by Rex Stout
“I’m not sure I follow you, Mr. Cramer. Connection between what?”
“Like hell you don’t follow me! Between whatever Jarrell hired you for and the murder!”
Wolfe nodded. “I assumed you meant that, but I am wary of assumptions. You should be too. You are assuming that Mr. Jarrell hired me. Have you grounds for that? Isn’t it possible that someone else hired me, and I imposed Mr. Goodwin on Mr. Jarrell’s household to get information for my client?”
That settled it. Ever since I had opened the door a crack and got Cramer’s message for Wolfe, I had been thinking that Wolfe would probably decide that the cat was too scratchy to hang on to, and would let Cramer take it, but not now. Jarrell’s gun would not be mentioned. The temptation to teach Cramer to be wary of assumptions had been irresistible.
Cramer was staring. “By God,” he said. “Who’s your client? No. I’d never pry that out of you. But you can tell me this: was Eber your client?”
“No, sir.”
“Then is it Jarrell or isn’t it? Is Jarrell your client?”
Wolfe was having a picnic. “Mr. Cramer. I am aware that if I have information relevant to the crime you’re investigating I am bound to give it to you; but its relevance may be established, not by your whim or conjecture, but by an acceptable process of reason. Since you don’t know what information I have, and I do, you can’t apply that process and it must be left to me. My conclusion is that I have nothing to tell you. I have answered your one question that was clearly relevant, whether Mr. Eber was my client. You will of course ask Mr. Jarrell if he is my client, telling him his secretary is my confidential assistant, Archie Goodwin; I can’t prevent that. I’m sorry you gave yourself the trouble of coming, but your time hasn’t been entirely wasted; you have learned that I wasn’t working for Mr. Eber.”
Cramer looked at me, probably because, for one thing, if he had gone on looking at Wolfe he would have had to get his hands on him; and for another, there was the question whether I might possibly disagree with the conclusion Wolfe had reached through an acceptable process of reason. I met his look with a friendly grin which I hoped wouldn’t strike him as sarcastic.
He put the cigar in his mouth and closed his teeth on it, got up, risked another look at Wolfe, not prolonged, turned, and tramped out. I stayed put long enough for him to make it down the hall, then went to see if he had been sore enough to try the old Finnegan on us. He hadn’t; he was out, pulling the door shut as he went.
As I stepped back into the office Wolfe snapped at me, “Get Mr. Jarrell.”
“The assistant DA is probably still with him.”
“No matter, get him.”
I went to my desk, dialed, got Nora Kent, and told her that Mr. Wolfe wished to speak to Mr. Jarrell. She said he was engaged and would call back, and I said the sooner the better because it was urgent. Say two minutes. It wasn’t much more than that before the ring came, and Jarrell was on, and Wolfe got at his phone. I stayed at mine.
Jarrell said he had gone to another phone because two men from the district attorney’s office were with him, and Wolfe asked, “Have they mentioned Mr. Goodwin or me?”
“No, why should they?”
“They might have. Inspector Cramer of the Homicide Squad was here and just left. The entrance to your address is under surveillance and Mr. Goodwin was recognized when he came out this morning, and it has been learned that he has been there as your secretary since Monday, with Alan Green as his name. Mr. Goodwin told you what would happen if that were disclosed, and it has happened. I gave Mr. Cramer no information whatever except that Mr. Eber was not my client. Of course you-”
“Did you tell him what I hired you for?”
“You’re not listening. I said I gave him no information whatever. I didn’t even tell him that you hired me, let alone what for. Of course they’ll be at you immediately, since they know about Mr. Goodwin. I suggest that you reflect on the situation with care. Whatever you tell them, do not fail to inform me at once. If you admit that you hired me-”
“What the hell, I’ve got to admit it! You say they know about Goodwin!”
“So they do. But I mentioned to Mr. Cramer the possibility that someone else hired me to send Goodwin there to spy on you. Merely as a possibility. Please understand that I told him nothing.”
“I see.” Silence. “I’ll be damned.” Silence. “I’ll have to think it over and decide what to say.”
“You will indeed. It will probably be best for you to tell them that you hired me on a personal and confidential matter, and leave it at that. But on one point, between you and me, there must be no ambiguity. I am free to disclose what I know about your gun, and its disappearance, at any moment that I think is necessary or desirable. You understand that.”
“That’s not the way you put it. You said you’d have to report it if the possibility that my gun was used to kill Eber became a probability.”
“Yes, but the decision rests with me. I am risking embarrassment and so is Mr. Goodwin. We don’t want to lose our licenses. It would have been prudent to tell Mr. Cramer when he was here, but he provoked me.”
He hung up and glared at me as if I had done the provoking.
I hung up and glared back. “License my eye,” I told him. “We’re risking eating on the State of New York for one to ten years with time off for good behavior.”
“Do you challenge me?” he demanded. “You were present. You have a tongue, heaven knows. Would you have loosened it if I hadn’t been here?”
“No,” I admitted. “He goes against the grain. He has bad manners. He lacks polish. Look at you for contrast. You are courteous, gracious, tactful, eager to please. What now? I left up there to be out of the way when company came, but now they’re on to me. Do I go back?”
He said no, not until we heard further from Jarrell, and I went to the front room to tell Orrie to come and get on with the day’s work, and then returned to the couch and the Times.
Chapter 10
THE OTHER DAY I looked up “moot” in the dictionary. The murderer of James L. Eber had just been convicted, and, discussing it, Wolfe and I had got onto the question of whether or not a life would have been saved if he had told Cramer that Saturday morning about Jarrell’s gun, and he had said it was moot, and, though I thought I knew the word well enough, I went to the dictionary to check. In spite of the fact that I had taken a position just to give the discussion some spirit, I had to agree with him on that. It was moot all right, and it still is.
The thirty hours from noon Saturday until six o’clock Sunday afternoon were not without events, since even a yawn is an event, but nobody seemed to be getting anywhere, least of all me. Soon after lunch Saturday, at Wolfe’s table with him and Orrie, Jarrell phoned to tell us the score. Cramer had gone straight there from our place to join the gathering in the library. Presumably he hadn’t started barking, since even an inspector doesn’t bark at an Otis Jarrell unless he has to, but he had had questions to which he intended to get answers. Actually he had got only one answered: had Jarrell hired Nero Wolfe to do something? Yes. Plus its rider: had Archie Goodwin, alias Alan Green, come as Jarrell’s secretary to do the something Wolfe had been hired for, or to help do it? Yes. That was all. Jarrell had told them that the something was a personal and confidential matter, with no bearing on their investigation, and that therefore they could forget it.
It was a cinch Cramer wouldn’t forget it, but evidently he decided that for the present he might as well lump it, for there wasn’t a peep out of him during those thirty hours.
I could see no point in Alan Green’s getting back into the picture, and apparently Jarrell couldn’t either, for he also reported that Alan Green was no more. He was telling the family, and also Corey Brigham, who I was and why, but was leaving the why vague. He had engaged the services of Nero Wolfe on a business matter, and Wolfe had sent me there to collect some facts he needed. He was also telling them I wouldn’t be back, but on that Wolfe balked. I was going b
ack, and I was staying until further notice. When Jarrell asked what for, Wolfe said to collect facts. When Jarrell asked what facts, Wolfe said facts that he needed. Jarrell, knowing that if I wasn’t let in he would soon be letting Cramer in to ask about a gun, had to take it. When Wolfe had hung up and pushed his phone back I asked him to give me a list of the facts he needed.
“How the devil can I,” he demanded, “when I don’t know what they are? If something happens I want you there, and with you there it’s more likely to happen. Now that they know who you are, you are a threat, a pinch at their nerves, at least for one of them, and he may be impelled to act.”
Since it was May it might have been expected that at least some of them would be leaving town for what was left of the week end, and they probably would have if their nerves weren’t being pinched. Perhaps Jarrell had told them to stick around; anyway, they were all at the dinner table Saturday. Their attitude toward me, with my own name back, varied. Roger Foote thought it was a hell of a good joke, his asking Wolfe to investigate my past; he couldn’t get over it, and didn’t. Trella not only couldn’t see the joke; she couldn’t see me. Her cooing days were over as far as I was concerned. Wyman didn’t visibly react one way or another. Susan went out of her way to indicate that she still regarded me as human. In the lounge at cocktail time she actually came up to me as I was mixing a Bloody Mary for Lois, and said she hoped she wouldn’t forget and call me Mr. Green.
“I’m afraid,” she added, almost smiling, “that my brain should have more cells. It put you and that name, Alan Green, in a cell together, and now it doesn’t know what to do.”
I told her it didn’t matter what she called me as long as it began with G. I hadn’t forgotten that she was supposed to be a snake, or that she had been the only one to bid me welcome, or that she had pulled me halfway across a room on an invisible string. That hadn’t happened again, but once was enough. I didn’t have her tagged yet, not by any means. As a matter of fact, I was a little surprised to see her and Wyman still there, since Jarrell had accused her of swiping his gun before witnesses. Maybe, I thought, they were staying on just to get that detail settled. Her little mouth in her little oval face could have found it hard to smile, not because it was shy but because it was stubborn.
I had supposed there would be bridge after dinner, but no. Jarrell and Trella had tickets for a show, and Wyman and Susan for another show. Nora Kent was going out, destination unspecified. Roger Foote suggested gin for an hour or so, saying that he had to turn in early because he was going to get up at six in the morning to go to Belmont. I asked what for, since there was no racing on Sunday, and he said he had to go and look at the horses. Declining his gin invitation, I approached Lois. There was no point in my staying in for the evening, since there would be no one there to have their nerves pinched except Roger, and he was soon going to bed, so I told Lois that now that my name was changed it would be both possible and agreeable to take her to the Flamingo Club. She may have had no plans because her week end had been upset, or she may have had plans but took pity on me, or my charm may simply have been too much for her. Anyhow, we went, and got home around two o’clock.
On Sunday it looked at first as if I might do fairly well as a threat. Four of them were at breakfast with me-Wyman, Susan, Lois, and Nora. Jarrell had already had his and gone out somewhere, Roger had gone to look at horses, and I gathered that Trella wasn’t up yet. But the future didn’t look promising. Nora was going to church and then to the Picasso show at the Modern Museum, apparently to spend the day. Susan was going to church. Wyman went to the side terrace with an armload of Sunday papers. So when Lois said she was going for a walk I said I was too and which way should I head, away from her or with her? She said we could try with and see how it worked. I found that she wouldn’t walk in the park, probably on account of squirrels, so we kept to the avenues, Madison and Park. After half an hour she took a taxi to go to have lunch with friends, not named. I was invited to come along, but thought I had better go and see if there was anyone around to be threatened. On the way back I phoned Wolfe to tell him what had happened: nothing. In the reception hall, Steck told me Jarrell wanted me in the library.
He thought he had news, but I wasn’t impressed. He had spent an hour at the Penguin Club with an old friend, or at least an old acquaintance, Police Commissioner Kelly, and had been assured that while the district attorney and the police would do their utmost to bring the murderer of Jarrell’s former secretary to the bar of justice, there would be no officious prying into Jarrell’s private affairs. Respectable citizens deserved to be treated with respect, and would be. Jarrell said he was going to ring Wolfe to tell him about it, and I said that would be fine. I didn’t add that Wolfe would be even less impressed than I was. Officious prying would be no name for it if and when they learned about Jarrell’s gun.
Having bought a newspaper of my own on the way back, I went to the lounge with it, finding no one there, and caught up with the world, including the latest non-news on the Eber murder. There was no mention of the startling fact that Otis Jarrell’s new secretary had turned out to be no other than Nero Wolfe’s man Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, the celebrated detective, Archie Goodwin. Evidently Cramer and the DA weren’t going to give us any free publicity until and unless we were involved in murder, a typical small-minded attitude of small men, and it was up to Wolfe’s public-relations department, namely me, to do something about it; and besides, I owed Lon Cohen a bone. So I went up to my room and phoned him, and wished I hadn’t, since he tried to insist on a hunk of meat with it. I had no sooner hung up than a ring called me to the green phone. It was Assistant District Attorney Mandelbaum, who invited me to appear at his office at three o’clock that afternoon for a little informal chat. I told him I would be delighted, and went down to get some oats, having been informed by Steck that lunch would be at one-thirty.
Lunch wasn’t very gay, since there were only three of them there-Jarrell, Wyman, and Susan. Susan said maybe thirty words altogether, as for instance, “Will you have cream, Mr. Goodwin?” When I announced that I would have to leave at two-thirty for an appointment at the district attorney’s office, thinking that might pinch a nerve, Wyman merely used a thumb and forefinger to pinch his thin straight nose, whether or not meant as a vulgar insult I couldn’t say, and Susan merely said that she supposed talking with an assistant district attorney was nothing for a detective but she would be frightened out of her wits. Jarrell said nothing then, but when we left the table he took me aside and wanted to know. I told him that since the police commissioner had promised that there would be no officious prying into his private affairs there was no problem. I would just tell Mandelbaum that I was part of Mr. Jarrell’s private affairs and therefore a clam.
Which I did. Having stopped on the way to phone Wolfe because he always likes to know where I am, I was a little late, arriving in the anteroom at 3:02 p.m., and then I was kept waiting exactly one hour and seventeen minutes. Taken in to Mandelbaum at 4:19, I was in no mood to tell him anything whatever except that he was a little balder and a little plumper than when I had last seen him, but he surprised me. I had expected him to try to bulldoze me, or sugar me, into spilling something about my assignment at Jarrell’s, but he didn’t touch on that at all. Apparently Jarrell’s session with the commissioner had had some effect. After apologizing for keeping me waiting, Mandelbaum wanted to know what I had seen and heard when I entered the studio at noon on Wednesday and found James L. Eber there with Mrs. Wyman Jarrell. Also whether I had seen Eber with anyone else or had heard anyone say anything about him.
Since that was about Eber and his movements and contacts the day before he was killed, I couldn’t very well say that I concluded by an acceptable process of reasoning that it was irrelevant, so I obliged. I even gave him verbatim the words that had passed among Eber and Susan and me. He spent some time trying to get me to remember other words, comments that had been made in my hearing ab
out Eber and his appearance there that day, but on that I passed. I had heard a few, chiefly at the lunch table, and had reported them to Wolfe, but none of them had indicated any desire or intention to kill him, and I saw no point in supplying them for the record.
It was for the record. A stenographer was present, and after Mandelbaum finished with me I had another wait while a statement was typed for me to sign. Reading it, I could find nothing that needed changing, so I signed it “Archie Goodwin, alias Alan Green.” I thought that might as well be on record too.
Back at my threatening base at twenty minutes to six, I found that bridge was under way in the lounge, but only one table: Jarrell, Trella, Wyman, and Nora. Steck informed me, when asked, that neither Lois nor Roger had returned, and that Mrs. Wyman Jarrell was in the studio. Proceeding down the corridor and finding the studio door open, I entered.
The only light was from the corridor and the television screen. Susan was in the same chair as before, in the same spot. Since she was concentrating on the screen, with the discussion panel, “We’re Asking You,” it wasn’t much of a setup from a professional standpoint, but personally it might be interesting. The conditions were precisely the same as formerly, and I wanted to see. If I felt another trace coming on I could make a dash for the door and safety. Not to cut her view of the screen, I circled behind her chair and took the one on the other side.
I would have liked to look at her, her profile, instead of the screen, giving her magic every chance, but she might have misunderstood, so I kept my eyes on “We’re Asking You” clear to the end. I didn’t learn much. They were asking what to do about extra-bright children, and since I didn’t have any and intended to stay as far away as I could from those I had seen and heard on TV and in the movies, I wasn’t concerned.