Rex Stout

Home to Roost

I

“Our nephew Arthur was the romantic type,” said Mrs. Benjamin Rackell with the least possible movement of her thin tight lips. “He thought being a Communist was romantic.”

Nero Wolfe, behind his desk in his outsized chair that thought nothing of his seventh of a ton, scowled at her. I, at my own desk with a notebook and pen, permitted myself a private grin, not unsympathetic. Wolfe was controlling himself under severe provocation. The appointment for Mr. Rackell to call at Wolfe’s office on the ground floor of his old brownstone house on West Thirty-fifth Street, at six p.m., had been made by phone by a secretary in the office of the Rackell Importing Company, and nothing had been said about a wife coming along. And the wife, no treat as a spectacle to begin with, was an interrupter and a cliché tosser, enough to make Wolfe scowl at any man, let alone a woman.

“But,” he objected, not too caustic, “you say that he was not a Communist, that, on the contrary, he was acting for the FBI when he joined the Communist party.”

He would have loved to tell her to get lost. But his house had five stories, counting the basement and the plant rooms full of orchids on the roof, and there was Fritz the chef and Theodore the botanist and me, Archie Goodwin, the fairly confidential assistant, with nothing to carry the load but his income as a private detective; and the Rackell check for three thousand bucks, offered as a retainer, was under a paperweight on his desk.

“That’s just it,” Mrs. Rackell said impatiently. “Isn’t it romantic to work for the FBI? But that wasn’t why he did it; he did it to serve his country, and that’s why they killed him. His being the romantic type had nothing to do with it.”

Wolfe made a face and undertook to bypass her. His eyes went to Rackell. She would probably have called her husband the stubby type, with his short arms and legs, but he was no runt. His trunk was long and broad and his head long and narrow. His eyes pointed down at the corners, and so did his mouth, making him look mournful.

Wolfe asked him, “Have you spoken with the FBI, Mr. Rackell?”

But the wife answered. “No, he hasn’t,” she said. “I went myself yesterday, and I never heard anything to equal it. They wouldn’t tell me a single thing. They wouldn’t even admit Arthur was working for them as a spy for his country! They said it was a matter for the New York police and I should talk to them — as if I hadn’t!”

“I told you, Pauline,” Rackell said mildly but not timidly, “that the FBI won’t tell people things. And the police won’t either, not when it’s murder, and especially when the Communists come into it. That’s why I insisted on coming to Nero Wolfe to find out what’s going on. If the FBI doesn’t want it known that Arthur was with them, even if it means not getting his murderer, what else can you expect?”

“I expect justice!” Mrs. Rackell declared, her lips actually moving visibly.

I gave it a line to itself in the notebook.

Wolfe was frowning at Rackell. “There seems to be some confusion. I understood that you want a murder investigated. Now you say you came to me to find out what’s going on. If you mean you want me to investigate the police and the FBI, that’s too big a bite.”

“I didn’t say that,” Rackell protested.

“No, but clear it up. What do you want?”

Rackell’s down-pointing eyes looked even mournfuller. “We want facts,” he declared. “I think the police and the FBI are quite capable of sacrificing the rights of a private citizen to what they consider the public interest. Our nephew was murdered, and my wife had a right to ask them what line they’re proceeding on, and they wouldn’t tell her. I don’t intend to just let it go at that. Is this a democracy or isn’t it? I’m not—”

“No!” the wife snapped. “It’s not a democracy, it’s a republic.”

“I suggest,” said Wolfe, exasperated, “that I recapitulate to see if I have it straight. I’ll combine what I have read in the papers with what you have told me.” He focused on the wife, probably figuring that she would be less apt to cut in if he held her eye. “Arthur Rackell, your husband’s orphaned nephew, was a fairly efficient employee of his importing business, drawing a good salary, living at your home here in New York, on Sixty-eighth Street. Some three years ago you noted that he was taking a radically leftist position in discussions of political and social questions, and you remonstrated without effect. As time passed he became more leftist and more outspoken, until his opinions and arguments were identical with the Communist line. You, both you and your husband, argued with him and entreated him, but—”

“I did,” Mrs. Rackell snapped. “My husband didn’t.”

“Now, Pauline,” Rackell protested. “I argued with him some.” He looked at Wolfe. “I didn’t entreat him because I didn’t think I had a right to. I don’t believe in entreating people about their convictions. I was paying him a salary and I didn’t want him to think he had to—” The importer fluttered a hand. “I liked Arthur, and he was my brother’s son.”

“In any case,” Wolfe went on brusquely, still at the wife, “he did not change. He stubbornly adhered to the Communist position. He applauded the Communist attack in Korea and denounced the action of the United Nations. You finally found it insufferable and gave him an ultimatum: either he would abandon his outrageous—”

“Not an ultimatum,” Mrs. Rackell corrected. “My husband refused to permit it. I merely—”

Wolfe outspoke her. “At least you made it plain that you had had enough and he was no longer welcome in your home. You must have made it fairly strong, since he was moved to disclose an extremely tight secret: that he had been persuaded by the FBI, back in nineteen forty-eight, to join the Communist party for the purpose of espionage. No easy admonition would have dragged that out of him, surely.”

“I didn’t say it was easy. I told him—” She stopped, and the thin lips really did tighten. She relaxed them enough to let words out. “I think he thought he would lose his job, and he was well paid. Much more than he earned, the amount of work he did.”

Wolfe nodded. “Anyhow, he told you his secret, and you promised to keep it, becoming a confederate. Privately admiring him, with others you had to pretend to maintain your condemnation. You told your husband and no one else. That was about a week ago, you say?”

“Yes.”

“And Saturday evening, three days ago, your nephew was murdered. Now to that. You have added little to what the papers have carried, but let’s see. He left the apartment, your home, and took a taxi to Chezar’s restaurant, where he had a dinner engagement He had invited three women and two men to dine with him, and they were all there when he arrived, in the bar. When your nephew came they went with him to the table he had reserved and had cocktails. He took a small metal box from—”

“Gold.”

“Gold is a metal, madam. He took it from a pocket, his side coat pocket, put it on the table, and left it there while he conferred with the waiter. There was conversation. When plates and rolls and butter were brought, the pillbox got pushed around. It was on the table altogether some ten or twelve minutes. When hors d’oeuvres were served, your nephew started to eat, remembered the pillbox, found it behind the basket of rolls, got from it a vitamin capsule, swallowed the capsule with a sip of water, and began on his hors d’oeuvres. Six or seven minutes later he suddenly cried out, sprang to his feet, overturning his chair, made convulsive gestures, became rigid, collapsed and crumpled to the floor, and died. A doctor arrived shortly, but he was already dead. It has been found that two other capsules in the metal box, similar in appearance to the one he took, contained what they were supposed to and were harmless; but your nephew had swallowed potassium cyanide. He was murdered by replacing a vitamin capsule with a capsule filled with poison.”

“Certainly. That’s what—”

“I’ll go on, please. You were and are convinced that the substitution was made by one of his dinner companions who is a Communist and who learned that your nephew was acting for the FBI, and you so informed Inspector Cramer of the police. You were not satisfied with his acceptance of that information, especially in a subsequent talk with him yesterday morning, Monday, and went yourself to the office of the FBI, saw a Mr. Anstrey, and found him noncommittal. He took the position that a homicide in Manhattan is the business of the New York police. Exasperated, you went to Inspector Cramer’s office, were unable to see him, talked with a sergeant named Stebbins, came away further exasperated, regarded with favor your husband’s suggestion, made this morning, that I be consulted, and here you are. Have I left out anything important?”

“One little point.” Rackell cleared his throat. “Our telling Inspector Cramer about Arthur’s joining the Communist party for the FBI — that was in confidence. Of course this talk with you is confidential too, naturally, since we’re your clients.”

Wolfe shook his head. “Not yet. You want to hire me to investigate the death of your nephew?”

“Yes. Certainly.”

“Then you should know that while no one excels me in discretion I will not work under restrictions.”

“That’s fair enough.”

“Good. I’ll let you know tomorrow, probably by noon.” Wolfe reached to push the paperweight aside and pick up the check. “Shall I keep this meanwhile and return it if I can’t take the job?”

Rackell frowned, perplexed. His wife snapped, “Why on earth couldn’t you take it?”

“I don’t know, madam. I hope to. I need the money. But I’ll have to look into it a little — discreetly, of course. I’ll let you know tomorrow at the latest.” He extended a hand with the check. “Unless you prefer to take this and try elsewhere.”

They didn’t like it, especially her. She even left the red leather chair to take the check, her lips tight, but after some give-and-take with her husband they decided to let it ride, and she put the check back on the desk. They wanted to give us more details, especially about their nephew’s five dinner guests, but Wolfe said that could wait, and they left, none too pleased. As I let them out at the front door Rackell gave me a polite thank-you nod, but she didn’t even know I was there.

Returning to the office, I got the check and put it in the safe and then stood to regard Wolfe. His nose was twitching. He looked as if he had an oyster with horseradish on it in his mouth, a combination he detests.

“It can’t be helped,” I told him. “It takes all kinds to make a clientele. What are we going to look into a little?”

He sighed. “Get Mr. Wengert of the FBI. You want to see him, this evening if possible. I’ll talk.”

“It’s nearly seven o’clock.”

“Try.”

I went to the phone on my desk, dialed RE 2–3500, talked to a stranger and to a man I had met a couple of times, and reported to Wolfe, “Not available. Tomorrow morning.”

“Make an appointment.”

I did so and hung up.

Wolfe sat scowling at me. He spoke. “I’ll give you instructions after dinner. Have we got the Gazette of the past three days?”

“Sure.”

“Let me have them, please. Confound it.” He sighed again. “Saturday, and tomorrow’s Wednesday. Like a warmed-over meal.” He came erect and his face brightened. “I wonder how Fritz is making out with that fish.”

He left his chair and headed for the hall and the kitchen.

II

Wednesday morning all the air in Manhattan was conditioned — the wrong way. It was no place for penguins. On my way to Foley Square my jacket was beside me on the seat of the taxi, but when I had paid the driver and got out I put it on. Sweat or no sweat, I had to show the world that a private detective can be tough enough to take it.

When, after some waiting, I got admitted to Wengert’s big corner room I found him in his shirt sleeves with his tie and collar loosened. He got up to shake hands and invited me to sit. We exchanged remarks.

“I haven’t seen you,” I told him, “since you got elevated here. Congratulations.”

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome. I notice you’ve got brass in your voice, but I guess that can’t be helped. Mr. Wolfe sends his regards.”

“Give him mine.” His voice warmed up a little, just perceptibly. “I’ll never forget how he came through on that mercury thing.” He glanced at the watch on his wrist. “What can I do for you, Goodwin?”

Back a few years, when we had been in G2 together, it had been Archie, but then he hadn’t had a corner room with five phones on his desk. I crossed my legs to show there was no rush.

“Not a thing,” I told him. “Mr. Wolfe just wants to clear. Yesterday a man and wife named Rackell came to see him. They want him to investigate the death of their nephew, Arthur Rackell. Do you know about it, or do you want to call someone in? Mrs. Rackell has talked with a Mr. Anstrey.”

“I know. Go ahead.”

“Then I won’t have to draw pictures. Our bank says that Rackell rates seven figures west of the decimal point, and we would like to earn a fee by tagging a murderer, but our country right or wrong. We would hate to torpedo the ship of state in this bad weather. The Rackells came to Mr. Wolfe because they think the FBI and the NYPD regard the death of Arthur as a regrettable but minor incident. They say he was killed by a Commie who discovered that he was an FBI plant. Before we proceed on that theory Mr. Wolfe wants to clear with you. Of course you may not want to say, even under the rug to us, that he was yours. May you?”

“It’s hotter than yesterday,” Wengert stated.

“Yeah. Would you care to make any sign at all, for instance a wink?”

“No.”

“Then I’ll try something more general. There has been nothing in the papers about the Commie angle, not a word, so there has been no mention of the FBI. Is the FBI working on the murder, officially or otherwise?”

“Much hotter,” he said.

“It sure is. How about the others, the five dinner guests? Of course they’re our meat. Any suggestions, requests, or orders? Any strings you wouldn’t want us to trip on?”

“The humidity, too.”

“Absolutely. I realize that you would like to tell us to lay off on general principles, but you’re afraid there might be a headline tomorrow, FBI WARNS NERO WOLFE TO KEEP HANDS OFF OF RACKELL MURDER. Besides, if you give us a stop sign you’ll have to say why or we’ll keep going. Just to clean it up, it there any question I might ask that would take your mind off the weather?”

“No.” He stood up. “It was nice to see you for old time’s sake, and you can still give Wolfe my regards, but tell him to go climb a tree. Some nerve. Sending you here with that bull about wanting to clear! Why didn’t he ask me to send him up the files? Come again when I’m not here.”

I was on my way, but before I reached the door I turned. “The radio said this morning it would hit ninety-five,” I told him and went.

There are always taxis at Foley Square. I removed my jacket, climbed into one, and gave an address on West Twentieth Street. When we got there my shirt was stuck to the back of the seat. I pulled loose, paid, got out, put on the jacket, and went into a building. The headquarters of the Homicide Squad, Manhattan West, was much more familiar to me than the United States Courthouse. So were the inmates, one in particular, the one sitting at a dingy little desk in a dingy little room to which I was escorted. They have never let me roam loose in that building since the day I took a snapshot of a piece of paper they were saving, though they couldn’t prove it.

Sergeant Purley Stebbins was big and strong but not handsome. His rusty old swivel chair squeaked and groaned as he leaned back.

“Oh, hell,” I said, sitting, “I forgot. I meant to bring a can of oil for that chair my next trip here.” I cocked my head. “What are you glaring about? Is my face dirty?”

“It don’t have to be dirty.” He went on glaring. “Goddam it, why did they have to pick Nero Wolfe?”

I considered a moment, maybe two seconds. “I am glad to know,” I said pleasantly, “that the cops and the feds are collaborating so closely. Citizens can sleep sound. Wengert must have phoned the minute I left. What did he say?”

“He spoke to the Inspector. What do you want?”

“Maybe I should speak to the Inspector.”

“He’s busy. So the Rackells have hired Wolfe?”

I lifted my nose. “Mr. and Mrs. Rackell have asked Mr. Wolfe to investigate the death of their nephew. Before he starts to whiz through it like a cyclone he wants to know whether he will be cramping the style of those responsible for the national security. I’ve seen Wengert, and the heat has got him. He’s not interested. I am now seeing you because of the Commie angle, which has not appeared in the papers. If it is against the public interest for us to take the job, tell me why. I know you and Cramer think it’s against the public interest for us to eat, let alone detect, but that’s not enough. We would need facts.”

“Uh-huh,” Purley growled. “We give ’em to you and Wolfe decides he can use ’em better than we can. Nuts. I’ll tell you one fact: this one has got stingers. Lay off.”

I nodded sympathetically. “That’s probably good advice. I’ll tell Mr. Wolfe.” I arose. “We would like you to sign a statement covering the substance of this interview. Three copies, one—”

“Go somewhere,” he rasped. “On out. Beat it.”

I thought he was getting careless, but my escort, a paunchy old veteran with a pushed-in nose, was waiting in the hall. As I strode to the front and the entrance he waddled along behind.

It was past eleven by the time I got back to the office, so Wolfe had finished his two hours in the plant rooms and was behind his desk, with beer. It would have been impossible for anything with life in it to look less like a cyclone.

“Well?” he muttered at me.

I sat. “We deposit the check. Wengert sends his regards. Purley doesn’t. They both think you sent me merely to get the dope for free and they sneer at the idea of our caring for the public welfare. Wengert phoned Cramer the minute I left. Not a peep from either one. We only know what we see in the papers.”

He grunted. “Get Mr. Rackell.”

So we had a case.

III

There were two open questions about the seven people gathered in the office after dinner that Wednesday evening: were any of them Commies, and was one of them a murderer? I make it seven, including our clients, not to seem prejudiced.

I had given them the eye as they arrived and gathered and now, as I sat at my desk with them all in sight, I was placing no bets. There had been a time, years back, when I had had the notion that no murderer, man or woman, could stand exposed to view and not let it show somewhere if you had good enough eyes, but now I knew better. However, I was using my eyes.

The one nearest me was a lanky middle-aged guy named Ormond Leddegard. He may have been expert at handling labor-management relations, which was how he made a living, but he was a fumbler with his fingers. Getting out a pack of cigarettes, and matches, and lighting up, he was all thumbs, and that would have put him low on the list if it hadn’t been for the possibility that he was being subtle. If I could figure that thumbs wouldn’t have been up to the job of sneaking a pillbox from a cluttered table, making a substitution, and returning the box without detection, so could he. Of course that little point could be easily settled by having a good man, say Saul Panzer, spend a couple of days interviewing a dozen or so of his friends and acquaintances.

Next to him, with her legs crossed just right to be photographed from any angle, was Fifi Goheen. The leg-crossing technique was automatic, from an old habit. Seven or eight years ago she had been the Deb of the Year and no magazine would have dared to go to press without a shot of her; then it became all a memory; and now she was a front-page item as a murder suspect. She hadn’t married. It was said that a hundred males, lured by the attractions, opening their mouths for the big proposition, had seen the hard glint in her lovely dark eyes and lost their tongues. So she was still Miss Fifi Goheen, living with Pop and Mom on Park Avenue.

Beyond her in the arc facing Wolfe’s desk was Benjamin Rackell, whose check had been deposited in our bank that afternoon, with his long narrow face more mournful even than the day before. At his right was a specimen who was a female anatomically but otherwise a what-is-it. Her name was Delia Devlin, and her age was beside the point. She was a resident buyer of novelties for out-of-town stores. There are ten thousand of her in midtown New York any weekday, and they’re all being imposed on. You see it in their faces. The problem is to find out who it is that’s imposing on them, and some day I may tackle it. Aside from that there was nothing visibly wrong with Delia Devlin, except her ears were too big.

Next to her was a celebrity — though of course they were all celebrities for the time being, you might say ex officio. Henry Jameson Heath, now crowding fifty, had inherited money in his youth, quite a pile, but very few people in his financial bracket were speaking to him. There was no telling whether he had contributed dough to the Communist party or cause, or if so how much, but there was no secret about his being one of the chief providers and collecters of bail for the Commies who had been indicted. He had recently been indicted too, for contempt of Congress, and was probably headed for a modest stretch. He wore an old seersucker suit that was too small for him, had a round pudgy face, and couldn’t look at you without staring.

Beyond Heath, at the end of the arc, was Carol Berk, the only one toward whom I had a personal attitude worth mentioning. Whenever we have a flock of guests I handle the seating, and if there is one who seems worthy of study I put her in the chair nearest mine. I had done so with this Carol Berk, but while I was in the hall admitting Leddegard, who had come last, she had switched on me, and I resented it. I felt that she deserved attention. Checking on her, along with the others, that afternoon with Lon Cohen of the Gazette, I had learned that she was supposed to be free-lancing as a TV contact specialist but no one actually claimed her, that she had a reputation as an extremely fast mover, and that there were six different versions of why she had left Hollywood three years ago. Added to that was the question whether it was a pleasure to look at her or not. In cases where it’s a quick no, the big majority, or a quick yes, the small minority, that settles it and what the hell; but the borderline numbers take application and sound judgment. I had listed Carol Berk as one when, crossing the doorsill, she had darted a sidewise glance at me with brown eyes that were dead dull from the front. Now, in the chair she had changed to, she was a good five paces away.

Mrs. Benjamin Rackell, her lips tighter than ever, was in the red leather chair at the end of Wolfe’s desk.

Wolfe’s gaze swept the arc. “I won’t thank you for coming,” he rumbled at them, “because it would be impertinent. You are here at the request of Mr. and Mrs. Rackell. Whether you came to oblige them or because you thought it unwise not to is immaterial.”

Also, it seemed to me, it was close to immaterial whether they were there or not. Apparently, since he had sent me to Foley Square and Homicide to clear, Wolfe was proceeding on the Rackell theory that Arthur had got it because a Commie or Commies had discovered that he was an FBI plant. But that theory had not been published, and Wolfe couldn’t blurt it out. You don’t disclose the identity of FBI undercover men, even dead ones, if you make your living as a private detective and want to keep your license. And if by any chance Arthur had fed his aunt one with a worm in it, if he had actually had no more connection with the FBI than me with the DAR — no, that was one to steer clear of.

So not only could Wolfe not come to the point, he couldn’t even let out a hint of what the point was. How could he talk at all?

He talked. “I don’t know,” he said, “whether the police have made it clear to you how you stand. They don’t like it that I’m taking a hand in this. The entrance to my house has been under surveillance since this morning, when they learned that Mr. and Mrs. Rackell had consulted me. One or more of you were probably followed here this evening. But Mr. Rackell may properly hire me, I may properly work for him, and you may properly give me information if you feel like it.”

“We don’t know whether we do or not.” Leddegard shifted in his chair, stretching his lanky legs. “At least I don’t. I came as a courtesy to people in bereavement.”

“It is appreciated,” Wolfe assured him. “Now for how you stand. I talked with Mr. and Mrs. Rackell yesterday, and with Mrs. Rackell again this afternoon. It is characteristic of the newspapers to focus attention on you five people; it’s obvious and dramatic, and, after all, you were there when Arthur Rackell swallowed poison and died. But beyond the obvious, why you? Have the police been candid?”

“That’s a damn silly question,” Heath declared. He had a flat but aggressive baritone. “The police are never candid.”

“I knew a candid cop once,” Fifi Goheen said helpfully.

“It seems to me,” Carol Berk told Wolfe, “that you’re being dramatic too, getting us down here. It would have taken a slight-of-hand artist to get the pillbox from his pocket and switch a capsule and put it back, without being seen. And while the box was on the table it was right under our eyes.”

Wolfe grunted. “You were all staring at it? For twelve minutes straight?”

“She didn’t say we were staring at it,” Leddegard blurted offensively.

“Pfui.” Wolfe was disgusted. “A lummox could have managed it. Reaching for something — a roll, a cocktail glass — dropping the hand onto the box, checking glances while withdrawing the hand, changing capsules beneath the table, returning the box with another casual unnoticeable gesture. I would undertake it myself with thin inducement, and I’m not Houdini.”

“Tell me something,” Leddegard demanded. “I may be thick, but why did it have to be done at the restaurant? Why not before?”

Wolfe nodded. “That’s not excluded, certainly. You five people were not the only ones intimate enough with Arthur Rackell to know about his pink vitamin capsules and that he took three a day, one before each meal. Nor did you have a monopoly of opportunity. However—” His glance went left. “Mrs. Rackell, will you repeat what you told me this afternoon? About Saturday evening?”

She had been keeping her eyes at Wolfe but now moved her head to take the others in. Judging from her expression as she went down the line, apparently she was convinced not that one of them was a Commie and a murderer, but that they all were — excluding her husband, of course.

She returned to Wolfe. “My husband and Arthur had spent the afternoon getting an important shipment released, and got home a little before six. They went to their rooms to take a shower and change. While Arthur was in the shower my cook and housekeeper, Mrs. Kremp, went to his room to get things out for him, shirt and socks and underwear — she’s like that; she’s been doing it for years. The articles he had taken from his pockets were on the bureau, and she looked in the pillbox and saw it was empty, and she got three capsules from the bottle in a drawer — it held a hundred and was half full — and put them in the box. She did that too, every day. She is a competent woman, but she’s extremely sentimental.”

“And she had no reason,” Wolfe inquired, “for wishing your nephew dead?”

“Certainly not!”

“She has of course told the police?”

“Of course.”

“Was there anyone in the apartment other than you four — you, your husband, your nephew, and Mrs. Kremp?”

“No. No one. The maid was away. My husband and I were going to the country for the weekend.”

“After Mrs. Kremp put the capsules in the box, and before your nephew came from the shower to dress — did you enter your nephew’s room during that period?”

“No. I didn’t enter it at all.”

“Did you, Mr. Rackell?”

“I did not.” He sounded as mournful as he looked.

Wolfe’s eyes went left to right, from Carol Berk at one end to Leddegard at the other. “Then we have Arthur Rackell bathed and dressed, the pillbox in his pocket. The police are not confiding in me, but I read newspapers. Leaving the apartment, he went down in the elevator and out to the sidewalk, and the doorman got a taxi for him. He was alone in the taxi, and it took him straight to the restaurant. The capsules left in the bottle have been examined and had not been tampered with. There we are. Are you prepared to impeach Mrs. Kremp, or Mr. or Mrs. Rackell? Can you support the assumption that one of them murdered Arthur Rackell?”

“It’s not inconceivable,” Delia Devlin murmured.

“No,” Wolfe conceded. “Nor is it inconceivable that he chose that moment and method to kill himself, nor even that a capsule of poison got into the bottle by accident. But I exclude them as too improbable for consideration, and so will everyone else, including the police. The inquiring mind is rarely blessed with a certainty; it must make shift with assumptions; and I am assuming, on the evidence, that when Arthur arrived at the restaurant the capsules in the box in his pocket were innocent. I invite you to challenge it. If you can’t the substitution was made at the restaurant, and you see how you stand. The police are after you, and so am I. One of you? Or all of you? I intend to find out.”

“You’re scaring me stiff,” Fifi Goheen said. “I’m frail and I may collapse.” She stood up. “Come on, Leddy, I’ll buy you a drink.”

Leddegard reached for her elbow and gave it a little shake. “Hold it, Fee,” he told her gruffly. “This guy has been known to do flips. Let’s see. Sit down.”

“Blah. You are scared. You’ve got a reputation.” She jerked her arm loose and took two quick steps to the edge of Wolfe’s desk. Her voice rose a little. “I don’t like the atmosphere here. You’re too fat to look at. Orchids, for God’s sake!” Her hand darted to the bowl of Miltonias, and with a flip of the wrist she sent it skidding along the slick surface and off to the floor.

There was some commotion. Mrs. Rackell jerked her feet back, away from the tumbling bowl. Carol Berk said something. Leddegard left his chair and started for Fifi, but she whirled away to Henry Jameson Heath, pressed her palms to his cheeks, and bent to him. She implored him, “Hank, I love you! Do you love me? Take me somewhere and buy me a drink.”

Delia Devlin sprang up, hauled off, and smacked Fifi on the side of the head. It was not merely a tap, and Fifi, off balance, nearly toppled. Heath came upright and was between them. Delia stood, glaring and panting. They held the tableau long enough for a take, then Fifi broke it up by addressing Delia past Heath’s shoulder.

“That won’t help any, Del. Can he help it when he’s with you if he wishes it was me? Can I help it? This only makes it worse. If he’ll buy a new suit and quit bailing out Commies and stay out of jail, I may make him happy.” She touched Heath’s cheek with her fingertips. “Say when, Hank.” She swerved around him to the desk and told Wolfe, “Look, you buy me a drink.”

I was there, retrieving the bowl. The water wouldn’t hurt the rug. Taking her arm firmly, I escorted her across to the table by the big globe, which Fritz and I had outfitted, and told her to name it. She said Scotch on the rocks, and I made it ample. The others, invited, stated their preferences, and Carol Berk came to help me. Rackell, who had been between Delia and Fifi, decided to move and went to Carol’s chair, so when we had finished serving she took his.

Throughout the interlude two had neither moved nor spoken — Mrs. Rackell and Wolfe. Now Wolfe sent his eyes from left to right and back again.

“I trust,” he said sourly, “that Miss Goheen has completed her impromptu performance. I was trying to make it clear that you five people are in a fix. I’m not going to pester you about your positions and movements at the restaurant that evening, what you saw or didn’t see; if there was anything in that to point or eliminate the police would have already acted on it and I’m too far behind. I might spend a few hours digging at you, trying to find a reason why one or more of you wanted Arthur Rackell dead, but the police have had four days on that too, and I doubt if I could catch up. Since you were good enough to come here at Mrs. Rackell’s request, I suppose you would be willing to answer some questions, but there doesn’t seem to be any worth asking. Have you people been together at any time since Saturday evening?”

Glances were exchanged. Leddegard inquired, “Do you mean all five of us?”

“Yes.”

“No, we haven’t.”

“Then I should think you would want to talk. Go ahead. I’ll drink some beer and eavesdrop. Of course at least one of you will be on guard, but the others can speak freely. You might say something useful.”

Carol Berk, now nearer me, let out a little snort. Fritz had brought a tray, and Wolfe opened a bottle, poured, waited for the foam to reach the right level, and drank. Nobody said a word.

Leddegard spoke. “It doesn’t seem to work. Did you expect it to?”

“We ought to make it work,” Fifi declared. “I think he’s damn considerate even if he is fat, and we should help.” Her head turned. “Carol, let’s talk.”

“Glad to,” Carol agreed. “You start. Shoot.”

“Well, how’s this? We all knew Arthur was practically a commissar, I always called him comrade, and we knew his aunt and uncle hated it, and he was afraid he might lose his job and have to go on relief but he was so damn brave and honest he couldn’t keep his mouth shut. We all knew that?”

“Of course.”

“Did you know this too? He told me — a week ago today, I think it was. His aunt put it to him, reform or out on the street, and he told her he was secretly working for the FBI, spying on the Commies, but he wasn’t. He thought the FBI was practically the Gestapo. I told him he shouldn’t—”

“That’s a lie!”

Mrs. Rackell didn’t shout but she put lots of feeling in it. All eyes went to her. Her husband got up and put a hand on her shoulder. There were murmurs.

“That’s an infamous lie,” she said. “My nephew was a patriotic American. More than you are, all of you. All of you!” She left her chair. “I’ve had enough of this. I shouldn’t have come. Come, Ben, we’re going.”

She marched out. Rackell muttered to Wolfe, “A shock for her — a real shock — I’ll phone you—” and trotted after her. I went to the hall to let them out, but she had already opened the door and was on the stoop, and Rackell followed. I shut the door and went back to the office.

They were buzzing. Fifi had started them talking, all right. Wolfe was refilling his glass, watching the foam rise. I crossed to Fifi and took her glass and went to the table to replenish it, thinking she had earned a little service. She was the center of the buzzing, supplying the details of her revelation. She was sure Arthur had not been stringing her; he had told her in strict confidence, at a place and time she declined to specify, that he had told his aunt a barefaced lie — that he was working for the FBI and it must not be known. No, she hadn’t told the police. She didn’t like the police, especially a Lieutenant Rowcliff, who had questioned her three times and was a lout.

I looked and listened and tried to decide if Fifi was putting on an act. She was hard to tag. Was one of the others covering, and if so which one? I reached no conclusion and had no hunch. They were all interested and inquisitive, even Delia Devlin, though she didn’t address Fifi directly.

The only one who knew I was there was Carol Berk, who sent me a slanting glance and saw me catch it. I raised a brow at her. “What is it, a pitchout?”

“You name it.” She smiled, the way she might smile at a panhandler, humane but superior. “Why, who’s on base?”

I decided it right then, she was worth looking at, if for nothing else, to find out what she was keeping back. “They’re loaded,” I told her. “Five of you. It’s against the rules. The umpire won’t allow it. Mr. Wolfe is the umpire.”

“He looks to me more like the backstop,” she said indifferently.

I saw that it might be necessary, if events permitted, to find an opportunity to spend enough time with her to make it clear that I didn’t like her.

All of a sudden Fifi Goheen let fly again. Returning from the bar with her second refill, she brought the bottle of Scotch along and poured a good three fingers in Wolfe’s beer glass. She put the bottle on his desk, leaned over to stretch an arm and pat him on top of the head, straightened up, and grinned at him.

“Get high,” she said urgently.

He glared at her.

“Do a flip,” she commanded.

He glared.

“It’s a damn shame,” she declared. “The cops aren’t speaking to you, and here you’re buying the drinks and we’re not even sociable. Why shouldn’t we tell you what the cops have already found out? If they’re any good they have. Take Miss Devlin here.” She waved a hand. “Dozens of people will tell you that she would have got Hank Heath to make it legal long ago if Arthur hadn’t told him something about her, God knows what. Any woman would kill a man for that. And—”

“Shut up, Fee!” Leddegard barked at her.

“Let her rave,” Delia Devlin said, white-faced.

Fifi ignored them. “And Mr. Leddegard, who is a dear friend of mine, with him it’s a question of his wife — don’t be a fool, Leddy. Everybody knows it.” Back to Wolfe. “She went to South America with Arthur a couple of years ago and caught a disease and died there. I have no idea why Mr. Leddegard waited so long to kill him.”

She drained her glass and put it on the desk. “This Arthur Rackell,” she said, “was quite a guy, of his kind. Carol Berk and I discovered only a month ago that he was driving double, by a little mischance I’d rather not describe. It was quite embarrasing. I don’t know how she felt about it, you can ask her, but I know about me. All I needed was the poison, and all you need is to find out how I got it. I understand that potassium cyanide is used for a lot of things and is easy to get if you really want it. Then there’s Hank Heath. He thought Arthur had me taped, which was true in a way, but would a man kill another man just to get a woman, even one as pure and beautiful as me? You can ask him. No, I’ll ask him.”

She wheeled. “Would you, Hank?” She wheeled again to Wolfe. “As you see, that was quite a dinner party Arthur got up, but he doesn’t deserve all the credit. I dared him to. I wanted a good audience, one that would appreciate — hey, that hurts!”

Heath was beside her, gripping her arm. She jerked away and bumped into Delia Devlin, also out of her chair. Carol Berk said something, and so did Leddegard. Heath spoke to Wolfe. “This is a joke, and it’s not funny.”

Wolfe’s brows went up. “It’s not my joke, sir.”

“You asked us to come here.” His voice was soft but very sour, and his glassy eyes looked about ready to pop out of his round pudgy face. “Miss Goheen has been making a fool of you, and there—”

“I have not!” Fifi was back, at his elbow. “I wouldn’t dream of it,” she told Wolfe. “You know, there’s something about you, fat as you are.” She reached to pick up the glass of beer and Scotch. “Open your mouth and I’ll — hey! Where you going?”

She got no reply. Out of his chair and headed for the door, Wolfe kept on, turning left in the hall, toward the kitchen.

That ended the party. They made remarks, especially Leddegard and Heath, and I was sympathetic as I wrangled them into the hall and on to the front. I went out and stood on the stoop as they descended to the sidewalk and headed for Tenth Avenue, just to see, but by the time they had gone fifty paces no furtive figures had sneaked out of areaways along the line, so I thought what the hell and went back in. A glance in the office showed me it was empty, and I went on to the kitchen.

Fritz was pouring something thick into a big stone jar. Wolfe stood watching him, a slice of sturgeon in one hand and a glass of beer in the other. His mouth was occupied.

I attacked head on. “I admit,” I said, “that she was set to toss it at you, but I was there to help wipe it off. What good does it do to duck? There are at least eighty-six things you have to know before you can even start, and you had them there and didn’t even try. My vacation starts next Monday. And what about your rule on not eating at bedtime?”

He swallowed. He drank beer, put the glass and the sturgeon on the table, reached to a shelf for a Bursatto melon, got a knife from the rack, cut the melon open, and began spooning the seeds onto a plate.

“The precise moment,” he said. “Do you want some?”

“Certainly not,” I said coldly. The peach-colored meat was so juicy there was a little pool in each half, and a breeze from the open window carried the smell to me. I reached for one of the halves, got a spoon, scooped out a bite — and another …

Wolfe never talks business during meals, but this was not a meal. In the middle of his melon he remarked, “For us the past is impossible.”

I darted my tongue to catch a drop of juice. “Oh. It is?”

“Yes. It would take an army. The police and the FBI have already had four days for it. The source of the poison. Mrs. Kremp. Mrs. Rackell’s surmise of the motive. Mr. Heath is presumbably a Communist, but what about the others? Anyone might be a Communist, just as anyone might have a hidden carcinoma.”

He scooped a bite of melon and dealt with it. “What of the motives suggested by that fantastic female buffoon? Are any of them authentic, and if so which one or ones? That alone would need a regiment. As for the police and the FBI, we have nothing to bargain with. Are they all Communists? Were they all in on it? Must we expose not one murderer but five? All those questions and others would have to be answered. How long would it take?”

“A year ought to do it.”

“I doubt it. The past is hopeless. There’s too much of it.”

I raised my shoulders and let them drop. “Okay, you don’t have to rub it in. So we cross it off. Do I draw a check to Rackell for his three grand tonight or wait till morning?”

“Have I asked you to draw a check?”

“No, sir.”

He picked up the slice of sturgeon and took a bite. He never skimped on his chewing, and it took him a good four minutes to finish. Meanwhile I disposed of my melon.

“Archie,” he said.

“Yes, sir.”

“How does Mr. Heath feel about Miss Goheen?”

“Well.” I considered. “There are different ways of putting it. I would say something like you would feel about a dish of stewed terrapin with sherry — within your sight and smell — if you thought you knew how it would taste but had never had any.”

He grunted. “Don’t be fanciful. It’s a serious question in a field where you are qualified as an expert and I’m not. Is his appetite deeply aroused? Would he take a risk for her?”

“I don’t know how he is on risks, but I saw how he looked at her and how he reacted when she touched him. Also I saw Delia Devlin, and so did you. I would say he would try crossing a high shaky bridge with a wind blowing, but not unless it had rails.”

“That was the impression I got. We’ll have to try it.”

“Try what?”

“A shove. A dig in their ribs. If their past is too much for us, their future isn’t, or shouldn’t be. We’ll have to try it. If it doesn’t work we’ll try again.” He was scowling. “The best I can give it is one chance in twenty. Confound it, it requires the cooperation of Mrs. Rackell, so I’ll have to see her again; that can’t be helped.”

He scooped a bite of melon. “You’ll need some instructions. I’ll finish this, and we’ll go to the office.”

He put the bite where it belonged and concentrated on his taste buds.

IV

It didn’t work out as scheduled. The program called for getting Mrs. Rackell to the office at eleven o’clock the next morning, Thursday, but when I phoned a little before nine the maid said it was too early to disturb her. At ten she hadn’t called back, and I tried again and got her. I explained that Wolfe had an important confidential question to put to her, and she said she would be at the office not later than eleven-thirty. Shortly before eleven she phoned again to say that she had called her husband at his office, and it had been decided if the question was important and confidential they should both be present to consider it. Her husband would be free for an hour or so after lunch but had a four-o’clock appointment he would have to keep. We finally settled for six o’clock, and I called Rackell at his office and confirmed it.

Henry Jameson Heath was on the front page of the Gazette again that morning, not in connection with homicide. Once more he had refused to disclose the names of contributors to the fund for bail for the indicted Communists and apparently he was going to stick to it no matter how much contempt he rolled up. The day’s installment on the Rackell murder was on page seven, and there wasn’t enough meat in it to feed a cricket. As for me, after an hour at the phone, locating Saul Panzer and Fred Durkin and Orrie Cather and passing them the word, I might as well have gone to the ball game. Wolfe had given me plenty of instructions, but I couldn’t act on them until and unless the clients agreed to string along.

Mrs. Rackell arrived first, at six on the dot. A minute later Wolfe came down from the plant rooms, and she started in on him. She had the idea that he was responsible for Fifi Goheen’s slanderous lie about her dead nephew, since it had been uttered in his office, and what did he propose to do about it? Why didn’t he have her arrested? Wolfe controlled himself fairly well, but his tone was beginning to get sharp when the doorbell rang and I beat it to the front to let Rackell in. He jogged past me to the office on his short legs, nodded at Wolfe, kissed his wife on the cheek, dropped onto a chair, wiped his long narrow face with a handkerchief, and asked wearily, “What is it? Did you get anywhere with them?”

“No.” Wolfe was short. “Not to any conclusion.”

“What’s this important question?”

“It’s blunt and simple. I need to know whether you want the truth enough to pay for it, and if so how much.”

Rackell looked at his wife. “What’s he talking about?”

“We haven’t discussed it,” Wolfe told him. “We’ve been considering a point your wife raised, which I regard as frivolous. This question of mine — perhaps I should call it a suggestion. I have one to offer.”

“What?”

“First I’ll give you the basis for it.” Wolfe leaned back and half closed his eyes. “You heard me tell those five people yesterday why it is assumed that one of them substituted the capsules. On that assumption, after further talk with them, I stack another: that it is highly improbable that the substitution could have been made, under the circumstances as established, entirely unobserved. It would have required a coincidence of remarkable dexterity and uncommon luck, and I will not accept such a coincidence except on weighty evidence. So, assuming that the substitution was made in the restaurant, I also assume, for a test at least, that one of the others saw it and knows who did it. In short, that there was an eyewitness to the murder.”

Rackell’s mournful face did not light up with interest. His lips were puckered, making the droop at the corners more pronounced. “That may be,” he conceded, “but what good does it do if he won’t talk?”

“I propose to make him talk. Or her.”

“How?”

Wolfe rubbed his chin with a thumb and forefinger. His eyes moved to Mrs. Rackell and back to the husband. “This sort of thing,” he said, “requires delicacy, discretion, and reticence. I’ll put it this way. I will not conspire to get a man punished for a crime he did not commit. It is true that all five of those people may be Communists and therefore enemies of this country, but that does not justify framing one of them for murder. My purpose is clear and innocent — to expose the real murderer and bring him to account; and I suggest a devious method only because no other seems likely to succeed. Evidently the police, after five days on it, are up a tree, and so is the FBI — if it is engaged, and you think it is. I want to earn my fee, and I wouldn’t mind the kudos.”

Rackell was frowning. “I still don’t know exactly what you’re suggesting.”

“I know it; I’ve been long-winded. I didn’t want you to misunderstand.” Wolfe came forward in his chair and put his palms on the desk. “The eyewitness is obviously reluctant. I suggest that you consent to provide twenty thousand dollars, to be paid only if my method succeeds. That will cover my fee for the unusual service I will render and also any extraordinary expense I may incur. Two things must be understood: you approve the expenditure in your interest, and the express purpose is to catch the guilty person.” He upturned his palms. “There it is.”

“My God. Twenty thousand.” Rackell shook his head. “That’s a lot of money. You mean you want a check for that amount now?”

“No. To be paid if and when earned. An oral commitment will do. Mr. Goodwin hears us and has a good memory.”

Rackell opened his mouth and closed it again. He looked at his wife. He looked back at Wolfe. “Look here,” he said earnestly, “maybe I’m thickheaded. It sounds to me as if what this amounts to is bribing a witness. With my money.”

“Don’t be a fool, Ben,” his wife said sharply.

“I think you misunderstand,” Wolfe told him. “To bribe is to influence corruptly by some consideration. Anyone who receives any of your money through me will get it only as an inducement to tell the truth. Influence, yes. Corrupt, surely not. As for the amount, I don’t wonder that you hesitate. It’s quite a sum, but I wouldn’t undertake it for less.”

Rackell looked at his wife again. “What did you mean, Pauline, don’t be a fool?”

“I meant you’d be a fool not to do it, of course.” She felt so strongly about it that her lips moved. “It was you who wanted to come to Mr. Wolfe in the first place, and now when he really wants to do something you talk about bribing. If it’s the money, I have plenty of my own and I’ll pay—” She stopped abruptly, tightening her lips. “I’ll pay half,” she said. “That’s fair enough; we’ll each pay half.” She went to Wolfe. “Who is it, that Goheen woman?”

Wolfe ignored her. He asked Rackell, “Well, sir? How about it?”

Rackell didn’t like it. He avoided his wife’s gaze, but he knew it was on him, and it was pressing. He even looked at me, as if my eye might somehow help, but I was deadpan. Then he returned to Wolfe.

“All right,” he said.

“You accept the proposal as I made it?”

“Yes. Only I’ll pay it. I’d rather not — I’d rather pay it myself. You said to be paid if and when earned. Who decides whether you’ve earned it or not?”

“You do. I doubt if that will be a bone to pick.”

“A question my wife asked — do you know who the eyewitness is?”

“Your wife was witless to ask it. If I knew would I tell you? Or would you want me to? Now?”

Rackell shook his head. “No, I guess not. No, I can see that it’s better just to let you—” He left it hanging. “Is there anything else you want to say about it?”

Wolfe said there wasn’t. Rackell got up and stood there as if he would like to say something but didn’t know what. I arose and moved toward the door. I didn’t want to be rude to a client who had just bought a suggestion that would cost him twenty grand, but now that he had okayed it I had a job to do and I wanted to get going. I still didn’t know where Wolfe thought he was headed for, but the sooner I got started on my instructions the sooner I would know. They finally came, and I went ahead and opened the front door for them. She held his elbow going down the stoop. I shut the door and rejoined Wolfe in the office.

“Well?” I demanded. “Do I proceed?”

“Yes.”

“It’s nearly half-past six. If I offer to buy her a meal — I doubt if that’s the right approach.”

“You know the approaches to women, I don’t.”

“Yeah.” I sat at my desk and pulled the phone to me. “If you ask me this stunt you’ve hatched is a swell approach to a trip to the hoosegow. For both of us.”

He grunted. I started dialing a number.

V

New York can have pleasant summer evenings when it wants to, and that was one of them — warm but not hot and not muggy. I paid the taxi driver when he rolled to the curb at the address on Fifty-first Street east of Lexington, got out, and took a look. In bright sunshine the old gray brick building would probably show signs of wear and tear, but now in twilight it wasn’t too bad. Entering the vestibule, I scanned the tier of names on the wall panel. The one next to the top said DEVLIN — BERK. I pushed the button, shoved the door open when the click came, went in, glanced around for an elevator and saw none, and started to climb stairs. Three flights up a door stood open, and there waiting was Delia Devlin.

I told her hello, friendly but not profuse. She nodded, not so friendly, hugged the wall to let me pass, shut the door, and went by me to lead the way through an arch into a living room. I sent my eyes around with an expression of comradely interest. The chairs and couch were attractive and cool in summer slips. There were shelves of books. The windows were on the street, and there were three doors besides the arch, two of them standing open and one not quite closed.

She sat and invited me to. “I can’t imagine,” she said in a louder voice than seemed necessary, in spite of the street noises from the open windows, “what you want to ask me that’s so mysterious.”

Sitting, I regarded her. Only one corner lamp was on, and in the dim light she wasn’t at all bad looking. With smaller ears she would have been a worthy specimen, with no glare on her.

“It’s not mysterious,” I protested. “As I said on the phone, it’s private and confidential, that’s all. Mr. Wolfe felt it would be an imposition to ask you to come to his office again, so he sent me. Miss Berk is out, is she?”

“Yes, she went to a show with a friend. Guys and Dolls.”

“Fine. It’s a good show. This really is confidential, Miss Devlin. So we’re alone?”

“Certainly we are. What is it, anyhow?”

There were three things wrong. First, I had a hunch, and my batting average on hunches is high. Second, she was talking too loud. Third, her telling me where Carol Berk was, even naming the show, was off key.

“The reason it’s so confidential,” I said, “is simply that you ought to decide for yourself what you want to do. I doubt if you realize what lengths other people may go to help you decide. You say we’re alone, but it wouldn’t surprise me a bit—”

I sprang up, marched across to the door that wasn’t quite closed, thinking it the most likely, and jerked it open. Behind me a little smothered shriek came from Delia Devlin. In front of me, backed up against closet shelves piled with cartons and miscellany, was Carol Berk. One look at her satisfied me on one point — what her eyes were like when something happened that really aroused her.

I stepped back. Delia Devlin was at my elbow, jabbering. I gripped her arm hard enough to hurt a little and addressed Carol Berk as she emerged from the closet. “My God, do I look like that big a sap? Maybe your sidewise glance isn’t as keen as you think—”

Delia was yapping at me. “You get out! Get out!”

Carol stopped her. “Let him stay, Delia.” She was calm and contemptuous. “He’s only a crummy little stooge, trying to slip one over for his boss. I’ll be back in an hour or so.”

She moved. Delia, protesting, caught her arm, but she pulled loose and left through one of the open doors. There were sounds in the adjoining room, then she appeared again with a thing on her head and a jacket and handbag, and passed through to the foyer. The outer door opened and then closed. I crossed to a window and stuck my head out and in a minute saw her emerge to the sidewalk and turn west.

I went back to my chair and sat. The open closet door was unsightly, and I got up and closed it and then sat again. “Just forget it,” I said cheerfully. “The closet was a bum idea anyhow; she would have stifled in there. Sit down and relax while I try and slip one over for my boss.”

She stood. “I’m not interested in anything you have to say.”

“Then you shouldn’t have let me in. Certainly you shouldn’t have stuck Miss Berk in that closet. Let’s get it over with. I merely want to find out whether you have any use for ten thousand dollars.”

She gawked. “Whether I what?”

“Sit down and I’ll tell you.”

She went to a chair and sat, and I shifted position to be more comfortable facing her. “First I want to tell you a couple of things about murder investigations. In—”

“I’ve heard all I want to about murder.”

“I know you have, but that’s one of the things. When you get involved in one it’s not a question of what or how much you want to hear. That’s the one question nobody asks you. Until and unless the Rackell case is solved, with the answers all in, you’ll be hearing about it the rest of your life. Face it, Miss Devlin.”

She didn’t say anything. She clasped her hands.

“The other thing about murder investigations. Someone gets murdered, and the cops go to work on it. Everybody that might possibly have a piece of useful information gets questioned. Say they question fifty different people. How many of the fifty answer every question truthfully? Maybe ten, maybe only four or five. Ask any experienced homicide man. They know it and they expect it, and that’s why, when they think it’s worth it, they go over the same questions with the same person again and again, after the truth. They often get it that way and they nearly always do with people who have cooked up a story, something they did or saw, with details. Of course you’re not one of those. You haven’t cooked up a detailed story. You have only answered a simple question ‘No’ instead of ‘Yes.’ They can’t catch you—”

“What question? What do you mean?”

“I’m coming to it. I want—”

“Do you mean I lied? About what?”

I shook my head, not to call her a liar. “Wait till I get to it. You would of course show shocked surprise if I made the flat statement that Fifi Goheen murdered Arthur Rackell by changing his capsules at the restaurant that evening and that you saw her do it. Naturally you would, since the police have asked you if you saw anyone perform that action or any part of it, and you have answered no. Wouldn’t you?”

She was frowning, concentrated. Her hands were still clasped. “But you — you haven’t made any such statement.”

“Right. I’d rather put it another way. Nero Wolfe has his own way of investigating and his own way of reaching conclusions. He has concluded that if he sends me to see you, to ask you to tell the police that you saw Fifi Goheen substituting the capsules, it will serve the interest of truth and justice. So he sent me, and I’m asking you. It will be embarrassing for you, but not so bad. As I explained, it won’t be the first time they’ve had somebody suddenly remembering something. You can say you and Miss Goheen have been friends and you hated to come out with it, but now you see you have to. You can even say I came here and persuaded you to speak, if you want to, but you certainly shouldn’t mention the ten thousand dollars. That—”

“What ten thousand dollars?”

“I’m telling you. Mr. Wolfe has also concluded that it would not be reasonable to expect you to undergo such embarrassment without some consideration. He has made a suggestion to Mr. and Mrs. Rackell, and they have agreed to provide a certain sum of money. Ten thousand of it will come to you, in appreciation of your cooperation in the cause of justice. It will be given you in cash, in currency, within forty-eight hours after you have done your part — and we’ll have to discuss that, exactly what you’ll tell the police. Speaking for Nero Wolfe, I guarantee the payment within forty-eight hours, or, if you want to, come down to his office with me now and he’ll guarantee it himself. Don’t ask me what it was that made him conclude that Fifi Goheen did it and that you saw her, because I don’t know. Anyhow, if he’s right, and he usually is, she’ll only be getting what she deserves. You know that’s true.”

I stopped. She sat motionless, staring at me. There wasn’t much light, and I couldn’t tell anything from her eyes, but they looked absolutely blank. As the seconds grew to a minute and on I began to think I had literally stupefied her, and I gave her a nudge.

“Have I made it plain?”

“Yes,” she mumbled, “you’ve made it plain.”

Suddenly a shudder ran over her whole body, her head dropped forward, and her hands lifted to cover her face, her elbows on her knees. The shudder quit, and she froze like that. She held it so long that I decided another nudge was required, but before I got it out she straightened up and demanded, “What made you think I would do such a thing?”

“I don’t think. Mr. Wolfe does the thinking. I’m just a crummy little stooge.”

“You’d better go. Please go!”

I stood up and I hesitated. My feeling was that I had run through it smooth as silk, as instructed, but at that point I wasn’t sure. Should I make a play of trying to crowd her into a yes or no, or leave it hanging? I couldn’t stand there forever, debating it with her staring at me, so I told her, “I do think it’s a good offer. The number’s in the phone book.”

She had nothing to tell my back as I walked to the foyer. I let myself out, descended the three flights, walked to Lexington, found a phone booth in a drugstore, and dialed the number I knew best. In a moment Wolfe’s voice was in my ear.

“Okay,” I said. “I’m in a booth. I just left her.”

“In what mind?”

“I’m not sure. She had Carol Berk hid in a closet. After that had been attended to and we were alone I followed the script, and she was impressed. I’m so good at explaining things that she didn’t have to ask questions. The light wasn’t very good, but as far as I could tell the prospect of collecting ten grand wasn’t absolutely repulsive to her, and neither was the idea of flipping Miss Goheen into the soup. She was torn. She told me to go, and I though it wise to oblige. When I left she was in a clinch with herself.”

“What is she going to do?”

“Don’t quote me. But I told her we’d have to discuss exactly what she would tell the cops, so we’ll hear from her if she decides to play. Do you want my guesses?”

“Yes.”

“Well. On her spilling it to the cops, the one thing that would spoil it, forty to one against. That isn’t how her mind will work. On her deciding to play ball with us, twenty to one against. She’s not tough enough. On her just keeping it to herself, fifteen to one against. On general principles. On her telling Miss Goheen, ten to one against. She hates her too much. On telling Carol Berk, two to one against, but I wouldn’t dig deep on that one either way. On her telling Mr. H, even money, no matter who is a Commie and who isn’t. It would show him how fine and bighearted and noble she is. She could be, at that. It has been done. Is Saul there?”

“Yes. I never spent anybody’s money, not even my own, on a slimmer chance.”

“Especially your own. And incidentally sticking my neck out. You don’t know the meaning of fear when it comes to sticking my neck out. Do we proceed?”

“What alternative is there?”

“None. Has Saul got his men there?”

“Yes.”

“Tell him to step on it and meet me at the northeast corner of Sixty-ninth and Fifth Avenue. She could be phoning Heath right now.”

“Very well. Then you’ll come home?”

I said I would, hung up, and got out of the oven. Nothing would have been more appreciated right then than a large coke-and-lime with the ice brushing my lips, but it was possible that Delia was already phoning him and he was at home to get the call, so I marched on by the fountain and out. A taxi got me to the corner of Sixty-ninth and Fifth in six minutes. My watch said 9:42.

I strolled east on Sixty-ninth and stopped across the street from the canopied entrance of the towering tenement of which Henry Jameson Heath was a tenant. It was no casing problem for me, since Saul Panzer had been there in the afternoon to make a survey and spot foxholes. That was elaborate but desirable, because it was to be a very fancy tail, using three shifts of three men each, with Saul in charge of one, Fred Durkin of the second, and Orrie Gather of the third. Fifteen skins an hour that setup would cost, which was quite a disbursement on what Wolfe had admited was a one-in-twenty chance. Seeing no one but a uniformed doorman in evidence around the canopy, I moseyed back to the corner.

A taxi pulled up and three men got out. Two of them were just men whose names I knew and with whose records I was fairly familiar, but the third was Saul Panzer, the one guy I want within hearing the day I get hung on the face of a cliff with jet eagles zooming at me. With his saggy shoulders and his face all nose, he looks one-fifth as strong and hardy, and one-tenth as smart, as he really is. I shook hands with him, not having seen him for a week or so, and nodded to the other two.

“Is there anything to say?” I asked him.

“I don’t think so. Mr. Wolfe filled me in.”

“Okay, take it. You know the Homicide boys may be on him too?”

“Sure. We’ll try not to trip on ’em.”

“You know it’s a long shot and the only bet we’ve got? So lose him quick, what do we care.”

“We’ll lose him or die.”

“That’s the spirit. That’s what puts statues of private detectives in the park. See you on the witness stand.”

I left them. My immediate and urgent objective was Madison Avenue for a coke-and-lime, but I went a block north to Seventieth Street. Sixty-ninth Street now belonged to Saul and his squad.

VI

At eleven o’clock the next morning, Friday, I sat in the office listening to the clank of Wolfe’s elevator as it brought him down from the plant rooms.

There had been no cheep from Delia Devlin, but we hadn’t wanted one anyway. What we wanted we had got, at least the first installment. At 12:42 Thursday night Saul had phoned that Heath had checked in at Sixty-ninth Street, arriving in a taxi, alone. That was all for the night. At 6:20 in the morning he had phoned that Fred Durkin and his two men had taken over and had been briefed on the terrain. And at 10:23 Fred had phoned that Heath had left his tenement and taken a taxi to 719 East Fifty-first Street and entered the building. That was the gray brick house I had visited the day before. Fred said they had seen no sign of an official tail. They were deployed. I told him he was my favorite mick and still would be if he hung on, and buzzed Wolfe in the plant rooms to inform him.

Wolfe entered, got at his desk, looked over the morning mail, signed a couple of checks, dictated a letter of inquiry about sausage to a man in Wisconsin, and settled down with the crossword puzzle in the London Times. I carried on my routine neatly and normally, making it perfectly plain that I could be just as placid as him, no matter how tense and ticklish it got. I had just finished typing the envelope for the letter and was twirling it out of the machine when the doorbell rang. I went to the hall to answer it, took one look through the one-way glass panel, wheeled and returned to the office, and spoke.

“I guess I’m through as a bookie. I said forty to one she wouldn’t spill it. Wengert and Cramer want in. We can sneak out the back way and head for Mexico.”

He finished putting in a letter, with precision, before he looked up. “Is this flummery?”

“No, sir. It’s them.”

“Indeed.” His brows went up a trifle. “Bring them in.”

I went out and to the door, turned the knob, and pulled it open. “Hello hello,” I said brightly. “Mr. Wolfe was saying only a minute ago that he would like to see Mr. Cramer and Mr. Wengert, and here you are.”

Bright as it was, it didn’t go over so well because they stepped in with the first hello and were well along the hall by the time I finished. I shut the door and followed. Entering the office, it struck me as encouraging that Wengert and Wolfe were shaking hands, but then I remembered the District Attorney who always shook hands with the defendant before he opened up, to show there was no personal feeling. Cramer usually took the red leather chair at the end of Wolfe’s desk, but this time he let Wengert have it, and I moved up one of the yellow ones for him.

“I sent you my regards the other day by Goodwin,” Wengert said. “I hope he remembered.”

Wolfe inclined his head. “He did. Thank you.”

“I didn’t know then I’d be seeing you so soon.”

“Nor did I.”

“No, I suppose not.” Wengert crossed his legs and leaned back. “Goodwin said you had taken on a job for Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin Rackell.”

“That’s right.” Wolfe was casual. “To investigate the death of their nephew. They said he had been working for the FBI. It would have been impolitic to wander into your line of fire, so I sent Mr. Goodwin to see you.”

“Let’s cut the blah. You sent him to get information you could use.”

Wolfe shrugged. “Confronted with omniscience, I bow. My motives are often obscure to myself, but you know all about them. Your advantage. If that was his errand, he failed. You told him nothing.”

“Right. Our files are for us, not for private operators. My coming here tells you that we’ve got a hand in this case, but that’s not for publication. If you didn’t want to get into our line of fire you certainly stumbled. But officially it’s a Manhattan homicide, so I’m here to listen.” He nodded at Cramer. “Go ahead, Inspector.”

Cramer had been holding in with difficulty. Holding in is a chronic problem with him, and it shows in various ways, chiefly by his big red face getting redder, with the color spreading lower on his thick muscular neck. He blurted at Wolfe, “Honest to God, I’m surprised! Not at Goodwin so much, but you! Subornation of perjury. Attempting to bribe a witness to give false testimony. I’ve known you to take some fat risks, but holy saints, this ain’t risking it, it’s yelling for it!”

Wolfe was frowning. “Are you saying that Mr. Goodwin and I have suborned perjury?”

“You’ve tried to!”

“Good heavens, that’s a serious charge. You must have warrants. Serve them, by all means.”

“Just give it to him, Inspector,” Wengert advised.

Cramer’s head jerked to me. “Did you go last evening to the apartment of Delia Devlin on Fifty-first Street?”

“It’s hotter than yesterday,” I stated.

“I asked you a question!”

“This is infantile,” Wolfe told him. “You must know the legal procedure with suspected felons. We do.”

“Just give it to him,” Wengert repeated.

Cramer was glaring at Wolfe. “What you know about legal procedures. Okay. Yesterday you sent Goodwin to see Delia Devlin. In your name he offered her ten thousand dollars to testify falsely that she saw Fifi Goheen take the pillbox from the table, remove a capsule and replace it with another, and put the box back on the table. He said the money would be supplied by Mr. and Mrs. Rackell and would be handed her in currency after she had so testified. I shouldn’t have said subornation of perjury, I should have said attempt. Now do I ask Goodwin some questions?”

“I’d like to ask him one myself.” Wolfe’s eyes moved. “Archie. Is what Mr. Cramer just said true?”

“No, sir.”

“Then don’t answer questions. A policeman has no right to make an inaccurate statement to a citizen about his actions and then order him to answer questions about it.” He went to Cramer. “We could drag this out interminably. Why not resolve it sensibly and conclusively?” He came to me. “Archie, get Miss Devlin on the phone and ask her to come down here at once.”

I turned and started to dial.

“Cut it, Goodwin,” Wengert snapped. I went on dialing. Cramer, who can move when he wants to, left his chair and was by me, pushing down the button. I cocked my head to look up at him. He scowled down at me. I put it back in the cradle. He returned to his chair.

“Then we’ll have to change the subject,” Wolfe said dryly. “Surely your position is untenable. You want to bullyrag us for what Mr. Goodwin, as my agent, said to Miss Devlin; the first thing to establish is what was actually said; and the only satisfactory way to establish it is to have them both here. Yet you not only didn’t bring her with you, you are even determined that we shall not communicate with her. Obviously you don’t want her to know what’s going on. It’s quite preposterous, but I draw no conclusion. It’s hard to believe that the New York police and the FBI would conspire to bamboozle a citizen, even me.”

Cramer was reddening up again.

Wengert cleared his throat. “Look, Wolfe,” he said, not belligerently, “we’re here to talk sense.”

“Good. Why not start?”

“I am. The interest of the people and government of the United States is involved in this case. My job is to protect that interest. I know you and Goodwin can keep your mouths shut when you want to. I am now talking off the record. Is that understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Goodwin?”

“Good here.”

“See that you keep it good. Arthur Rackell told his aunt that he was working with the FBI. That was a lie. He was either a member of the Communist party or a fellow traveler, we’re not sure which. We don’t know who he told, besides his aunt, that he was with the FBI, but we’re working on it and so are the police. He may have been killed by a Communist who heard it somehow and believed it. There were other motives, personal ones, but the Communist angle comes first until and unless it’s ruled out. So you can see why we’re in on it. The public interest is involved, not only of this city and state but the whole country. You see that?”

“I saw it,” Wolfe muttered, “when I sent Mr. Goodwin to see you day before yesterday.”

“We’ll skip that.” Wengert didn’t want to offend. “The point is, what about you? I concede that all you’re after is to catch the murderer and collect a fee. But we know you sent Goodwin to Miss Devlin yesterday to offer to pay her to say that she saw Miss Goheen in the act. We also know that you are not likely to pull such a stunt just for the hell of it. You knew exactly what you were doing and why you were doing it. You say you have regard for the public interest. All right, the inspector here represents it, and so do I, and we want you to open up for us. We confidently expect you to. What and whom are you after, and where does that stunt get you?”

Wolfe was regarding him sympathetically through half-closed eyes. “You’re not a nincompoop, Mr. Wengert.” The eyes moved. “Nor you, Mr. Cramer.”

“That’s something,” Cramer growled.

“It is indeed, considering the average. But your coming here to put this to me, either peremptorily or politely, was ill considered. Shall I explain?”

“If it’s not too much bother.”

“I’ll be as brief as possible. Let us make a complex supposition — that I got Mr. and Mrs. Rackell’s permission for an extraordinary disbursement for a stated purpose; that I sent Mr. Goodwin to see Miss Devlin; that he told her I had concluded that Miss Goheen had murdered Arthur Rackell and she had seen the act; that I suggested that she should inform the police of the fact; and that, as compensation for her embarrassment and distress, I engaged to pay her a large sum of money which would be provided by Mr. and Mrs. Rackell.”

Wolfe upturned a palm. “Supposing I did that, it was not an attempt to suborn perjury, since it cannot be shown that I intended her to swear falsely, but certainly I was exposing myself to a claim for damages from Miss Goheen. That was a calculated risk I had to take, and whether the calculation was sound depended on the event. There was also a risk of being charged with obstruction of justice, and that too depended on the event. Should it prove to serve justice instead of obstructing it, and should Miss Goheen suffer no unmerited damage, I would be fully justified. I hope to be. I expect to be.”

“Then you can—”

“If you please. But suppose, having done all that, I now admit it to you and tell you my calculations and intentions. Then you’ll either have to try to head me off or be in it with me. It would be jackassery for you to head me off — take my word for it; it would be unthinkable. But it would also be unthinkable for you to be in it, either actively or passively. Whatever the outcome may be, you cannot afford to be associated with an offer to pay a large sum of money to a person involved in a murder case for disclosing a fact, even an authentic one. Your positions forbid it. I’m a private citizen and can stand it; you can’t. What the devil did you come here for? If I’m headed for defeat, opprobrium, and punishment, then I am. Why dash up here only to get yourselves confronted with unthinkable alternatives?”

Wolfe fluttered a hand. “Luckily, this is just talk. I was merely discussing a complex supposition. To return to reality, I will be glad to give you gentlemen any information that you may properly require — and Mr. Goodwin too, of course. So?”

They looked at each other. Cramer let out a snort. Wengert pulled at his ear and gazed at me, and I returned the gaze, open-faced and perfectly innocent. He found that not helpful and transferred to Wolfe.

“You called the turn,” he said, “when you told Goodwin to phone Miss Devlin. I should have foreseen that. That was dumb.”

The phone rang, and I swiveled and got it. “Nero Wolfe’s office, Archie Goodwin speaking.”

“This is Rattner.”

“Oh, hello. Keep it down, my ears are sensitive.”

“Durkin sent me to phone so he could stay on the subject. The subject came out of the house at seven nineteen East Fifty-first Street at eleven forty-one. He was alone. He walked to Lexington and around the corner to a drugstore and is in there now in a phone booth. I’m across the street in a restaurant. Any instructions?”

“Not a thing, thank you. Give my love to the family.”

“Right.”

It clicked off, and I hung up and swiveled back to rejoin the party, but apparently it was over. They were on their feet, and Wengert was turning to go. Cramer was saying, “… but it’s not all off the record. I just want that understood.”

He turned and followed Wengert out. I saw no point in dashing past them out to the door, since two grown men should be up to turning a knob and pulling, but I stepped to the hall to observe. When they were outside and the door closed I went back in and remarked to Wolfe, “Very neat. But what if they had let me phone her?”

He made a face. “Pfui. If they had got it from her they wouldn’t have called on me. They would have sent for you, possibly with a warrant. That was one of the contingencies.”

“They might have let me phone her anyway.”

“Unlikely, since that would have disclosed their knowledge — to her and therefore to anyone — and betrayed their informant. But if they had, while she was on her way I would have proceeded with them, and they would have left before she arrived.”

I put the yellow chair back in place. “All the same I’m glad they didn’t and so are you. That was Rattner on the phone, reporting for Fred. Heath was with Miss Devlin an hour and four minutes. He left at eleven forty-one and was in a phone booth in a drugstore when Rattner called.”

“Satisfactory.” He picked up his pencil and bent over the crossword puzzle with a little sigh.

VII

June twenty-first is supposed to be the longest day, but this year it was August third. It went on for weeks after Cramer and Wengert left. I spent it all in the office, and it was no fun. There was only one thing that could keep us floating, but there were a dozen that could sink us. They might lose him. Or he might handle it by phone — most unlikely, but not impossible. Or Wolfe might have it figured entirely wrong; he himself gave it one in twenty. Or Heath might meet him or her some place where they couldn’t be nailed. Or a city or federal employee might horn in and ruin it. Or and or and or.

Five bucks an hour had been added to the outgo. If and when the call came that would start me moving, I didn’t want to waste any precious minutes or even seconds finding transportation, so Herb Aronson had his taxi parked at the filling station at the corner of Eleventh Avenue, on us. Also he came to us for lunch and again, at seven in the evening, for dinner.

Every time the phone rang and I grabbed it, I wanted it and I didn’t. It might be the starting gun, but on the other hand it might be the awful news that they had lost him. Keeping a tail on a guy in New York, especially if he has an important reason for wanting privacy, needs not only great skill but also plenty of luck. We were buying the skill, in Saul and Fred and Orrie, but you can’t buy luck.

The luck held, and so did they. There were two more calls from Fred, via Rattner, before two o’clock, when he was relieved by Orrie Cather. One was to report that Heath, after calls at an optician’s and a bookstore, had entered a restaurant on Forty-fifth Street and was lunching with two men, not known to me as described, and the other was to tell where Orrie could find him. There was still no sign of an official tail. During the afternoon and early evening there was a series of reports from Orrie. Heath and his companions left the restaurant at 2:52, taxied to the apartment house on Sixty-ninth Street where Heath lived, and entered. At 5:35 the two men emerged and walked off. At 7:03 Heath came out and took a taxi to Chezar’s restaurant, where he met Delia Devlin and they dined. At 9:14 they left and taxied to the gray brick house on Fifty-first Street and went in. Heath was still in there at ten o’clock, the hour for Orrie to be relieved by Saul Panzer, and it was at the corner of Fifty-first and Lexington that Orrie and Saul connected.

By that time I would have been chewing on a railroad spike if I had had one, and Wolfe was working hard trying to be serene. Between nine-thirty and ten-thirty he made four trips to the bookshelves, trying different ones, setting a record.

I snarled at him, “What’s the matter, restless?”

“Yes,” he said placidly. “Are you?”

“Yes.”

It came a little before eleven. The phone rang, and I got it. It was Bill Doyle.

He seemed to be panting. “I’m out of breath,” he said, wasting some of it. “When he left there he got smart and started tricks. We let him spot Al and ditch him, you know how Saul works it, but even then we damn near lost him. He came to Eighty-sixth and Fifth and went in the park on foot. A woman was sitting on a bench with a collie on a leash, and he stopped and started talking to her. Saul thinks you’d better come.”

“So do I. Describe the woman.”

“I can’t. I was keeping back and didn’t get close enough.”

“Where is Saul?”

“On the ground under a bush.”

“Where are you?”

“Drugstore. Eighty-sixth and Madison.”

“Be at the Eighty-sixth-Street park entrance. I’m coming.”

I whirled and told Wolfe, “In Central Park. He met a woman with a dog. So long.”

“Are you armed?”

“Certainly.” I was at the door.

“They will be desperate.”

“I already am.”

I let myself out, ran down the stoop and to the corner. Herb was in his hack, listening to the radio. At sight of me on the lope he switched it off, and by the time I was in he had the engine started. I told him, “Eighty-sixth and Fifth,” and we rolled.

We went up Eleventh Avenue instead of Tenth because with the staggered lights on Tenth you can’t average better than twenty-five. On Eleventh you can make twelve or more blocks on a light if you sprint, and we sprinted. At Fifty-sixth we turned east, had fair luck crosstown, and turned left on Fifth Avenue. I told Herb to quit crawling, and he told me to get out and walk. When we reached Eighty-sixth Street I had the door open before the wheels stopped, hopped out, and crossed the avenue to the park side.

Bill Doyle was there. He was the pale gaunt type, from reading too much about horses and believing it. I asked him, “Anything new?”

“No. I been here waiting.”

“Can you show me Saul’s bush without rousing the dog?”

“I can if he’s still there. It’s quite a ways.”

“Within a hundred yards of them take to the grass. They mustn’t hear our footsteps stopping. Let’s go.”

He entered the park by the paved path, and I trailed. The first thirty paces it was upgrade, curving right. Under a park light two young couples had stopped to have an argument, and we detoured around them. The path leveled and straightened under overhanging branches of trees. We passed another light. A man swinging a cane came striding from the opposite direction and on by. The path turned left, crossed an open space, and entered shrubbery. A little further on there was a fork, and Doyle stopped.

“They’re down there a couple of hundred feet,” he whispered, pointing to the left branch of the fork. “Or they were. Saul’s over that way.”

“Okay, I’ll lead. Steer me by touch.”

I stepped onto the grass and started alongside the right branch of the fork. It was uphill a little, and I had to duck under branches. I hadn’t gone far when Doyle tugged at my sleeve, and when I turned he pointed to the left. “That bunch of bushes there,” he whispered. “The big one in the middle. That’s where he went, but I can’t see him.”

My sight is twenty-twenty, and my eyes had got adjusted to the night, but for a minute I couldn’t pick him up. When I did the huddled hump under the bush was perfectly plain. A ripple ran up my spine. Since Saul was still there, Heath was still there too, under his eye, and almost certainly the woman with the dog was there also. Of course I couldn’t see them, on account of the bushes. I considered what to do. I wanted to confront them together, before they separated, but if Saul was close enough to hear their words I didn’t want to bust it up. The most attractive idea was to sneak across to Saul’s bush and join him, but I might be heard, if not by them by the dog. Standing there, peering toward Saul’s bush, concentrated, with Doyle beside me, I became aware of footsteps behind me, approaching along the path, but supposed it was just a late park stroller and didn’t turn — until the footsteps stopped and a voice came.

“Looking for tigers?”

I wheeled. It was a flatfoot on park patrol. “Good evening, officer,” I said respectfully. “Nope, just getting air.”

“The air’s the same if you stay on the path.” He approached on the grass, looking not at us but past us, in the direction we had been gazing. Suddenly he grunted, quickened his step, and headed straight for Saul’s bush. Apparently he had good eyes too. There was no time to consider. I muttered fast at Doyle’s ear, “Grab his cap and run — jump, damn it!”

He did. I will always love him for it, especially for not hesitating a tenth of a second. Four leaps got him to the cop, a swoop of his hand got the cap, and away he scooted, swerving right to double back to the path. I stood in my tracks. The cop acted by reflex. Instead of ignoring the playful prank and proceeding to inspect the object under the bush, or making for me, he bounded after Doyle and his cap, calling a command to halt. Doyle, reaching the path and streaking along it, had a good lead, but the cop was no snail. They disappeared.

All that commotion changed the situation entirely. I made it double quick to the left across the grass until I reached the other fork of the path, and kept going. Around a bend, there they were — Heath seated on a bench with a woman, a big collie lying at their feet. When I stopped in front of them the collie rose to its haunches and made a noise, asking a question. I had a hand in a coat pocket.

“Tell the dog it’s okay,” I suggested. “I hate to shoot a dog.”

“Why should you—” Heath started, and stopped. He stood up.

“Yeah, it’s me,” I said. “Representing Nero Wolfe. It won’t help if you scream, there’s two of us. Come on out, Saul. Watch the dog, it may not wait for orders.”

There was a sound from the direction of the bushes, and in a moment Saul appeared, circling around to join me on the right. The dog made a noise that was more of a whine than a growl, but it didn’t move. The woman put a hand on its head. I asked Saul, “Could you hear what they said?”

“Most of it. I heard enough.”

“Was it interesting?”

“Yes.”

“This is illegal,” Heath stated. He was half choked with indignation or something. “This is an invasion—”

“Nuts. Save it; you may need it. I have a cab parked at the Eighty-sixth-Street entrance. Four of us with the dog will just fill it comfortably. Mr. Wolfe is expecting us. Let’s go.”

“You’re armed,” Heath said. “This is assault with a deadly weapon.”

“I’m going home,” the woman said, speaking for the first time. “I’ll telephone Mr. Wolfe, or my husband will, and we’ll see about this. I brought my dog to the park, and this gentleman and I happened to get into conversation. This is outrageous. You won’t dare to harm my dog.”

She got up, and the collie was instantly erect by her, against her knee.

“Well,” I conceded, “I admit I hate to shoot a dog. I also admit that Mr. Wolfe likes himself so well that he’ll steal the throne on the Day of Judgment if they don’t watch him. So you go on home with Towser, and Saul and I will call on the police and the FBI, and I’ll tell them what I saw, and Saul will tell them what he saw and heard. But don’t make the mistake of thinking you can talk them out of believing us. We have our reputations just as you have yours.”

They looked at each other. They looked at me and back at each other.

“We’ll see Mr. Wolfe,” the woman said.

Heath looked right and then left, as if hoping there might be someone else around to see, and then nodded at her.

“That’s sensible,” I told them. “You lead the way, Saul. Eighty-sixth-Street entrance.”

VIII

We left the collie in Herb’s taxi, parked at the curb in front of Wolfe’s place. There has never been a dog in that house, and I saw no point in breaking the precedent for one who was on such strained terms with me. Herb, on advice, closed the glass panels.

I went ahead up the stoop to open the door and let them in, put them in the front room with Saul, and went through to the office.

“Okay,” I told Wolfe, “it’s your turn. They’re here.”

Behind his desk, he closed the book he had been reading and put it down. He asked, “Mrs. Rackell?”

“Yes. They were there on a bench, with dog, and Saul was behind a bush and could hear, but I don’t know what. I gave them their choice of the law or you, and they preferred you. She probably thinks she can buy out. You want Saul first?”

“No. Bring them in.”

“But Saul can tell you—”

“I don’t need it. Or if I do — we’ll see.”

“You want him in too?”

“Yes.”

I went and opened the connecting door and invited them, and they entered. As Mrs. Rackell crossed to the red leather chair and sat her lips were so tight there were none. Heath’s face had no expression at all, but it must be hard to display feeling with that kind of round pudgy frontispiece even if you try. Saul took a chair against the far wall, but Wolfe told him to move up, and he transferred to one at the end of my desk.

Mrs. Rackell grabbed the ball. She said it was absolutely contemptible, spying on her and threatening her with the police. It was infamous and treacherous. She wouldn’t tolerate it.

Wolfe let her get it out and then said dryly, “You astonish me, madam.” He shook his head. “You chatter about proprieties when you are under the menace of a mortal peril. Don’t you realize what I’ve done? Don’t you know where we stand?”

“You’re chattering yourself,” Heath said harshly. “We were brought here under a threat. By what right?”

“I’ll tell you.” Wolfe leaned back. “This is no pleasure for me, so I’ll hurry it — my part of it. But you need to know exactly what the situation is, for you have a vital decision to make. First let me introduce Mr. Saul Panzer.” His eyes moved. “Saul, you followed Mr. Heath to a clandestine meeting with Mrs. Rackell?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then I’ll risk an assumption. I assume that his purpose was to protest against her supplying funds to inculpate Miss Goheen, and to demand that the attempt be abandoned. You heard much of what they said?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did it impeach my assumption?”

“No, sir.”

“Did it support it?”

“Yes, sir. Plenty.”

Wolfe went to Heath. “Mr. Panzer’s quality is known, though not to you until now. I think a jury will believe him, and I’m sure the police and the FBI will. My advice, sir, is to cut the loss.”

“Loss?” Heath was trying to sneer but with that face he couldn’t make it. “I haven’t lost anything.”

“You’re about to. You can’t help it.” Wolfe wiggled a finger at him. “Must I spell it out for you? Wednesday evening, day before yesterday, when you and six others were here, I was nonplused. I had my choice of giving up or of attempting simultaneously a dozen elaborate lines of inquiry, any one of which would have strained my resources. Neither was tolerable. Since I was helpless with what had already happened, I had to try to make something happen under my eye, and I devised a stratagem — a clumsy one, but the best I could do. I made a proposal to Mr. and Mrs. Rackell. I phrased it with care, but in effect I asked for money to bribe a witness and solve the case by chicanery.”

Wolfe’s eyes darted to Mrs. Rackell. “And you idiotically exposed yourself.”

“I did?” She was contemptuous. “How?”

“You grabbed at it. Your husband, in his innocence, was dubious, but not you. You thought that, having decided the job was beyond me, I was trying to earn a fee by knavery, and you eagerly acquiesced. Why? It was out of character and indeed preposterous. What you had said you wanted was the murderer of your nephew caught and punished, but apparently you were willing to spend a large sum of money, your own money, on a frame-up. Either that or you were excessively naive, and at least it justified speculation.”

His gaze was straight at her, and she was meeting it. He went on, “So I speculated. What if you had yourself killed your nephew? As for getting the poison, that was as feasible for you as for the others. As for opportunity, you said you had not entered your nephew’s room after Mrs. Kremp had been there and put the capsules in the pillbox, but could you prove it? There was nothing to my knowledge that excluded you. Your harassment of the FBI and the police could have been for assurance that you were safe. It was your husband who insisted on coming to me, and naturally you would have wanted to be present. As for motive, that would have to be explored, but for speculation there was material at hand, furnished by you. You were positive, with no real evidence for it, that your nephew had been killed by a Communist who had discovered that he was betraying the cause; you got that in first thing when you called here Tuesday with your husband. Might it not be true and you yourself the Communist?”

“Rot!” She snorted.

Wolfe shook his head. “Not necessarily. I deplore the current tendency to accuse people of pro-communism irresponsibly and unjustly, but anybody could be one secretly, no matter what façade he presented. There was the question, if you were in fact a Communist or a sympathizer, why did you so badger your nephew that he had to pacify you by telling the lie that he was working for the FBI? Why didn’t you confide in him your own devotion to the cause? Of course you didn’t dare. There would have been the danger that he might recant; he might have become an ex-Communist and told all he knew, as so many have done the past year or two; and to preserve your façade for your husband and friends you had to keep after him. It must have been a severe shock when you learned, or thought you did, that he was an agent of communism’s implacable enemy. It made him an imminent threat, there in your own household.”

Wolfe came forward in his chair. “That was all speculation two days ago, but not now. Your meeting with Mr. Heath has made it a confident assumption. Why would you make a secret rendezvous with him? What could give him the right to demand that you withdraw the offer of money for Miss Devlin? Well. If you are secretly a Communist, almost certainly you have contributed substantial sums of money — to the party of course, but also to the bail fund; and Mr. Heath is the trustee of the bail fund and is inviting a term in jail rather than disclose the names of the contributors. So, madam, my stratagem worked — with, I confess, a full share of luck. Mr, Goodwin and I have been under some strain. Until a few minutes ago, when he entered and told me you two were here, I wouldn’t have wagered a nickel on it. Now it’s over, thank heaven. My assumptions are on rock. You’re cooked.”

“You’re a conceited fool,” Mrs. Rackell said flatly. For the first time I thought she was really impressive. He hadn’t made a dent in her. She was still dead sure of herself. “With your crazy assumptions,” she said. “I was resting on a park bench, and this Mr. Heath came along and spoke.” She darted a contemptuous glance at Saul. “Whatever lies that man tells about what he heard.”

Wolfe nodded. “That of course is your best position, and no doubt you’re capable of defending it against all assault, so I won’t try butting it.” He looked at Heath. “But yours is much weaker, and I don’t see how you can hold it.”

“I have withstood better men than you,” Heath declared. “Men in positions of great power. Men who head the imperialist conspiracy to dominate the world.”

“No doubt,” Wolfe conceded. “But even if you appraise them correctly, which I question, right now you have to appraise me. I head no conspiracy to dominate anything, but I’ve got you in a hole you can’t scramble out of. Must I spell it out for you? You’re a trustee of that Communist bail fund, amounting to nearly a million dollars, and at great personal risk you are determined to keep the names of the contributors secret. Court orders haven’t budged you. Obviously you prefer any alternative to disclosure of the names. But you’re going to disclose one of them to me now: Mrs. Benjamin Rackell. And the amounts and dates of her contributions. Well?”

“No comment.”

“Pfui. I say you can’t hold it. Consider what’s going to happen. I am convinced that Mrs. Rackell murdered her nephew because she thought he was spying on Communists for the FBI, and therefore, of course, her own secret was in danger. The FBI and the police will now share that conviction. Whether it takes a day or a year, do you think there’s any chance we won’t get her? Knowing she had the poison, do you think we won’t discover where and how she got it?”

Wolfe shook his head. “No. You’ll have to ditch her. She’s too hot to hold. The police will put it to you — have you any knowledge or evidence that she has been in sympathy with the Communist cause? You say no or refuse to answer. Subsequently they get such evidence, with proof that you were aware of it; it is easily possible that, through some process which you cannot avert, they will get the whole list of contributors. And instead of a brief commitment for contempt of court you’ll get a considerable term for withholding vital evidence in a murder case. Besides, what of the cause you’re devoted to? You know the opinion of communism held by most Americans, including me. To the odium already attached to it would you add the stigma of shielding a murderer?”

Wolfe raised his brows. “Really, Mr. Heath. There are plenty of precedents to guide you. This will be by no means the first time that an act of misguided zeal by a Communist has come home to roost. In the countries they rule the jails are full — let alone the graves — of former comrades who were indiscreet. In America, where you don’t rule and I hope you never will, can you afford the luxury of shielding a murderer? No. She’s too much for you. How much has she contributed and when?”

Heath’s face was really something. If he hadn’t inherited money he could have piled it up playing poker. From looking at him no one could have got the faintest notion how to bet.

He stood up. “I’ll let you know tomorrow,” he said.

Wolfe grunted. “Oh no. I want to phone the police to come for her. They’ll want a statement from you. Archie?”

I got up and moved and was between the company and the door. Heath moved too. “I’m going,” he said, and came. When I stood pat he swerved to circle around me. It would have been a pleasure to plug him, but I refrained and merely got his shoulder, whirled him, and propelled him a little. He stumbled but stayed upright.

“This is assault,” he told Wolfe, not me. “And illegal restraint. You’ll regret this.”

“Bosh.” Wolfe suddenly blew up. “Confound it, do you think I’m going to let you walk out to call a meeting of your Politburo? Do you think I don’t know when I’ve got you hooked? You can’t possibly hang onto her. Talk sense! Can you?”

“No,” he said.

“Are you ready to disclose the facts?”

“Not to you. To the police, yes.”

Mrs. Rackell snapped at him, “Have you gone mad, you fool?”

He stared at her. I’ve heard a lot of phony cracks in that office, of all kinds and shapes, but that one by Henry Jameson Heath took the cake. Staring at her, he said calmly, “I must do my duty as a citizen, Mrs. Rackell.”

Wolfe spoke. “Archie, get Mr. Cramer.”

I stepped to my desk and dialed.

IX

Saturday noon, the next day, Wengert and Cramer stood there in the office, at the end of Wolfe’s desk. They were standing because, having been there nearly an hour and covered all the points, they were ready to leave. They had not admitted in so many words that Wolfe had done the American people, including them, a favor, but on the whole they had been sociable.

As they were turning to go I said, “Excuse me, one little thing.”

They looked at me. I spoke to Wengert. “I thought Mr. Wolfe might mention it, but he didn’t, and neither did you. I only bring it up to offer a constructive criticism. An FBI undercover girl, even one disguised as a Commie, shouldn’t get in the habit of hurting people’s feelings just for the hell of it. It didn’t do a particle of good for Carol Berk to call me a crummy little stooge before a witness. Of course she was sore because I found her in the closet, but even so. I think you ought to speak to her about it.”

Wengert was frowning at me. “Carol Berk? What kind of a gag is this?”

“Oh, come off it.” I was disgusted. “How thick could I get? It was so obvious Mr. Wolfe didn’t even bother to comment on it. Who else could have told you about my talk with Delia Devlin? She trusted Miss Berk enough to let her hide in the closet, so of course she told her about it. Do you want to debate it with me on TV?”

“No. Nor with anybody else. You talk too damn much.”

“Only with the right people. Say please, and I’ll promise not to tell. I just wanted to make a helpful suggestion. I may be crummy and I may be a stooge, but I’m not little.”

Cramer snorted. “If you ask me there’s too much of you. About a hundred and eighty pounds too much. Come on, Wengert, I’m late.”

They went. I supposed that was the last of that, but a couple of days later, Monday afternoon, while Wolfe was dictating a letter, the phone rang and a voice said it was Carol Berk. I said hello, showing no enthusiasm, and asked her, “How are your manners?”

“Rotten when required,” she said cheerfully. “Privately like this, from a phone booth, I can be charming. I thought it was only fair for me to apologize for calling you little.”

“Okay, go ahead.”

“I thought you might prefer it face to face. I’m willing to take the trouble if you insist.”

“Well, I’ll tell you. I had an idea last week, Wednesday I think it was, that I ought to find time some day to tell you why I don’t like you. We could meet and clean it up. I’ll tell you why I don’t like you, and you’ll apologize. The Churchill bar at four-thirty? Can you be seen with me in public?”

“Certainly, I’m supposed to be seen in public.”

“Fine. I’ll have a hammer and sickle in my buttonhole.”

As I hung up and swiveled I told Wolfe, “That was Carol Berk. I’m going to buy her a drink and possibly food. Since she was connected with the case we’ve just finished, of course I’ll put it on the expense account.”

“You will not,” he asserted and resumed the dictation.

Content

Rex Stout
Home to Roost

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