works in that shop. No one there has the kind of dough that hires Nero Wolfe. So I don’t see how it could be money that pulled you in, and I frankly admit I have no idea what else could. I guess I’ll have a little beer after all, if you don’t mind. I’m tired.”
Wolfe leaned forward to push the button.
“What was on my mind,” Cramer said, “was two things. First, I did not believe that Goodwin just happened to drop in at the scene of a murder. I admit he’s not quite brazen enough to commit perjury.” He looked at me. “I want that affidavit. Today. Word it yourself, but say it right.”
“You’ll get it,” I assured him.
“Today.”
“Yep.”
“Don’t forget it.”
Fritz entered with another tray, put it down on the little table at Cramer’s elbow, and uncapped the bottle. “Shall I pour, sir?”
“Thanks, I will.” Cramer took the glass in his left hand, tilted it, and poured with his right. Unlike Wolfe, he didn’t care for a lot of foam. “Second,” he said, “I thought that what took Goodwin there might be something you would be ready to tell me about, but he wouldn’t because you’re the boss and he’s such a goddam clam unless you say the word. I don’t pretend to have anything to pry it out of you with. You know the law about withholding evidence as well as I do, you ought to by this time, the stunts you’ve pulled—”
The foam was down to where he liked it, and he stopped to take a swig.
“You thought,” Wolfe asked, “that I had sent Archie to the shop on business?”
Cramer ran his tongue over his lips. “Yes. For the reason given. I still think so.”
“You’re wrong. I didn’t. Since you’re to get an affidavit from Archie, you might as well have one from me too and get it settled. In it I will say that I did not send him to the barber shop, that I did not know he was going there, and that I heard and knew nothing of the murder until he returned and told me.”
“You’ll swear to that?”
“As a favor to you, yes. You’ve wasted your time coming here, and you might as well get a little something out of it.” Wolfe reached for his second bottle. “By the way, I still don’t know why you came. According to Archie, the murderer is known and all you have to do is find him—that man at the clothes rack—uh, Carl. And his wife, you said, Archie?”
“Yes, sir. Tina, one of the manicures. Purley told me straight they had done it and scooted.”
Wolfe frowned at Cramer. “Then what could you expect to get from me? How could I help?”
“What I said, that’s all,” Cramer insisted doggedly, pouring the rest of his beer. “When I see Goodwin poking around I want to know why.”
“I don’t believe it,” Wolfe said rudely. He turned to me. “Archie. I think you’re responsible for this. You’re brash and you talk too much. I think it was something you did or said. What was it?”
“Sure, it’s always me.” I was hurt. “What I did, I got a shave, and Ed had a customer and I had to wait, so I talked with Purley and looked at a magazine—no, I started to but didn’t—and with Inspector Cramer and then with Janet, Miss Stahl to you, and with Ed while I was in the chair—that is, he talked—”
“What did you say to Mr. Cramer?”
“Practically nothing. Just answered a civil question.”
“What did you say to Mr. Stebbins?”
I thought I knew now where he was headed and hoped to God I was right. “Oh, just asked what was going on, and he told me. I’ve told you about it.”
“Not verbatim. What did you say?”
“Nothing, damn it! Of course Purley wanted to know what brought me there, and I told him I—say, wait a minute! Maybe you’re right at that! He asked me if I had seen Carl or Tina this morning, and I said sure, I had put them here in the front room and told them to wait, and if he would step on it—”
“Ha!” Wolfe snorted. “I knew it! Your confounded tongue. So that’s it.” He looked at Cramer. “Why have you waited to pounce?” he asked, trying not to sound too contemptuous, for after all Cramer was drinking his beer. “Since Archie has rashly disclosed our little secret, it would be useless for me to try to keep it. That’s what we use the front room for mainly, to keep murderers in. You’re armed, I suppose? Go in and get them. Archie, open the door for him.”
I went to the door to the front room and pulled it open, not too wide. “I’m scared of murderers myself,” I said courteously, “or I’d be glad to help.”
Cramer had a glass half full of beer in his hand, and it may well be that that took the trick. Bullheaded as he was, he might have been capable of getting up and walking over for a look into the room, even though our build-up had convinced him it was empty, not caring how much we would enjoy it or how silly he would look coming out. But the glass of beer complicated it. He would either have to take it with him or reach first to put it down on the little table—or throw it at Wolfe.
“Nuts,” he said and lifted the glass to drink.
I swung the door to carelessly, without bothering to see that it latched, and yawned on the way back to my chair.
“At least,” Wolfe said, rubbing it in, “I can’t be jailed for harboring a fugitive—one of your favorite threats. But I really don’t know what you’re after. If it was those two you’ll get them, of course. What else is there?”
“Nothing but a little more evidence.” Cramer glanced at his wristwatch. “I’ll get down to my office. That’s where I started for, and this was on the way so I thought I’d stop to see what you had to say. We’ll get ’em all right. It don’t pay to kill a cop in this town.” He stood up. “It wouldn’t pay for anyone to hide a cop-killer in their front room, either. Thanks for the beer. I’ll be expecting those affidavits, and in case—”
The phone rang. I swiveled and got it. “Nero Wolfe’s office, Archie Goodwin speaking.”
“Inspector Cramer there?”
I said yes, hold it. “For you,” I told him and moved aside, and he came and took it. He spoke not more than twenty words altogether, between spells of listening. He dropped the phone onto the cradle, growled something about more trouble, and headed for the door.
“Have they found ’em?” I asked his back.
“No.” He didn’t turn. “Someone’s hurt-the Stahl girl.”
I marched after him, thinking the least I could do was cooperate by opening another door for him, but he was there and on out before I caught up, so I about-faced and returned to the office.
Wolfe was standing up, and I wondered why all the exertion, but a glance at the wall clock showed me 3:55, nearly time for his afternoon visit to the plant rooms.
“He said Janet got hurt,” I stated.
Wolfe, finishing the last of his beer, grunted.
“I owe Janet something. Besides, it could mean that Carl and Tina are out of it. We ought to know, and they would like to know. I don’t usually get shaved twice a day, but there’s no law against it. I can be there in ten minutes. Why not?”
“No.” He put the glass down. “We’ll see.”
“I don’t feel like we’ll seeing. I need to do something. I lost ten pounds in ten seconds, standing there holding that doorknob, trying to look as if it would be fun to watch him coming to look in. If it wasn’t for our guests I almost wish he had, just to see what you would do, not to mention me. I’ve got to do something now.”
“There’s nothing to do.” He looked at the clock and moved. “Put those folders back, please?” Halfway to the door he turned. “Disturb me only if it is unavoidable. And admit no more displaced persons to the house. Two at a time is enough.”
“It was you who fed—” I began with feeling, but he was gone. In a moment I heard the sound of his elevator.
I put the folders away and took the beer remains to the kitchen and then went to the front room. Tina, who was lying on the couch, sat up as I entered and saw to her skirt hem. She had nice legs, but my mind was occupied. Carl, on a chair near the foot of the couch, stood up and asked a string of questions with his eyes.
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