by Rex Stout
In the office, after opening the mail, all I had to pass was time. There was a phone call for Fritz from a fish man, and I listened in, but got no sign that the line was tapped, though of course it was. Hooray for the technicians. Modern science was fixing it so that anybody can do anything but nobody can know what the hell is going on. I got my notebook from a drawer and went through the dope Lon Cohen had given us, considering the possibilities. There were fourteen items altogether, and at least five of them were obviously hopeless. Of the other nine we had made a stab at three and got nothing. That left six, and I sized them up, one by one. I decided that the most promising one, or anyway the least unpromising, concerned a woman who had been fired from a job in the State Department and got it back, and was reaching for the Washington phone book to see if she was listed when the doorbell rang.
Going to the hall for a look through the one-way glass in the front door, I was expecting to see a stranger, and maybe two. The direct approach. Or possibly Morrison. But there was a well-known face and figure on the stoop-Dr Vollmer, whose office is in a house he owns down the block. I went and opened the door and greeted him, and he entered, along with a lot of fresh icy air. Turning from shutting the door, I told him if he was drumming up trade he'd have to try next door, and put out a hand for his hat.
He kept it on. "I've got too much trade as it is, Archie. Everybody's sick. But I've got a message for you, just now on the phone. A man, no name. He said to give it to you personally. You're to be at the Westside Hotel, Room Two-fourteen, on Twenty-third Street, at eleven-thirty or as soon thereafter as you can make it, and you must be sure you're loose."
My brows were up. "Quite a message.
"That's what I thought. He said you would tell me to keep it under my hat."
"Okay, I tell you. That's why you're keeping it on." I looked at my wrist: 10:47. "What else did he say?"
"That's all, just the message, after he asked if I would come and tell you personally."
"Room Two-fourteen, Westside Hotel."
"That's right."
"What kind of a voice?"
"No particular kind, nothing distinctive, neither high nor low. Just a normal man's voice."
"All right, Doc, many thanks. We need another favor if you can spare it. We're on an operation that's a little tricky, and you were probably seen. It's possible that someone will want to know why you called. If anybody asks, you might-"
"I'll say you phoned and asked me to come and look at your throat."
"No. Wrong twice. He'll know there's nothing wrong with my throat, and he'll know I didn't phone. Our line is tapped. The trouble is that if someone gets the notion that we get confidential messages through you, your line will be tapped."
"My God. But that's illegal!"
"That makes it more fun. If anybody asks, you might be indignant and say it's none of his damned business, or you might be obliging and say you came to take Fritz's blood pressure-no, you haven't got the gadget. You came-"
"I came to get his recipe for escargots bourguignonne. I like that better, nonprofessional." He moved to the door. "My word, Archie, it certainly is tricky."
I agreed and thanked him again, and he said to give his regards to Wolfe. When I closed the door after him I didn't bother to slide the bolt since I would soon be leaving. I went to the kitchen and told Fritz he had just given the recipe for escargots bourguignonne to Dr Vollmer, and then to the office and buzzed the plant rooms on the house phone. I refused to believe they could tap a house phone. Wolfe answered, and I told him. He grunted and asked, "Have you any notion?"
"Not the vaguest. Not the FBI. Why would they? It could be that quote some prick may have stirred someone end of quote. Evers or Miss Fenster or even Muller. Any instructions?"
He said pfui and hung up, and I admit I had asked for it.
There would be the problem of spotting a tail and shaking it, and that can take time, so I would have to get help if I wanted to be punctual for the appointment. Also I should be prepared for the remote possibility that Ernst Muller was sensitive about having his arm twisted and was intending to return the compliment, so I got the shoulder holster from the drawer and put it on, and the Marley.38, and loaded it. But another kind of ammunition might be needed, and I opened the safe and got a grand in used tens and twenties from the cash reserve. Of course there were other conceivables, such as that I was going to have my picture taken in a room with a naked female or a corpse or God knew what, but I would have to dive off of that bridge when I came to it.
It was one minute to eleven when I left the house. With no glance around, I walked to the drugstore at the corner of Ninth Avenue, entered, went to the phone booth, and dialed the number of the garage on Tenth Avenue which houses the Heron sedan that Wolfe owns and I drive. Tom Halloran, who had been there for ten years, didn't answer, but after a wait I got him and explained the program, and he said he would be ready in five minutes. Thinking it would be better to give him ten, I looked over the rack of paperbacks awhile before leaving. Heading back on Thirty-fifth Street, I went on past the brownstone, turned right at Tenth Avenue, entered the garage office, went on through, and crossed to a Ford sedan standing there with the engine running. Tom was in front behind the wheel. I climbed in the back, took my hat off and curled up on the floor, clear down, and the car moved.
There may be leg room in that Ford model, but there's not body room for a six-footer who is not an expert contortionist, and I suffered. After five minutes of it I began to suspect that Tom was jerking to stops and around corners just to see how tough I was, but I was stuck, in more ways than one. My ribs were about to give and my legs were going numb when he stopped for the sixth time and his voice came. "All right, pal. All clear."
"Damn it, get a crowbar."
He laughed. I worked my head and shoulders up, got a grip on the rim of the seat back, somehow made it, and put my hat on.
We were at Twenty-third Street and Ninth Avenue. "How sure are you?" I asked him.
"Posilutely. Not a chance."
"Wonderful. But the next time use an ambulance. You'll find a piece of my ear in the corner. Keep it to remember me by."
I got out. He asked if there was anything more, and I said no and I would thank him later, and he rolled.
The Westside Hotel, in the middle of the block, was not exactly a dump, though many people would call it that. Evidently it was still in the black, since it had put on a new front and redone the lobby a couple of years back. Entering and ignoring everybody and everything, including a bald bellhop, I went to the do-it-yourself elevator, pushed the button, and was lifted. As I emerged and went to the nearest door to look at the number I noticed that my hand had slipped inside my coat to touch the Marley, and grinned at myself. If it was J. Edgar Hoover waiting for me, apparently he had better behave or he might get plugged. At Room 214, halfway down the hall on the left, the door was closed. My watch said 11:33. I knocked, and heard footsteps, and the door opened; and I stood and gawked. I was looking at the round red face and burly figure of Inspector Cramer of Homicide South.
"Right on time," he growled. "Come in." He sidestepped, and I crossed the sill.
My eyes have been trained so long to notice things that they took in the room automatically-the double bed, dresser with a mirror, two chairs, table with a desk pad that needed changing, open door to a bathroom-while my mind adjusted to the shock. Then, as I put my coat and hat on the bed, I got another shock: one of the chairs, the one without arms, was near the table, and on the table was a carton of milk and a glass. By God, he had bought it and brought it for his guest. I don't blame you if you don't believe it. I didn't, but there it was.
He went to the other chair, the one with arms, sat, and asked, "Are you loose?"
"Sure. I always obey instructions."
"Sit down."
I went to the other chair. He leveled his gray eyes at me. "Is Wolfe's phone tapped?"
My eyes were meeting his. "Look," I said, "you know damn well ho
w it is. If I had listed a hundred names of people who might be here, yours wouldn't have been on it. Is this carton of milk for me?"
"Yes."
"Then you're off your hinges. You are not the Inspector Cramer I know so well, and I don't know what I'm up against. Why do you want to know if our phone is tapped?"
"Because I don't like to make things more complicated than they are already. I like things simple. I'd like to know if I could just have called you and asked you to come here."
"Oh. Sure you could, but if you had I would have suggested that it might be better if we went for a ride."
He nodded. "All right. I want to know, Goodwin. I know Wolfe has tangled with the FBI, and I want the picture. All of it. If it takes all day."
I shook my head. "That's out of bounds and you know it."
He exploded. "Goddammit, this is out of bounds! My being here! My getting you here! I thought you had some sense! Don't you realize what I'm doing?"
"No. I haven't the slightest idea what you're doing."
"Then I'll tell you. I know you pretty well, Goodwin. I know you and Wolfe cut corners, I ought to, but I also know what your limits are. So here, just you and me, I'll tell you. About two hours ago the Commissioner called me. He had had a call from Jim Perazzo-do you know who Jim Perazzo is?"
"Yeah, I happen to. Licensing Services, State Department, State of New York. Two-seventy Broadway."
"You would. I won't string it out. The FBI wants Perazzo to take Wolfe's license, and yours. Perazzo wants the Commissioner to give him whatever we've got on you. The Commissioner knows that for years I have had-uh-contacts with you, and he wants a full report, in writing. You know what reports are, it depends on who's writing them. Before I write this one I want to know what Wolfe has done or is doing to get the FBI on his neck. I want the whole picture."
When you are shown something that needs a good look it helps to have your hands doing something, like lighting a cigarette, but I don't smoke, or blowing your nose. I picked up the carton of milk, pried the flap open, and poured, carefully. One thing was obvious. He could have either phoned me to come to his office, or have come to Wolfe's house, but he hadn't because he suspected that our line was tapped and the house was watched. Therefore he didn't want the FBI to know that he was making contact, and he had gone to a lot of trouble to make it. He was telling me about the FBI and Perazzo and the Commissioner, which was ridiculous for a police inspector talking to a private detective. Therefore he didn't want us to lose our licenses, and therefore something was biting him, and it was desirable to find out what it was. In such a situation, before spilling it, especially to a cop, I should ring Wolfe and put it up to him, but that was out. My standing instructions were that in any emergency I was to use my intelligence guided by experience.
I did so. I sipped some milk, put the glass down, and said, "If you can break a rule so can I. It's like this."
I gave him the whole crop-the talk with Mrs Bruner, the hundred-grand retainer, the evening with Lon Cohen, my talk with Mrs Bruner and Sarah Dacos, my day on Evers Electronics and Ernst Muller and Julia Fenster, my sleeping on the couch in the office. I didn't report it all verbatim, but I covered all the points and answered questions along the way. By the time I finished the milk glass was empty and he had a cigar between his teeth. He doesn't smoke cigars, he merely mangles them.
He removed the cigar and said, "So the hundred grand is his, no matter what happens."
I nodded. "And a check for me, personally. Didn't I mention that?"
"You did. I'm not surprised at Wolfe. With his ego, there's no one and nothing he wouldn't take on if you paid him. But I'm surprised at you. You know damn well the FBI can't be bucked. Not even by the White House. And you're hopping around pecking at people's scabs. You're asking for it and you'll get it. You're off your hinges."
I poured milk. "You're absolutely right," I said. "From any angle, you're dead right. An hour ago I would have said amen. But you know, I feel different about it now. Did I mention something Mr Wolfe said last night? He said some sting may have stirred someone to action. All right, they were stung into needling Perazzo, and he was stung into calling the Commissioner, and he was stung into calling you, and you were stung into getting me here without company and treating me to a quart of milk, which is completely incredible. If one incredible thing can happen, so can another one. Will you answer a question?"
"Ask it."
"You don't exactly love Nero Wolfe, and you certainly don't love me. Why do you want to make a report to the Commissioner that will make it tough to take our licenses?"
"I haven't said I do."
"Nuts." I tapped the milk carton. "This says it. Getting me here the way you did says it. Why?"
He left the chair and moved. He tiptoed to the door, smooth and silent considering his age and bulk, jerked the door open, and stuck his head out. Evidently he wasn't as sure he was loose as I was that I was. He shut the door and went to the bathroom, and I heard water spurting from a faucet, and in a minute he came with a glass of water. He drank it, in no hurry, put the glass on the table, sat, and narrowed his eyes at me.
"I've been a cop for thirty-six years," he said, "and this is the first time I've ever passed the buck to an outsider."
I had my eyes smile a little. "I'm flattered. Or Mr Wolfe is."
"Balls. He wouldn't know flattery if it had labels pasted all over it, and neither would you. Goodwin, I'm going to tell you something that's for you and Wolfe, and that's all. No Lou Cohen or Saul Panzer or Lily Rowan. Is that understood?"
"I don't know why you drag in Miss Rowan, she's merely a personal friend. And there's no point in telling me something if we can't use it."
"You'll use it all right. But it did not come from me. Never, to anybody."
"Okay. Mr Wolfe isn't here to cinch it by giving you his word of honor, so I'll do it for him. For us. Our word of honor."
"That'll have to do. You won't have to take notes, with your tape-recorder memory. Does the name Morris Althaus mean anything to you?" He spelled it.
I nodded. "I read the papers. One that you haven't cracked. Shot. In the chest. Late November. No gun."
"Friday night, November twentieth. The body was found the next morning by a cleaning woman. Died between eight p.m. Friday and three a.m. Saturday. One shot, in at his chest and through the middle of his pump and on out at the back, denting a rib. The bullet went on and hit the wall forty-nine inches above the floor, but it was spent and only nicked it. He was on his back, legs stretched out, left arm straight at his side and right arm crossing his chest. Dressed but no jacket, in his shirtsleeves. No disorder, no sign of a struggle. As you said, no gun. Am I going too fast?"
"No."
"Stop me if you have questions. It was the living room of his apartment on the third floor at Sixty-three Arbor Street-two rooms, kitchenette, and bath. He had been living there three years, alone, single, thirty-six years old. He was a free-lance writer, and in the last four years he had done seven articles for Tick-Tock magazine. He was going to be married in March to a girl named Marian Hinckley, twenty-four, on the staff of Tick-Tock. Of course I could go on. I could have brought the file. But there's nothing in it about his movements or connections or associates that would help. It hasn't helped us."
"You left out a little detail, the caliber of the bullet."
"I didn't leave it out. There was no bullet. It wasn't there."
My eyes widened. "Well. A damned neat murderer."
"Yeah. Neat and coolheaded. Judging from the wound, it was a thirty-eight or bigger. Now two facts. One: for three weeks Althaus had been collecting material for an article on the FBI for Tick-Tock magazine, and not a sign of it, nothing, was there in the apartment. Two: about eleven o'clock that Friday night three FBI men left the house at Sixty-three Arbor Street and went around the corner to a car and drove off."
I sat and looked at him. There are various reasons for keeping your mouth shut, but the best one is that you have no
thing to say.
"So they killed him," Cramer said. "Did they go there to kill him? Certainly not. There are several ways to figure it. The one I like best is that they rang his number and he wasn't answering the phone, so they thought he was out. They went and rang his bell and he wasn't answering that either, so they opened the door and went in for a bag job. He pulled a gun, and one of them shot before he did. They train them good in that basement in Washington. They looked for what they wanted and got it and left, taking the bullet because it was from one of their guns."
I was listening. I never listened better. I asked, "Did he have a gun?"
"Yes. S and W thirty-eight. He had a permit. It wasn't there. They took it, you'd have to ask them why. There was a box of cartridges, nearly full, in a drawer."
I sat and looked some more, then said, "So you have cracked it. Congratulations."
"You'd clown in the hot seat, Goodwin. Do I have to describe it?"
"No. But, after all- Who saw them?"
He shook his head. "I'll give you everything but that. He couldn't help you anyway. He saw them leave the house and go to the car and drive off, and he got the license number. That's how we know and all we know. We're hogtied. Even if we could name them, where would that get us? I've seen plenty of murderers I could name, but so what, if I couldn't prove it. But this one, that goddam outfit, I'd give a year's pay to hook them and make it stick. This isn't their town, it's mine. Ours. The New York Police Department. They've had us gritting our teeth for years. Now, by God, they think they can break and enter people's houses and commit homicide in my territory, and laugh at me!"
"Did they? Laugh?"
"Yes. I went to Sixty-ninth Street myself and saw Wragg. I told him that of course they had known that Althaus was collecting material for a piece, and maybe they had had a stake-out on him the night he was killed, and if so I would appreciate some cooperation. He said he would like to help if he could, but they had too many important things to do to bother about a hack muckraker. I didn't tell him they had been seen. He would have laughed."