Fer-De-Lance

by Rex Stout

  Looking at Anna’s face, I saw we were up against it.

  Wolfe went into the subtleties of contract. He explained several times, using different kinds of words, that a contract between two parties was valid only when they both voluntarily agreed to it. She was under no contract of silence with the murderer because no contract had been made; he had merely sent her money and told her what to do. He had even given her an alternative; she could have burned the money if she had wanted to. She could burn it now. Wolfe opened the drawer of his desk and took out five new twenty-dollar bills and spread them out in front of her.

  “You can burn them now, Miss Fiore. It would be sacrilege, and I would have to leave the room, but Mr. Archie will help you. Burn them, and you may have these to take their place. You understand, I will give you these-here, I lay them on the desk. You still have the money?”

  She nodded.

  “In your stocking?”

  She pulled up her skirt and twisted her leg around and the bump was there.

  Wolfe said, “Take it out.” She unfastened the top of her stocking and reached inside and pulled out the twenties and unfolded them. Then she looked at me and smiled.

  “Here,” Wolfe said, “here are matches. Here is a tray. I shall leave the room and Mr. Archie will help you and give you this new money. Mr. Archie would be very pleased.”

  Wolfe glanced at me, and I said, “Come on, Anna, I know you’ve got a good heart. You knew Mr. Maffei. I was good to you, and you ought to be good to him. We’ll burn it together, huh?”

  I made the mistake of reaching out with my hand, just starting to reach out, and the twenties went back into her sock like a streak of lightning. I said, “Don’t get scared, and don’t be foolish. Nobody will touch your money as long as I’m around. You can burn it yourself; I won’t even help you.”

  She said to me, “I never will.”

  I nodded. “You said that before, but you see it’s different now. Now you have to burn it to get this other money.”

  She shook her head, and what a look she had on her face! She may not have had much of a mind, but what there was of it was all made up. She said, “I don’t have to. I never will. I know, Mr. Archie, you think I’m not very bright. I think that too because everybody says I’m not. But I’m not dumb, I mean I’m not all dumb. This is my money and I never will burn it. I won’t spend it until I can get married. That’s not very dumb.”

  “You’ll never get married if the man kills you the way he killed Mr. Maffei.”

  “He won’t kill me.”

  I thought, by heaven, if he doesn’t I will.

  Wolfe took a new tack. He began trying to trick her. He asked her questions about her parents, her early life, her duties and habits at the Riccis’, her opinions of this and that. She seemed relieved and answered pretty well, but she took her time, especially when he got on to the rooming-house. And the first time he started to edge up on her, by asking something about cleaning Carlo Maffei’s room, she closed up like a clam. He started somewhere else and came around by another way, but the same stone wall shut him off. It was really beautiful of her; I would have admired it if I had had time. Dumb or not, she had it fixed up inside so that something went click when Carlo Maffei’s name or anything associated with him was approached and it worked just as well as Wolfe’s sagacity worked. He didn’t give up. He had take a quiet casual tone, and knowing his incredible patience and endurance I was thinking that after all there was a chance he might wear her down in a couple of weeks.

  The door of the office opened. Fritz was there. He closed the door behind him, and when Wolfe nodded, came over and presented a card on the tray. Wolfe took it and looked at it and I saw his nostrils open a little.

  He said, “A pleasant surprise, Archie,” and handed the card across the desk and I reached and took it. The card said:

  MANUEL KIMBALL

  CHAPTER 15

  I stood up. Wolfe sat a moment silent, his lips pushing out and in, then he said, “Show the gentleman into the front room, Fritz. The hall is so dark I would scarcely recognize his face if I saw him there��� Just a moment. Be sure the blinds are up in the front room; and leave the door to the hall open so there will be plenty of air.” Fritz went out. Wolfe said, his voice a little quieter even than usual, “Thank you, Miss Fiore. You have been very patient and have kept within your rights. Would you mind if Mr. Archie does not take you home? He has work to do. Mr. Fritz is an excellent driver. Archie, will you take Miss Fiore to the kitchen and arrange with Fritz? You might then accompany her to the entrance.”

  I nodded. “I get you. Come on, Anna.”

  She started, too loud, “Can’t Mr. Archie-”

  “Don’t talk. I’ll take you home some other day. Come on.”

  I got her into the kitchen, and explained to Fritz the pleasure that awaited him. I don’t think I had ever really felt sorry for Anna until I saw that Fritz didn’t blush when I told him to take her home. That was terrible. But I left the feeling sorry for later; while Fritz was getting off his apron and his coat and hat on, I was figuring how to handle it.

  I said, “Look here, Anna, let’s have some fun. You said something about getting married, and that made me wonder what kind of a man you’d like to marry. There’s a man sitting in the front room now, I’ll bet he’s just the kind. Very good-looking. As we go out we’ll stop and look through the door at him, and then I’ll go outside with you and you will tell me if he’s the kind. Will you do that?”

  Anna said, “I know the kind-”

  “All right. Don’t talk. I don’t want him to hear your voice, so he won’t know we’re looking at him. Ready, Fritz?”

  We went out. Fritz had followed instructions and left the door open between the hall and the front room, and I steered Anna to the left of the hall so she wouldn’t be too close to the door. Manuel Kimball was in there, a good view, in an armchair, with one knee hanging over the other. Having heard our steps he was looking in our direction, but it was so dark in the hall he couldn’t see much. I had a hand on Anna’s elbow and my eyes on her face as she looked in at Kimball. I let her look a couple of seconds and then eased her toward the entrance where Fritz was holding the door open for us. Outside, I closed the door behind me.

  “Is that the kind you like, Anna?”

  “No. Mr. Archie, if I tell you-”

  “Some other day. That’s the girl. So long��� It won’t matter if lunch is late, Fritz, I’ve an idea we may be late too, and there’ll be no guest.”

  I ducked back in, and went past the open front room door to the office. Wolfe hadn’t moved. I said, “She never saw him before. Or if she did, she could give Lynn Fontanne a furlong start and lope in ahead of her.” He inclined his head. I asked, “Shall I bring him in?” He inclined his head again.

  I went directly through to the front room, by the connecting door. Manuel Kimball got up from his chair and faced around and bowed. I said, “Sorry to keep your waiting. We had a young lady client who thinks we can bring back her husband just by whistling to him, and it’s not that easy. Come this way.”

  Wolfe didn’t feel formal enough to get up, but he kept his hands laced on his belly. As I led Manuel toward him he said, “How do you do, Mr. Kimball. You will forgive me for not rising; I am not rude, merely unwieldy. Be seated.”

  I couldn’t see any signs that Manuel Kimball was suffering with agitation, but he did look concentrated. His black eyes seemed smaller than when I had seen him before, and concerned with something too important to permit of darting around everywhere to see what they could see. He was wiry and neat in a lightweight, finely tailored suit, with a yellow bow tie and yellow gloves in his pocket. He wasn’t bothering with me. After he got into the chair which was still warm from Anna Fiore, his eyes went to Wolfe and stayed there.

  Wolfe asked, “Will you have some beer?”

  He nodded his head. “Thank you.”

  I took the hint. In the kitchen I got a couple of bottles from the ice-
box and a glass from the shelf and fixed up a tray. I made it snappy because I didn’t want to miss anything. I went back with the tray and put it on Wolfe’s desk, and then sat down at my desk and pulled some papers out of a drawer and got things fixed up. Manuel Kimball was talking.

  “��� told me of his visit to your office yesterday. My father and I are on a completely confidential basis. He told me everything you said to him. Why did you say what you did?”

  “Well.” Wolfe pulled out his drawer to get the opener, removed the cap from a bottle and dropped it into the drawer, and filled a glass. He watched the foam a moment, then turned back to Manuel. “In the first place, Mr. Kimball, you say that your father repeated everything to you that I told him. You can hardly know that. So let us be properly selective. Your tone is minatory. What specifically do you wish to berate me for? What did I say to your father that you would rather I had left unsaid?”

  Manuel smiled, and got colder. “Don’t try to twist my words, Mr. Wolfe. I am not expressing my preferences, I am asking you to account for statements that seem to me unwarranted. I have that right, as the son of a man who is getting old. I have never before seen my father frightened, but you have frightened him. You told him that Barstow was killed as a result of borrowing my father’s golf driver.”

  “I did, indeed.”

  “You admit it. I trust that your man there taking this down will include your confession. What you told my father is criminal nonsense. I have never believed the tale of the poisoned needle as regarded Barstow; I believe it less now. What right have you to invent such absurdities and distress, first the whole Barstow family, now my father, with them? Probably it is actionable, my lawyer will know about that. Certainly it is unjustifiable and it must be stopped.”

  “I don’t know.” Wolfe appeared to be considering; as for me, I was handing it to Manuel for being cute enough to get what I was doing in the first five minutes; not many had done that. Wolfe downed a glass of beer and wiped his lips. “I really don’t know. If it is actionable at all, I suppose it could only be through a complaint of libel from the murdered. I don’t suppose you had that in mind?”

  “I have only one thing in mind.” Manuel’s eyes were even smaller. “That it has got to stop.”

  “But, Mr. Kimball,” Wolfe protested. “Give me a chance. You accused me of inventing absurdities. I have invented nothing. The invention, and a most remarkable and original one, even brilliant-and I am careful of words-was another’s; only the discovery was mine. If the inventor were to say to me what you have said, I would put him down for a commendably modest man. No, sir, I did not invent that golf driver.”

  “And no one else did. Where is it?”

  “Alas.” Wolfe turned a hand palm up. “I have yet to see it.”

  “What proof is there that it ever existed?”

  “The needle that it propelled into Barstow’s belly.”

  “Bah. Why from a golf driver? Why on the first tee?”

  “The wasp came from nowhere, and synchronized.”

  “No good, Mr. Wolfe.” Manuel’s intent little black eyes were scornful. “It’s what I said, criminal nonsense. If you have no better proof than that, I repeat, I have a right to demand that you retract. I do so. I have this morning called on Mr. Anderson, the District Attorney at White Plains. He agrees with me. I demand that you see my father and retract and apologize; likewise the Barstows if you have told them. I have reason to suspect that you have.”

  Wolfe shook his head slowly from side to side. After a moment he said regretfully, “It’s too bad, Mr. Kimball.”

  “It is. But you caught the crow, now you can eat it.”

  “No. You misunderstand me. I mean it’s too bad that you are dealing with me. I am perhaps the only man on this hemisphere whom your courage and wit cannot defeat, and by incredibly bad luck you find yourself confronted by me. I am sorry; but just as you have assumed a task suitable for your abilities, I have found one congenial for mine. You will forgive me for wheeling onto your flank, since you have made it impossible for me to meet you frontally. I hardly suppose that you expected your direct attack to gain its feigned objective; you could hardly have had so poor an opinion of me as that. Your true objective must have been concealed, and probably it was the discovery of the nature and extent of the evidence I have so far acquired. But surely you know that, for how else could I have foretold the result of the autopsy?-I beg you, let me finish. Yes, I know when and where and by whom the golf driver was made, I know where the man who made it is now, and I know what results to expect from the advertisement which I inserted in this morning’s newspapers and which you have perhaps seen.”

  Not a muscle on Manuel’s face had stirred, and no change was perceptible in his tone. His eyes kept straight on Wolfe as he said, “If you know all that-I doubt if you do-is that not information for the District Attorney?”

  “Yes. Do you want me to give it to him?”

  “I? I want? Of course, if you have it.”

  “Good.” Wolfe wiggled a finger at him. “I’ll tell you what you do, Mr. Kimball. Do me a favor. On your way home this afternoon stop at Mr. Anderson’s office; tell him what information I have and suggest that he send for it. Now-I am sorry-it is past my lunch hour. May I offer you a compliment? If almost anyone else I have known were in your position I would try to detain him longer on the chance of learning something. With you, I feel that eating my lunch will be more profitable.”

  Manuel was on his feet. “I should tell you, I am going from here to my lawyer. You will hear from him.”

  Wolfe nodded. “Certainly your best move. Obvious, but still the best. Your father would wonder if you did not.”

  Manuel Kimball turned and went. I got up and started after him for the courtesy of the house, but he was out of the front door before I made it.

  I went back to Wolfe. He was leaning back with his eyes closed. I asked loud enough to wake him up, “Did that guy come here to find out if he’d have to go ahead and kill his father during the weekend?”

  He sighed. His eyes opened and he shook his head. “Lunch, Archie.”

  “It won’t be ready for ten minutes. Fritz only got back at one.”

  “The anchovies and celery will divert us.”

  So we went to the dining-room.

  Right there, at that point, the Barstow-Kimball case went dead. At least Wolfe went dead, and that was the case as far as I was concerned. It wasn’t a relapse, he just closed up. While plenty went into him during lunch, of course nothing came out; and when the meal was finished he went to the office and sat. I sat at my desk and caught up with a few things, but there wasn’t much to do, and I kept glancing at Wolfe wondering when he would open up. Although his eyes were closed he must have felt my glances, for all of a sudden he looked at me and said: “Confound it, Archie, cannot paper be made not to rattle?”

  I got up. “All right, I’ll beat it. But damn it, where? Have you lost your tongue?”

  “Anywhere. Go for a walk.”

  “And return?”

  “Any time. It doesn’t matter. Dinner.”

  “Are you waiting for Manuel to bump off his old man?”

  “Go, Archie.”

  It seemed to me that he was rubbing it in, since it was already three-thirty and in another half hour he would himself have left to go up to the plant-rooms. But seeing the mood he was in, I got my hat from the hall and went out.

  I went to a movie to think, and the more I thought the more uncomfortable I got. Manuel Kimball’s visit and his challenge, for that was what it amounted to, darned near succeeded as far as I was concerned. I had been aware that we weren’t quite ready to tell Mrs. Barstow what address to mail the check to, but I hadn’t fully realized how awfully empty our bag was. We had found out some things to our own satisfaction, but we had no more proof that there had been a murder than we had had when we started. Let alone who had done it. But that wasn’t all; the worst was that there was no place to go from there. Granted that
it was Manuel Kimball, how could we tie him up? Find the golf driver. Fat chance. I could see him in his plane flying low over the river or a reservoir, dropping the club out with a chunk of lead wired to the shaft. Trace the poison to him. About the same chance. He had been planning this for years maybe, certainly months; he may even have had the poison with him when he came up with his father from the Argentine; anyway, he could have got it from there at any time-and try and find out. Get him to talk on the telephone with Mrs. Ricci and have her recognize his voice. Sure, that was it; any jury would convict on that without leaving the courtroom.

  I sat in a movie three hours without seeing anything that happened on the screen, and all I got was a headache.

  I never did know what Wolfe was up to that Saturday afternoon and Sunday. Was he just bumping his head against the wall, as I was? Maybe; he wasn’t very sociable. Or was he possibly waiting for Manuel to make a move? But the only move Manuel could have made would have been to kill his father, and then where would we have been? Anderson would have left us out in the cold, and while neither Wolfe nor I would have worn any back for E.D. Kimball we certainly would have done so for the fifty grand. As far as E.D. Kimball was concerned, I figured that by rights he had been killed on June fourth anyway and he might be grateful for two weeks of grace. But Wolfe wasn’t waiting for that; I was sure he didn’t expect it from what he said about Manuel Sunday afternoon. It was then that he opened up and talked a little, but not to much point. He was being philosophic.

  It was raining; it rained all that Sunday. I wrote some letters and went through two Sunday papers and spent a couple of hours on the roof chinning with Horstmann and looking over the plants, but no matter what I did I was in a bad humor. The damn rain never let up once. Not that it would have bothered me if I had had anything to do; I don’t notice rain or shine if I’m out in it busy; but monkeying around that dry dark quiet house all day long with that constant patter outside and never a let up didn’t help my disposition a bit. I was thankful when something happened around five-thirty that I could get good and sore about.