Rex Stout

The Labor Union Murder

Chapter 1

Flora Korby swiveled her head, with no hat hiding any of her dark brown hair, to face me with her dark brown eyes. She spoke.

“I guess I should have brought my car and led the way.”

“I’m doing fine,” I assured her. “I could shut one eye too.”

“Please don’t,” she begged. “I’m stupefied as it is. May I have your autograph — I mean when we stop?”

Since she was highly presentable I didn’t mind her assuming that I was driving with one hand because my right arm wanted to stretch across her shoulders, though she was wrong. I had left the cradle long ago. But there was no point in explaining to her that Nero Wolfe, who was in the back seat, had a deep distrust of moving vehicles and hated to ride in one unless I drove it, and therefore I was glad to have an excuse to drive with one hand because that would make it more thrilling for him.

Anyway, she might have guessed it. The only outside interest that Wolfe permits to interfere with his personal routine of comfort, not to mention luxury, is Rusterman’s restaurant. Its founder, Marko Vukcic, was Wolfe’s oldest and closest friend; and when Vukcic died, leaving the restaurant to members of the staff and making Wolfe executor of his estate, he also left a letter asking Wolfe to see to it that the restaurant’s standards and reputation were maintained; and Wolfe had done so, making unannounced visits there once or twice a week, and sometimes even oftener, without ever grumbling — well, hardly ever. But he sure did grumble when Felix, the maître d’hôtel, asked him to make a speech at the Independence Day picnic of the United Restaurant Workers of America. Hereafter I’ll make it URWA.

He not only grumbled, he refused. But Felix kept after him, and Wolfe finally gave in when Felix came to the office one day with reinforcements: Paul Rago, the sauce chef at the Churchill; James Korby, the president of URWA; H. L. Griffin, a food and wine importer who supplied hard-to-get items not only for Rusterman’s but also for Wolfe’s own table; and Philip Holt, URWA’s director of organization. They also were to be on the program at the picnic, and their main appeal was that they simply had to have the man who was responsible for keeping Rusterman’s the best restaurant in New York after the death of Marko Vukcic. Since Wolfe is only as vain as three peacocks, and since he had loved Marko if he ever loved anyone, that got him. There had been another inducement: Philip Holt had agreed to lay off of Fritz, Wolfe’s chef and housekeeper. For three years Fritz had been visiting the kitchen at Rusterman’s off and on as a consultant, and Holt had been pestering him, insisting that he had to join URWA. You can guess how Wolfe liked that.

Since I do everything that has to be done in connection with Wolfe’s business and his rare social activities, except that he thinks he does all the thinking, and we won’t go into that now, it would be up to me to get him to the scene of the picnic, Culp’s Meadows on Long Island, on the Fourth of July. Around the end of June James Korby phoned and introduced his daughter Flora. She told me that the directions to Culp’s Meadows were very complicated, and I said that all directions on Long Island were very complicated, and she said she had better drive us out in her car.

I liked her voice, that is true, but also I have a lot of foresight, and it occurred to me immediately that it would be a new and exciting experience for my employer to watch me drive with one hand, so I told her that, while it must be Wolfe’s car and I must drive, I would deeply appreciate it if she would come along and tell me the way. That was how it happened, and that was why, when we finally rolled through the gate at Culp’s Meadows, after some thirty miles of Long Island parkways and another ten of grade intersections and trick turns, Wolfe’s lips were pressed so tight he didn’t have any. He had spoken only once, around the fourth or fifth mile, when I had swept around a slowpoke.

“Archie. You know quite well.”

“Yes, sir.” Of course I kept my eyes straight ahead. “But it’s an impulse, having my arm like this, and I’m afraid to take it away because if I fight an impulse it makes me nervous, and driving when you’re nervous is bad.”

A glance in the mirror showed me his lips tightening, and they stayed tight.

Passing through the gate at Culp’s Meadows, and winding around as directed by Flora Korby, I used both hands. It was a quarter to three, so we were on time, since the speeches were scheduled for three o’clock. Flora was sure a space would have been saved for us back of the tent, and after threading through a few acres of parked cars I found she was right, and rolled to a stop with the radiator only a couple of yards from the canvas. She hopped out and opened the rear door on her side, and I did likewise on mine. Wolfe’s eyes went right to her, and then left to me. He was torn. He didn’t want to favor a woman, even a young and pretty one, but he absolutely had to show me what he thought of one-handed driving. His eyes went right again, the whole seventh of a ton of him moved, and he climbed out on her side.

Chapter 2

The tent, on a wooden platform raised three feet above the ground, not much bigger than Wolfe’s office, was crowded with people, and I wormed through to the front entrance and on out, where the platform extended into the open air. There was plenty of air, with a breeze dancing in from the direction of the ocean, and plenty of sunshine. A fine day for the Fourth of July. The platform extension was crammed with chairs, most of them empty. I can’t report on the condition of the meadow’s grass because my view was obstructed by ten thousand restaurant workers and their guests, maybe more. A couple of thousand of them were in a solid mass facing the platform, presumably those who wanted to be up front for the speeches, and the rest were sprayed around all over, clear across to a fringe of trees and a row of sheds.

Flora’s voice came from behind my shoulder. “They’re coming out, so if there’s a chair you like, grab it. Except the six up front; they’re for the speakers.”

Naturally I started to tell her I wanted the one next to hers, but didn’t get it out because people came jostling out of the tent onto the extension. Thinking I had better warn Wolfe that the chair he was about to occupy for an hour or so was about half as wide as his fanny, to give him time to fight his impulses, I worked past to the edge of the entrance, and when the exodus had thinned out I entered the tent. Five men were standing grouped beside a cot which was touching the canvas of the far side, and a man was lying on the cot. To my left Nero Wolfe was bending over to peer at the contents of a metal box there on a table with its lid open. I stepped over for a look and saw a collection of bone-handled knives, eight of them, with blades varying in length from six inches up to twelve. They weren’t shiny, but they looked sharp, worn narrow by a lot of use for a lot of years. I asked Wolfe whose throat he was going to cut.

“They are Dubois,” he said. “Real old Dubois. The best. They belong to Mr. Korby. He brought them to use in a carving contest, and he won, as he should. I would gladly steal them.” He turned. “Why don’t they let that man alone?”

I turned too, and through a gap in the group saw that the man on the cot was Philip Holt, URWA’s director of organization. “What’s the matter with him?” I asked.

“Something he ate. They think snails. Probably the wrong kind of snails. A doctor gave him something to help his bowels handle them. Why don’t they leave him alone with his bowels?”

“I’ll go ask,” I said, and moved.

As I approached the cot James Korby was speaking. “I say he should be taken to a hospital, in spite of what that doctor said. Look at his color!”

Korby, short, pudgy, and bald, looked more like a restaurant customer than a restaurant worker, which may have been one reason he was president of URWA.

“I agree,” Dick Vetter said emphatically. I had never seen Dick Vetter in person, but I had seen him often enough on his TV show — in fact, a little too often. If I quit dialing his channel he wouldn’t miss me, since twenty million Americans, mostly female, were convinced that he was the youngest and handsomest MC on the waves. Flora Korby had told me he would be there, and why. His father had been a bus boy in a Broadway restaurant for thirty years, and still was because he wouldn’t quit.

Paul Rago did not agree, and said so. “It would be a pity,” he declared. He made it “peety,” his accent having tapered off enough not to make it “peetee.” With his broad shoulders and six feet, his slick black hair going gray, and his mustache with pointed tips that was still all black, he looked more like an ambassador from below the border than a sauce chef. He was going on. “He is the most important man in the union — except, of course, the president — and he should make an appearance on the platform. Perhaps he can before we are through.”

“I hope you will pardon me.” That was H. L. Griffin, the food and wine importer. He was a skinny little runt, with a long narrow chin and something wrong with one eye, but he spoke with the authority of a man whose firm occupied a whole floor in one of the midtown hives. “I may have no right to an opinion, since I am not a member of your great organization, but you have done me the honor of inviting me to take part in your celebration of our country’s independence, and I do know of Phil Holt’s high standing and wide popularity among your members. I would merely say that I feel that Mr. Rago is right, that they will be disappointed not to see him on the platform. I hope I am not being presumptuous.”

From outside the tent, from the loudspeakers at the corners of the platform, a booming voice had been calling to the picnickers scattered over the meadow to close in and prepare to listen. As the group by the cot went on arguing, a state trooper in uniform, who had been standing politely aside, came over and joined them and took a look at Philip Holt, but offered no advice. Wolfe also approached for a look. Myself, I would have said that the place for him was a good bed with an attractive nurse smoothing his brow. I saw him shiver all over at least three times. He decided it himself, finally, by muttering at them to let him alone and turning on his side to face the canvas. Flora Korby had come in, and she put a blanket over him, and I noticed that Dick Vetter made a point of helping her. The breeze was sweeping through and one of them said he shouldn’t be in a draft, and Wolfe told me to lower the flap of the rear entrance, and I did so. The flap didn’t want to stay down, so I tied the plastic tape fastening to hold it, in a single bowknot. Then they all marched out through the front entrance to the platform, including the state trooper, and I brought up the rear. As Korby passed the table he stopped to lower the lid on the box of knives, real old Dubois.

The speeches lasted an hour and eight minutes, and the ten thousand URWA members and guests took them standing like ladies and gentlemen. You are probably hoping I will report them word for word, but I didn’t take them down and I didn’t listen hard enough to engrave them on my memory. At that, the eagle didn’t scream as much or as loud as I had expected. From my seat in the back row I could see most of the audience, and it was quite a sight.

The first speaker was a stranger, evidently the one who had been calling on them to gather around while we were in the tent, and after a few fitting remarks he introduced James Korby. While Korby was orating, Paul Rago left his seat, passed down the aisle in the center, and entered the tent. Since he had plugged for an appearance by Philip Holt I thought his purpose might be to drag him out alive or dead, but it wasn’t. In a minute he was back again, and just in time, for he had just sat down when Korby finished and Rago was introduced.

The faces out front had all been serious for Korby, but Rago’s accent through the loudspeakers had most of them grinning by the time he warmed up. When Korby left his chair and started down the aisle I suspected him of walking out on Rago because Rago had walked out on him, but maybe not, since his visit in the tent was even shorter than Rago’s had been. He came back out and returned to his chair, and listened attentively to the accent.

Next came H. L. Griffin, the importer, and the chairman had to lower the mike for him. His voice took the loudspeakers better than any of the others, and in fact he was darned good. It was only fair, I thought, to have the runt of the bunch take the cake, and I was all for the cheers from the throng that kept him on his feet a full minute after he finished. He really woke them up, and they were still yelling when he turned and went down the aisle to the tent, and it took the chairman a while to calm them down. Then, just as he started to introduce Dick Vetter, the TV star suddenly bounced up and started down the aisle with a determined look on his face, and it was easy to guess why. He thought Griffin was going to take advantage of the enthusiasm he had aroused by hauling Philip Holt out to the platform, and he was going to stop him. But he didn’t have to. He was still two steps short of the tent entrance when Griffin emerged alone. Vetter moved aside to let him pass and then disappeared into the tent. As Griffin proceeded to his chair in the front row there were some scattered cheers from the crowd, and the chairman had to quiet them again before he could go on. Then he introduced Dick Vetter, who came out of the tent and along to the mike, which had to be raised again, at just the right moment.

As Vetter started to speak, Nero Wolfe arose and headed for the tent, and I raised my brows. Surely, I thought, he’s not going to involve himself in the Holt problem; and then, seeing the look on his face, I caught on. The edges of the wooden chair seat had been cutting into his fanny for nearly an hour and he was in a tantrum, and he wanted to cool off a little before he was called to the mike. I grinned at him sympathetically as he passed and then gave my ear to Vetter. His soapy voice (I say soapy) came through the loudspeakers in a flow of lather, and after a couple of minutes of it I was thinking that it was only fair for Griffin, the runt, to sound like a man, and for Vetter, the handsome young idol of millions, to sound like whipped cream, when my attention was called. Wolfe was at the tent entrance, crooking a finger at me. As I got up and approached he backed into the tent, and I followed. He crossed to the rear entrance, lifted the flap, maneuvered his bulk through the hole, and held the flap for me. When I had made it he descended the five steps to the ground, walked to the car, grabbed the handle of the rear door, and pulled. Nothing doing. He turned to me.

“Unlock it.”

I stood. “Do you want something?”

“Unlock it and get in and get the thing started. We’re going.”

“We are like hell. You’ve got a speech to make.”

He glared at me. He knows my tones of voice as well as I know his. “Archie,” he said, “I am not being eccentric. There is a sound and cogent reason and I’ll explain on the way. Unlock this door.”

I shook my head. “Not till I hear the reason. I admit it’s your car.” I took the keys from my pocket and offered them. “Here. I resign.”

“Very well.” He was grim. “That man on the cot is dead. I lifted the blanket to adjust it. One of those knives is in his back, clear to the handle. He is dead. If we are still here when the discovery is made you know what will happen. We will be here all day, all night, a week, indefinitely. That is intolerable. We can answer questions at home as well as here. Confound it, unlock the door!”

“How dead is he?”

“I have told you he is dead.”

“Okay. You ought to know better. You do know better. We’re stuck. They wouldn’t ask us questions at home, they’d haul us back out here. They’d be waiting for us on the stoop and you wouldn’t get inside the house.” I returned the keys to my pocket. “Running out when you’re next on the program, that would be nice. The only question is do we report it now or do you make your speech and let someone else find it, and you can answer that.”

He had stopped glaring. He took in a long, deep breath, and when it was out again he said, “I’ll make my speech.”

“Fine. It’d be a shame to waste it. A question. Just now when you lifted the flap to come out I didn’t see you untie the tape fastening. Was it already untied?”

“Yes.”

“That makes it nice.” I turned and went to the steps, mounted, raised the flap for him, and followed him into the tent. He crossed to the front and on out, and I stepped to the cot. Philip Holt lay facing the wall, with the blanket up to his neck, and I pulled it down far enough to see the handle of the knife, an inch to the right of the point of the shoulder blade. The knife blade was all buried. I lowered the blanket some more to get at a hand, pinched a fingertip hard for ten seconds, released it, and saw it stay white. I picked some fluff from the blanket and dangled it against his nostrils for half a minute. No movement. I put the blanket back as I had found it, went to the metal box on the table and lifted the lid, and saw that the shortest knife, the one with the six-inch blade, wasn’t there.

As I went to the rear entrance and raised the flap, Dick Vetter’s lather or whipped cream, whichever you prefer, came to an end through the loudspeakers, and as I descended the five steps the meadowful of picnickers was cheering.

Our sedan was the third car on the right from the foot of the steps. The second car to the left of the steps was a 1955 Plymouth, and I was pleased to see that it still had an occupant, having previously noticed her — a woman with careless gray hair topping a wide face and a square chin, in the front seat but not behind the wheel.

I circled around to her side and spoke through the open window. “I beg your pardon. May I introduce myself?”

“You don’t have to, young man. Your name’s Archie Goodwin, and you work for Nero Wolfe, the detective.” She had tired gray eyes. “You were just out here with him.”

“Right. I hope you won’t mind if I ask you something. How long have you been sitting here?”

“Long enough. But it’s all right, I can hear the speeches. Nero Wolfe is just starting to speak now.”

“Have you been here since the speeches started?”

“Yes, I have. I ate too much of the picnic stuff and I didn’t feel like standing up in that crowd, so I came to sit in the car.”

“Then you’ve been here all the time since the speeches began?”

“That’s what I said. Why do you want to know?”

“I’m just checking on something. If you don’t mind. Has anyone gone into the tent or come out of it while you’ve been here?”

Her tired eyes woke up a little. “Ha,” she said, “so something’s missing. I’m not surprised. What’s missing?”

“Nothing, as far as I know. I’m just checking a certain fact. Of course you saw Mr. Wolfe and me come out and go back in. Anyone else, either going or coming?”

“You’re not fooling me, young man. Something’s missing, and you’re a detective.”

I grinned at her. “All right, have it your way. But I do want to know, if you don’t object.”

“I don’t object. As I told you, I’ve been right here ever since the speeches started, I got here before that. And nobody has gone into the tent, nobody but you and Nero Wolfe, and I haven’t either. I’ve been right here. If you want to know about me, my name is Anna Banau, Mrs. Alexander Banau, and my husband is a captain at Zoller’s—”

A scream came from inside the tent, an all-out scream from a good pair of lungs. I moved, to the steps, up, and past the flap into the tent. Flora Korby was standing near the cot with her back to it, her hand covering her mouth. I was disappointed in her. Granting that a woman has a right to scream when she finds a corpse, she might have kept it down until Wolfe had finished his speech.

Chapter 3

It was a little after four o’clock when Flora Korby screamed. It was 4:34 when a glance outside through a crack past the flap of the tent’s rear entrance, the third such glance I had managed to make, showed me that the Plymouth containing Mrs. Alexander Banau was gone. It was 4:39 when the medical examiner arrived with his bag and found that Philip Holt was still dead. It was 4:48 when the scientists came, with cameras and fingerprint kits and other items of equipment, and Wolfe and I and the others were herded out to the extension, under guard. It was 5:16 when I counted a total of seventeen cops, state and county, in uniform and out, on the job. It was 5:30 when Wolfe muttered at me bitterly that it would certainly be all night. It was 5:52 when a chief of detectives named Baxter got so personal with me that I decided, finally and definitely, not to play. It was 6:21 when we all left Culp’s Meadows for an official destination. There were four in our car: one in uniform with Wolfe in the back seat, and one in his own clothes with me in front. Again I had someone beside me to tell me the way, but I didn’t put my arm across his shoulders.

There had been some conversing with us separately, but most of it had been a panel discussion, open air, out on the platform extension, so I knew pretty well how things stood. Nobody was accusing anybody. Three of them — Korby, Rago, and Griffin — gave approximately the same reason for their visits to the tent during the speechmaking: that they were concerned about Philip Holt and wanted to see if he was all right. The fourth, Dick Vetter, gave the reason I had guessed, that he thought Griffin might bring Holt out to the platform, and he intended to stop him. Vetter, by the way, was the only one who raised a fuss about being detained. He said that it hadn’t been easy to get away from his duties that afternoon, and he had a studio rehearsal scheduled for six o’clock, and he absolutely had to be there. At 6:21, when we all left for the official destination, he was fit to be tied.

None of them claimed to know for sure that Holt had been alive at the time he visited the tent; they all had supposed he had fallen asleep. All except Vetter said they had gone to the cot and looked at him, at his face, and had suspected nothing wrong. None of them had spoken to him. To the question, “Who do you think did it and why?” they all gave the same answer: someone must have entered the tent by the rear entrance, stabbed him, and departed. The fact that the URWA director of organization had got his stomach into trouble and had been attended by a doctor in the tent had been no secret, anything but.

I have been leaving Flora out, since I knew and you know she was clear, but the cops didn’t. I overheard one of them tell another one it was probably her, because stabbing a sick man was more like something a woman would do than a man.

Of course the theory that someone had entered by the back door made the fastening of the tent flap an important item. I said I had tied the tape before we left the tent, and they all agreed that they had seen me do so except Dick Vetter, who said he hadn’t noticed because he had been helping to arrange the blanket over Holt; and Wolfe and I both testified that the tape was hanging loose when we had entered the tent while Vetter was speaking. Under this theory the point wasn’t who had untied it, since the murderer could have easily reached through the crack from the outside and jerked the knot loose; the question was when. On that none of them was any help. All four said they hadn’t noticed whether the tape was tied or not when they went inside the tent.

That was how it stood, as far as I knew, when we left Culp’s Meadows. The official destination turned out to be a building I had been in before a time or two, not as a murder suspect — a county courthouse back of a smooth green lawn with a couple of big trees. First we were collected in a room on the ground floor, and, after a long wait, were escorted up one flight and through a door that was inscribed DISTRICT ATTORNEY.

At least 91.2 percent of the district attorneys in the State of New York think they would make fine tenants of the governor’s mansion at Albany, and that should be kept in mind in considering the conduct of DA James R. Delaney. To him at least four of that bunch, and possibly all five, were upright, important citizens in positions to influence segments of the electorate. His attitude as he attacked the problem implied that he was merely chairing a meeting of a community council called to deal with a grave and difficult emergency — except, I noticed, when he was looking at or speaking to Wolfe or me. Then his smile quit working, his tone sharpened, and his eyes had a different look.

With a stenographer at a side table taking it down, he spent an hour going over it with us, or rather with them, with scattered contributions from Chief of Detectives Baxter and others who had been at the scene, and then spoke his mind.

“It seems,” he said, “to be the consensus that some person unknown entered the tent from the rear, stabbed him, and departed. There is the question, how could such a person have known the knife would be there at hand? but he need not have known. He might have decided to murder only when he saw the knives, or he might have had some other weapon with him, and, seeing the knives, thought one of them would better serve his purpose and used it instead. Either is plausible. It must be admitted that the whole theory is plausible, and none of the facts now known are in contradiction to it. You agree, Chief?”

“Right,” Baxter conceded. “Up to now. As long as the known facts are facts.”

Delaney nodded. “Certainly. They have to be checked.” His eyes took in the audience. “You gentleman, and you, Miss Korby, you understand that you are to remain in this jurisdiction, the State of New York, until further notice, and you are to be available. With that understood, it seems unnecessary at present to put you under bond as material witnesses. We have your addresses and know where to find you.”

He focused on Wolfe, and his tone changed. “With you, Wolfe, the situation is somewhat different. You’re a licensed private detective, and so is Goodwin, and the record of your high-handed performances does not inspire confidence in your — uh — candor. There may be some complicated and subtle reasons why the New York City authorities have stood for your tricks, but out here in the suburbs we’re more simpleminded. We don’t like tricks.”

He lowered his chin, which made his eyes slant up under his heavy brows. “Let’s see if I’ve got your story straight. You say that as Vetter started to speak you felt in your pocket for a paper on which you had made notes for your speech, found it wasn’t there, thought you had left it in your car, went to get it, and when, after you had entered the tent, it occurred to you that the car was locked and Goodwin had the keys, you summoned him and you and he went out to the car. Then Goodwin remembered that the paper had been left on your desk at your office, and you and he returned to the tent, and you went out to the platform and resumed your seat. Another item: when you went to the rear entrance to leave the tent to go out to the car, the tape fastening of the flap was hanging loose, not tied. Is that your story?”

Wolfe cleared his throat. “Mr. Delaney. I suppose it is pointless to challenge your remark about my candor or to ask you to phrase your question less offensively.” His shoulders went up an eighth of an inch, and down. “Yes, that’s my story.”

“I merely asked you the question.”

“I answered it.”

“So you did.” The DA’s eyes came to me. “And of course, Goodwin, your story is the same. If it needed arranging, there was ample time for that during the hubbub that followed Miss Korby’s scream. But with you there’s more to it. You say that after you and Wolfe re-entered the tent, and he continued through the front entrance to the platform, it occurred to you that there was a possibility that he had taken the paper from his desk and put it in his pocket, and had consulted it during the ride, and had left it in the car, and you went out back again to look, and you were out there when Miss Korby screamed. Is that correct?”

As I had long since decided not to play, when Baxter had got too personal, I merely said, “Check.”

Delaney returned to Wolfe. “If you object to my being offensive, Wolfe, I’ll put it this way: I find some of this hard to believe. Anyone as glib as you are needing notes for a little speech like that? And you thinking you had left the paper in the car, and Goodwin remembering it had been left at home on your desk and then thinking it might be in the car after all? Also there are certain facts. You and Goodwin were the last people inside the tent before Miss Korby entered and found the body. You admit it. The others all state that they don’t know whether the tape was tied or not when they visited the tent; you and Goodwin can’t very well say that, since you went out that way, so you say you found it untied.”

He cocked his head. “You admit you had had words with Philip Holt during the past year. You admit he had become obnoxious to you — your word, obnoxious — by his insistence that your personal chef must join his union. The record of your past performances justifies me in saying that a man who renders himself obnoxious to you had better watch his step. I’ll say this, if it weren’t for the probability that some unknown person entered from the rear, and I concede that it’s quite possible, you and Goodwin would be held in custody until a judge could be found to issue a warrant for your arrest as material witnesses. As it is, I’ll make it easier for you.” He looked at his wristwatch. “It’s five minutes to eight. I’ll send a man with you to a restaurant down the street, and we’ll expect you back here at nine-thirty. I want to cover all the details with you, thoroughly.” His eyes moved. “The rest of you may go for the present, but you are to be available.”

Wolfe stood up. “Mr. Goodwin and I are going home,” he announced. “We will not be back this evening.”

Delaney’s eyes narrowed. “If that’s the way you feel about it, you’ll stay. You can send out for sandwiches.”

“Are we under arrest?”

The DA opened his mouth, closed it, and opened it again. “No.”

“Then we’re going.” Wolfe was assured but not belligerent. “I understand your annoyance, sir, at this interference with your holiday, and I’m aware that you don’t like me — or what you know, or think you know, of my record. But I will not surrender my convenience to your humor. You can detain me only if you charge me, and with what? Mr. Goodwin and I have supplied all the information we have. Your intimation that I am capable of murdering a man, or of inciting Mr. Goodwin to murder him, because he has made a nuisance of himself, is puerile. You concede that the murderer could have been anyone in that throng of thousands. You have no basis whatever for any supposition that Mr. Goodwin and I are concealing any knowledge that would help you. Should such a basis appear, you know where to find us. Come, Archie.”

He turned and headed for the door, and I followed. I can’t report the reaction because Delaney at his desk was behind me, and it would have been bad tactics to look back over my shoulder. All I knew was that Baxter took two steps and stopped, and none of the other cops moved. We made the hall, and the entrance, and down the path to the sidewalk, without a shot being fired; and half a block to where the car was parked. Wolfe told me to find a phone booth and call Fritz to tell him when we would arrive for dinner, and I steered for the center of town.

As I had holiday traffic to cope with, it was half past nine by the time we got home and washed and seated at the dinner table. A moving car is no place to give Wolfe bad news, or good news either for that matter, and there was no point in spoiling his dinner, so I waited until after we had finished with the poached and truffled broilers and broccoli and stuffed potatoes and herbs, and salad and cheese, and Fritz had brought coffee to us in the office, to open the bag. Wolfe was reaching for the remote-control television gadget, to turn it on so as to have the pleasure of turning it off again, when I said, “Hold a minute. I have a report to make. I don’t blame you for feeling self-satisfied, you got us away very neatly, but there’s a catch. It wasn’t somebody that came in the back way. It was one of them.”

“Indeed.” He was placid, after-dinner placid, in the comfortable, big made-to-order chair back of his desk. “What is this, flummery?”

“No, sir. Nor am I trying to show that I’m smarter than you are for once. It’s just that I know more. When you left the tent to go to the car your mind was on a quick getaway, so you may not have noticed that a woman was sitting there in a car to the left, but I did. When we returned to the tent and you went on out front, I had an idea and went out back again and had a talk with her. I’ll give it to you verbatim, since it’s important.”

I did so. That was simple, compared with the three-way and four-way conversations I have been called on to report word for word. When I finished he was scowling at me, as black as the coffee in his cup.

“Confound it,” he growled.

“Yes, sir. I was going to tell you, there when we were settling the details of why we went out to the car, the paper with your notes, but as you know we were interrupted, and after that there was no opportunity that I liked, and anyway I had seen that Mrs. Banau and the car were gone, and that baboon named Baxter had hurt my feelings, and I had decided not to play. Of course the main thing was you, your wanting to go home. If they had known it was one of us six, or seven counting Flora, we would all have been held as material witnesses, and you couldn’t have got bail on the Fourth of July, and God help you, I can manage in a cell, but you’re too big. Also if I got you home you might feel like discussing a raise in pay. Do you?”

“Shut up.” He closed his eyes, and after a moment opened them again. “We’re in a pickle. They may find that woman any moment, or she may disclose herself. What about her? You have given me her words, but what about her?”

“She’s good. They’ll believe her. I did. You would. From where she sat the steps and tent entrance were in her minimum field of vision, no obstructions, less than ten yards away.”

“If she kept her eyes open.”

“She thinks she did, and that will do for the cops when they find her. Anyhow, I think she did too. When she said nobody had gone into the tent but you and me she meant it.”

“There’s the possibility that she herself, or someone she knew and would protect — No, that’s absurd, since she stayed there in the car for some time after the body was found. We’re in a fix.”

“Yes, sir.” Meeting his eyes, I saw no sign of the gratitude I might reasonably have expected, so I went on. “I would like to suggest, in considering the situation don’t bother about me. I can’t be charged with withholding evidence because I didn’t report my talk with her. I can just say I didn’t believe her and saw no point in making it tougher for us by dragging it in. The fact that someone might have come in the back way didn’t eliminate us. Of course I’ll have to account for my questioning her, but that’s easy. I can say I discovered that he was dead after you went back out to the platform to make your speech, and, having noticed her there in the car, I went out to question her before reporting the discovery, and was interrupted by the scream in the tent. So don’t mind me. Anything you say. I can phone Delaney in the morning, or you can, and spill it, or we can just sit tight and wait for the fireworks.”

“Pfui,” he said.

“Amen,” I said.

He took in air, audibly, and let it out. “That woman may be communicating with them at this moment, or they may be finding her. I don’t complain of your performance; indeed, I commend it. If you had reported that conversation we would both be spending tonight in jail.” He made a face. “Bah. As it is, at least we can try something. What time is it?”

I looked at my wristwatch. He would have had to turn his head almost to a right angle to glance at the wall clock, which was too much to expect. “Eight after eleven.”

“Could you get them here tonight?”

“I doubt it. All five of them?”

“Yes.”

“Possibly by sunup. Bring them to your bedroom?”

He rubbed his nose with a fingertip. “Very well. But you can call them now, as many as you can get. Make it eleven in the morning. Tell them I have a disclosure to make and must consult with them.”

“That should interest them,” I granted, and reached for the phone.

Chapter 4

By the time Wolfe came down from the plant rooms to greet the guests, at two minutes past eleven the next morning, there hadn’t been a peep out of the Long Island law. Which didn’t mean there couldn’t be one at three minutes past eleven. According to the morning paper, District Attorney Delaney and Chief of Detectives Baxter had both conceded that anyone could have entered the tent from the back and therefore it was wide open. If Anna Banau read newspapers, and she probably did, she might at any moment be going to the phone to make a call.

I had made several, both the night before and that morning, getting the guests lined up; and one special one. There was an address and phone number for an Alexander Banau in the Manhattan book, but I decided not to dial it. I also decided not to ring Zoller’s restaurant on Fifty-second Street. I hadn’t eaten at Zoller’s more than a couple of times, but I knew a man who had been patronizing it for years, and I called him. Yes, he said, there was a captain at Zoller’s named Alex, and yes, his last name was Banau. He liked Alex and hoped that my asking about him didn’t mean that he was headed for some kind of trouble. I said no trouble was contemplated, I just might want to check a little detail, and thanked him. Then I sat and looked at the slip on which I had scribbled the Banau home phone number, and with my finger itching to dial it, but to say what? No.

I mention that around ten-thirty I got the Marley .38 from the drawer, saw that it was loaded, and put it in my side pocket, not to prepare you for bloodshed, but just to show that I was sold on Mrs. Banau. With a murderer for a guest, and an extremely nervy one, there was no telling.

H. L. Griffin, the importer, and Paul Rago, the sauce chef, came alone and separately, but Korby and Flora had Dick Vetter with them. I had intended to let Flora have the red leather chair, but when I showed them to the office, Rago, the six-footer with the mustache and the accent, had copped it, and she took one of the yellow chairs in a row facing Wolfe’s desk, with her father on her right and Vetter on her left. Griffin, the runt who had made the best speech, was at the end of the row nearest my desk. When Wolfe came down from the plant rooms, entered, greeted them, and headed for his desk, Vetter spoke up before he was seated.

“I hope this won’t last long, Mr. Wolfe. I asked Mr. Goodwin if it couldn’t be earlier, and he said it couldn’t. Miss Korby and I must have an early lunch because I have a script conference at one-thirty.”

I raised a brow. I had been honored. I had driven a car with my arm across the shoulders of a girl whom Dick Vetter himself thought worthy of a lunch.

Wolfe, adjusted in his chair, said mildly, “I won’t prolong it beyond necessity, sir. Are you and Miss Korby friends?”

“What’s that got to do with it?”

“Possibly nothing. But now, nothing about any of you is beyond the bounds of my curiosity. It is a distressing thing to have to say, in view of the occasion of our meeting yesterday, the anniversary of the birth of this land of freedom, but I must. One of you is a miscreant. One of you people killed Philip Holt.”

The idea is to watch them and see who faints or jumps up and runs. But nobody did. They all stared.

“One of us?” Griffin demanded.

Wolfe nodded. “I thought it best to begin with that bald statement, instead of leading up to it. I thought—”

Korby cut in. “This is funny. This is a joke. After what you said yesterday to that district attorney. It’s a bad joke.”

“It’s no joke, Mr. Korby. I wish it were. I thought yesterday I was on solid ground, but I wasn’t. I now know that there is a witness, a credible and confident witness, to testify that no one entered the tent from the rear between the time that the speeches began and the discovery of the body. I also know that neither Mr. Goodwin nor I killed him, so it was one of you. So I think we should discuss it.”

“You say a witness?” Rago made it “weetnuss.”

“Who is he?” Korby wanted to know. “Where is he?”

“It’s a woman, and she is available. Mr. Goodwin, who has spoken with her, is completely satisfied of her competence and bona fides, and he is hard to satisfy. It is highly unlikely that she can be impeached. That’s all I—”

“I don’t get it,” Vetter blurted. “If they’ve got a witness like that why haven’t they come for us?”

“Because they haven’t got her. They know nothing about her. But they may find her at any moment, or she may go to them. If so you will soon be discussing the matter not with me but with officers of the law — and so will I. Unless you do discuss it with me, and unless the discussion is productive, I shall of course be constrained to tell Mr. Delaney about her. I wouldn’t like that and neither would you. After hearing her story his manner with you, and with me, would be quite different from yesterday. I want to ask you some questions.”

“Who is she?” Korby demanded. “Where is she?”

Wolfe shook his head. “I’m not going to identify her or place her for you. I note your expressions — especially yours, Mr. Korby, and yours, Mr. Griffin. You are skeptical. But what conceivable reason could there be for my getting you here to point this weapon at you except the coercion of events? Why would I invent or contrive such a dilemma? I, like you, would vastly prefer to have it as it was, that the murderer came from without, but that’s no good now. I concede that you may suspect me too, and Mr. Goodwin, and you may question us as I may question you. But one of us killed Philip Holt, and getting answers to questions is clearly in the interest of all the rest of us.”

They exchanged glances. But they were not the kind of glances they would have exchanged five minutes earlier. They were glances of doubt, suspicion, and surmise, and they weren’t friendly.

“I don’t see,” Griffin objected, “what good questions will do. We were all there together and we all know what happened. We all know what everybody said.”

Wolfe nodded. “But we were all supporting the theory that excluded us. Now we’re not. We can’t. One of us has something in his background which, if known, would account for his determination to kill that man. I suggest beginning with autobiographical sketches from each of us, and here is mine. I was born in Montenegro and spent my early boyhood there. At the age of sixteen I decided to move around, and in fourteen years I became acquainted with most of Europe, a little of Africa, and much of Asia, in a variety of roles and activities. Coming to this country in nineteen-thirty, not penniless, I bought this house and entered into practice as a private detective. I am a naturalized American citizen. I first heard of Philip Holt about two years ago when Fritz Brenner, who works for me, came to me with a complaint about him. My only reason for wishing him harm, but not the extremity of death, was removed, as you know, when he agreed to stop annoying Mr. Brenner about joining your union if I would make a speech at your blasted picnic. Mr. Goodwin?”

I turned my face to the audience. “Born in Ohio. Public high school, pretty good at geometry and football, graduated with honor but no honors. Went to college two weeks, decided it was childish, came to New York and got a job guarding a pier, shot and killed two men and was fired, was recommended to Nero Wolfe for a chore he wanted done, did it, was offered a full-time job by Mr. Wolfe, took it, still have it. Personally, was more entertained than bothered by Holt’s trying to get union dues out of Fritz Brenner. Otherwise no connection with him or about him.”

“You may,” Wolfe told them, “question us later if you wish. Miss Korby?”

“Well—” Flora said. She glanced at her father, and, when he nodded, she aimed at Wolfe and went on, “My autobiography doesn’t amount to much. I was born in New York and have always lived here. I’m twenty years old. I didn’t kill Phil Holt and had no reason to kill him.” She turned her palms up. “What else?”

“If I may suggest,” H. L. Griffin offered, “if there’s a witness as Wolfe says, if there is such a witness, they’ll dig everything up. For instance, about you and Phil.”

She gave him an eye. “What about us, Mr. Griffin?”

“I don’t know. I’ve only heard talk, that’s all, and they’ll dig up the talk.”

“To hell with the talk,” Dick Vetter blurted, the whipped cream sounding sour.

Flora looked at Wolfe. “I can’t help talk,” she said. “It certainly is no secret that Phil Holt was — well, he liked women. And it’s no secret that I’m a woman, and I guess it’s not a secret that I didn’t like Phil. For me he was what you called him, a nuisance. When he wanted something.”

Wolfe grunted. “And he wanted you?”

“He thought he did. That’s all there was to it. He was a pest, that’s all there is to say about it.”

“You said you had no reason to kill him.”

“Good heavens, I didn’t! A girl doesn’t kill a man just because he won’t believe her when she says no!”

“No to what? A marriage proposal?”

Her father cut in. “Look here,” he told Wolfe, “you’re barking up the wrong tree. Everybody knows how Phil Holt was about women. He never asked one to marry him and probably he never would. My daughter is old enough and smart enough to take care of herself, and she does, but not by sticking a knife in a man’s back.” He turned to Griffin. “Much obliged, Harry.”

The importer wasn’t fazed. “It was bound to come out, Jim, and I thought it ought to be mentioned now.”

Wolfe was regarding Korby. “Naturally it raises the question how far a father might go to relieve his daughter of a pest.”

Korby snorted. “If you’re asking it, the answer is no. My daughter can take care of herself. If you want a reason why I might have killed Phil Holt you’ll have to do better than that.”

“Then I’ll try, Mr. Korby. You are the president of your union, and Mr. Holt was an important figure in it, and at the moment the affairs of unions, especially their financial affairs, are front-page news. Have you any reason to fear an investigation, or had Mr. Holt?”

“No. They can investigate as much as they damn please.”

“Have you been summoned?”

“No.”

“Had Mr. Holt been summoned?”

“No.”

“Have any officials of your union been summoned?”

“No.” Korby’s pudgy face and bald top were pinking up a little. “You’re barking up the wrong tree again.”

“But at least another tree. You realize, sir, that if Mr. Delaney starts after us in earnest, the affairs of the United Restaurant Workers of America will be one of his major concerns. For the murder of Philip Holt we all had opportunity, and the means were there at hand; what he will seek is the motive. If there was a vulnerable spot in the operation of your union, financial or otherwise, I suggest that it would be wise for you to disclose it now for discussion.”

“There wasn’t anything.” Korby was pinker. “There’s nothing wrong with my union except rumors. That’s all it is, rumors, and where’s a union that hasn’t got rumors with all the stink they’ve raised? We’re not vulnerable to anything or anybody.”

“What kind of rumors?”

“Any kind you want to name. I’m a crook. All the officers are crooks. We’ve raided the benefit fund. We’ve sold out to the big operators. We steal lead pencils and paper clips.”

“Can you be more specific? What was the most embarrassing rumor?”

Korby was suddenly not listening. He took a folded handkerchief from his pocket, opened it up, wiped his face and his baldness, refolded the handkerchief at the creases, and returned it to his pocket. Then his eyes went back to Wolfe.

“If you want something specific,” he said, “it’s not a rumor. It’s a strictly internal union matter, but it’s sure to leak now and it might as well leak here first. There have been some charges made, and they’re being looked into, about kickbacks from dealers to union officers and members. Phil Holt had something to do with some of the charges, though that wasn’t in his department. He got hot about it.”

“Were you the target of any of the charges?”

“I was not. I have the complete trust of my associates and my staff.”

“You said ‘dealers.’ Does that include importers?”

“Sure, importers are dealers.”

“Was Mr. Griffin’s name mentioned in any of the charges?”

“I’m not giving any names, not without authority from my board. Those things are confidential.”

“Much obliged, Jim,” H. L. Griffin said, sounding the opposite of obliged. “Even exchange?”

“Excuse me.” It was Dick Vetter, on his feet. “It’s nearly twelve o’clock and Miss Korby and I have to go. We’ve got to get some lunch and I can’t be late for that conference. Anyway, I think it’s a lot of hooey. Come on, Flora.”

She hesitated a moment, then left her chair, and he moved. But when Wolfe snapped out his name he turned. “Well?”

Wolfe swiveled his chair. “My apologies. I should have remembered that you are pressed for time. If you can give us, say, five minutes?”

The TV star smiled indulgently. “For my autobiography? You can look it up. It’s in print — TV Guide a couple of months ago, or Clock magazine, I don’t remember the date. I say this is hooey. If one of us is a murderer, okay, I wish you luck, but this isn’t getting you anywhere. Couldn’t I just tell you anything I felt like?”

“You could indeed, Mr. Vetter. But if inquiry reveals that you have lied or have omitted something plainly relevant that will be of interest. The magazine articles you mentioned — do they tell of your interest in Miss Korby?”

“Nuts.” Many of his twenty million admirers wouldn’t have liked either his tone or his diction.

Wolfe shook his head. “If you insist, Mr. Vetter, you may of course be disdainful about it with me, but not with the police once they get interested in you. I asked you before if you and Miss Korby are friends, and you asked what that had to do with it, and I said possibly nothing. I now say possibly something, since Philip Holt was hounding her — how savagely I don’t know yet. Are you and Miss Korby friends?”

“Certainly we’re friends. I’m taking her to lunch.”

“Are you devoted to her?”

His smile wasn’t quite so indulgent, but it was still a smile. “Now that’s a delicate question,” he said. “I’ll tell you how it is. I’m a public figure and I have to watch my tongue. If I said yes, I’m devoted to Miss Korby, it would be in all the columns tomorrow and I’d get ten thousand telegrams and a million letters. If I said no, I’m not devoted to Miss Korby, that wouldn’t be polite with her here at my elbow. So I’ll just skip it. Come on, Flora.”

“One more question. I understand that your father works in a New York restaurant. Do you know whether he is involved in any of the charges Mr. Korby spoke of?”

“Oh, for God’s sake. Talk about hooey.” He turned and headed for the door, taking Flora with him. I got up and went to the hall and on to the front door, opened it for them, closed it after them, put the chain-bolt on, and returned to the office. Wolfe was speaking.

“... and I assure you, Mr. Rago, my interest runs with yours — with all of you except one. You don’t want the police crawling over you and neither do I.”

The sauce chef had straightened up in the red leather chair, and the points of his mustache seemed to have straightened up too. “Treeks,” he said.

“No, sir,” Wolfe said. “I have no objection to tricks, if they work, but this is merely a forthright discussion of a lamentable situation. No trick. Do you object to telling us what dealings you had with Philip Holt?”

“I am deesappointed,” Rago declared. “Of course I knew you made a living with detective work, everybody knows that, but to me your glory is your great contributions to cuisine — your sauce printemps, your oyster pie, your artichauts drigants, and others. I know what Pierre Mondor said of you. So it is a deesappointment when I am in your company that the only talk is of the ugliness of murder.”

“I don’t like it any better than you do, Mr. Rago. I am pleased to know that Pierre Mondor spoke well of me. Now about Philip Holt?”

“If you insist, certainly. But what can I say? Nothing.”

“Didn’t you know him?”

Rago spread his hands and raised his shoulders and brows. “I had met him. As one meets people. Did I know him? Whom does one know? Do I know you?”

“But you never saw me until two weeks ago. Surely you must have seen something of Mr. Holt. He was an important official of your union, in which you were active.”

“I have not been active in the union.”

“You were a speaker at its picnic yesterday.”

Rago nodded and smiled. “Yes, that is so. But that was because of my activity in the kitchen, not in the union. It may be said, even by me, that in sauces I am supreme. It was for that distinction that it was thought desirable to have me.” His head turned. “So, Mr. Korby?”

The president of URWA nodded yes. “That’s right,” he told Wolfe. “We thought the finest cooking should be represented, and we picked Rago for it. So far as I know, he has never come to a union meeting. We wish he would, and more like him.”

“I am a man of the kitchen,” Rago declared. “I am an artist. The business I leave to others.”

Wolfe was on Korby. “Did Mr. Rago’s name appear in any of the charges you spoke of?”

“No. I said I wouldn’t give names, but I can say no. No, it didn’t.”

“You didn’t say no when I asked about Mr. Griffin.” Wolfe turned to the importer. “Do you wish to comment on that, sir?”

I still hadn’t decided exactly what was wrong with Griffin’s left eye. There was no sign of an injury, and it seemed to function okay, but it appeared to be a little off center. From an angle, the slant I had from my desk, it looked normal.

He lifted his long narrow chin. “What do you expect?” he demanded.

“My expectations are of no consequence. I merely invite comment.”

“On that, I have none. I know nothing about any charges. What I want, I want to see that witness.”

Wolfe shook his head. “As I said, I will not produce the witness — for the present. Are you still skeptical?”

“I’m always skeptical.” Griffin’s voice would have suited a man twice his size. “I want to see that witness and hear what she has to say. I admit I can see no reason why you would invent her — if there is one it’s too deep for me, since it puts you in the same boat with us — but I’m not going to believe her until I see her. Maybe I will then, and maybe I won’t.”

“I think you will. Meanwhile, what about your relations with Philip Holt? How long and how well did you know him?”

“Oh, to hell with this jabber!” Griffin bounced up, not having far to bounce. “If there was anything in my relations with him that made me kill him, would I be telling you?” He flattened his palms on Wolfe’s desk. “Are you going to produce that witness? No?” He wheeled. “I’ve had enough of this! You, Jim? Rago?”

That ended the party. Wolfe could have held Korby and Rago for more jabber, but apparently he didn’t think it worth the effort. They asked some questions, what was Wolfe going to do now, and what was the witness going to do, and why couldn’t they see her, and why did Wolfe believe her, and was he going to see her and question her, and of course nobody got anything out of that. The atmosphere wasn’t very cordial when they left. After letting them out I returned to the office and stood in front of Wolfe’s desk. He was leaning back with his arms folded.

“Lunch in twenty minutes,” I said cheerfully.

“Not in peace,” he growled.

“No, sir. Any instructions?”

“Pfui. It would take an army, and I haven’t got one. To go into all of them, to trace all their connections and dealings with the man one of them murdered...” He unfolded his arms and put his fists on the desk. “I can’t even limit it by assuming that it was an act of urgency, resulting from something that had been said or done that day or in the immediate past. The need or desire to kill him might have dated from a week ago, or a month, or even a year, and it was satisfied yesterday in that tent only because circumstances offered the opportunity. No matter which one it was — Rago, who visited the tent first, or Korby or Griffin or Vetter, who visited it after him in that order — no matter which, the opportunity was tempting. The man was there, recumbent and disabled, and the weapon was there. He had a plausible excuse for entering the tent. To spread the cloud of suspicion to the multitude, all he had to do was untie the tape that held the flap. Even if the body was discovered soon after he left the tent, even seconds after, there would be no question he couldn’t answer.”

He grunted. “No. Confound it, no. The motive may be buried not only in a complexity of associations but also in history. It might take months. I will have to contrive something.”

“Yeah. Any time.”

“There may be none. That’s the devil of it. Get Saul and Fred and Orrie and have them on call. I have no idea for what, but no matter, get them. And let me alone.”

I went to my desk and pulled the phone over.

Chapter 5

There had been only five occasions in my memory when Wolfe has cut short his afternoon session with the orchids in the plant rooms, from four o’clock to six, and that was the fifth.

If there had been any developments inside his skull I hadn’t been informed. There had been none outside, unless you count my calling Saul and Fred and Orrie, our three best bets when we needed outside help, and telling them to stand by. Back at his desk after lunch, Wolfe fiddled around with papers on his desk, counted the week’s collection of bottle caps in his drawer, rang for Fritz to bring beer and then didn’t drink it, and picked up his current book, The Fall by Albert Camus, three or four times, and put it down again. In between he brushed specks of dust from his desk with his little finger. When I turned on the radio for the four-o’clock newscast he waited until it was finished to leave for his elevator trip up to the roof.

Later, nearly an hour later, I caught myself brushing a speck of dust off my desk with my little finger, said something I needn’t repeat here, and went to the kitchen for a glass of milk.

When the doorbell rang at a quarter past five I jumped up and shot for the hall, realized that was unmanly, and controlled my legs to a normal gait. Through the one-way glass panel of the front door I saw, out on the stoop, a tall lanky guy, narrow from top to bottom, in a brown suit that needed pressing and a brown straw hat. I took a breath, which I needed apparently, and went and opened the door the two inches allowed by the chain-bolt. His appearance was all against it, but there was no telling what kind of a specimen District Attorney Delaney or Chief of Detectives Baxter might have on his staff.

I spoke through the crack. “Yes, sir?”

“I would like to see Mr. Nero Wolfe. My name is Banau, Alexander Banau.”

“Yes, sir.” I took the bolt off and swung the door open, and he crossed the sill. “Your hat, sir?” He gave it to me and I put it on the shelf. “This way, sir.” I waited until I had him in the office and in the red leather chair to say, “Mr. Wolfe is engaged at the moment. I’ll tell him you’re here.”

I went to the hall and on to the kitchen, shutting doors on the way, buzzed the plant rooms on the house phone, and in three seconds, instead of the usual fifteen or twenty, had a growl in my ear. “Yes?”

“Company. Captain Alexander Banau.”

Silence, then: “Let him in.”

“He’s already in. Have you any suggestions how I keep him occupied until six o’clock?”

“No.” A longer silence. “I’ll be down.”

As I said, that was the fifth time in all the years I have been with him. I went back to the office and asked the guest if he would like something to drink, and he said no, and in two minutes there was the sound of Wolfe’s elevator descending and stopping, the door opening and shutting, and his tread. He entered, circled around the red leather chair, and offered a hand.

“Mr. Banau? I’m Nero Wolfe. How do you do, sir?”

He was certainly spreading it on. He doesn’t like to shake hands, and rarely does. When he was adjusted in his chair he gave Banau a look so sociable it was damn close to fawning, for him.

“Well, sir?”

“I fear,” Banau said, “that I may have to make myself disagreeable. I don’t like to be disagreeable. Is that gentleman” — he nodded at me — “Mr. Archie Goodwin?”

“He is, yes, sir.”

“Then it will be doubly disagreeable, but it can’t be helped. It concerns the tragic event at Culp’s Meadows yesterday. According to the newspaper accounts, the police are proceeding on the probability that the murderer entered the tent from the rear, and left that way after he had performed the deed. Just an hour ago I telephoned to Long Island to ask if they still regard that as probable, and was told that they do.”

He stopped to clear his throat. I would have liked to get my fingers around it to help. He resumed.

“It is also reported that you and Mr. Goodwin were among those interviewed, and that compels me to conclude, reluctantly, that Mr. Goodwin has failed to tell you of a conversation he had with my wife as she sat in our car outside the tent. I should explain that I was in the crowd in front, and when your speech was interrupted by the scream, and confusion resulted, I made my way around to the car, with some difficulty, and got in and drove away. I do not like tumult. My wife did not tell me of her conversation with Mr. Goodwin until after we got home. She regards it as unwise to talk while I am driving. What she told me was that Mr. Goodwin approached the car and spoke to her through the open window. He asked her if anyone—”

“If you please.” Wolfe wiggled a finger. “Your assumption that he hasn’t reported the conversation to me is incorrect. He has.”

“What! He has?”

“Yes, sir. If you will—”

“Then you know that my wife is certain that no one entered the tent from the rear while the speeches were being made? No one but you and Mr. Goodwin? Absolutely certain? You know she told him that?”

“I know what she told him, yes. But if you will—”

“And you haven’t told the police?”

“No, not yet. I would like—”

“Then she has no choice.” Banau was on his feet. “It is even more disagreeable than I feared. She must communicate with them at once. This is terrible, a man of your standing, and the others too. It is terrible, but it must be done. In a country of law the law must be served.”

He turned and headed for the door.

I left my chair. Stopping him and wrapping him up would have been no problem, but I was myself stopped by the expression on Wolfe’s face. He looked relieved; he even looked pleased. I stared at him, and was still staring when the sound came of the front door closing. I stepped to the hall, saw that he was gone and hadn’t forgotten his hat, and returned and stood at Wolfe’s desk.

“Goody,” I said. “Cream? Give me some.”

He took in air, all the way, and let it out. “This is more like it,” he declared. “I’ve had all the humiliation I can stand. Jumping out of my skin every time the phone rang. Did you notice how quickly I answered your ring upstairs? Afraid, by heaven, afraid to go into the tropical room to look over the Renanthera imschootiana! Now we know where we are.”

“Yeah. Also where we soon will be. If it had been me I would have kept him at least long enough to tell him—”

“Shut up.”

I did so. There are certain times when it is understood that I am not to badger, and the most important is when he leans back in his chair and shuts his eyes and his lips start to work. He pushes them out, pulls them in, out and in, out and in... That means his brain has crashed the sound barrier. I have seen him, dealing with a tough one, go on with that lip action for up to an hour. I sat down at my desk, thinking I might as well be near the phone.

That time he didn’t take an hour, not having one. More like eight minutes. He opened his eyes, straightened up, and spoke.

“Archie. Did he tell you where his wife was?”

“No. He told me nothing. He was saving it for you. She could have been in the drugstore at the corner, sitting in the phone booth.”

He grunted. “Then we must clear out of here. I am going to find out which of them killed that man before we are all hauled in. The motive and the evidence will have to come later; the thing now is to identify him as a bone to toss to Mr. Delaney. Where is Saul?”

“At home, waiting to hear. Fred and Orrie—”

“We need only Saul. Call him. Tell him we are coming there at once. Where would Mr. Vetter have his conference?”

“I suppose at the MXO studio.”

“Get him. And if Miss Korby is there, her also. And the others. You must get them all before they hear from Mr. Delaney. They are all to be at Saul’s place without delay. At the earliest possible moment. Tell them they are to meet and question the witness, and it is desperately urgent. If they balk I’ll speak to them and—”

I had the phone, dialing.

Chapter 6

After they were all there and Wolfe started in, it took him less than fifteen minutes to learn which one was it. I might have managed it in fifteen days, with luck. If you like games you might lean back now, close your eyes and start pushing your lips out and in, and see how long it takes you to decide how you would do it. Fair enough, since you know everything that Wolfe and I knew. But get it straight; don’t try to name him or come up with evidence that would nail him; the idea is, how do you use what you now know to put the finger on him? That was what Wolfe did, and I wouldn’t expect more of you than of him.

Saul Panzer, below average in size but miles above it in savvy, lived alone on the top floor — living room, bedroom, kitchenette, and bath — of a remodeled house on Thirty-eighth Street between Lexington and Third. The living room was big, lighted with two floor lamps and two table lamps, even at seven o’clock of a July evening, because the blinds were drawn. One wall had windows, another was solid with books, and the other two had pictures and shelves that were cluttered with everything from chunks of minerals to walrus tusks. In the far corner was a grand piano.

Wolfe sent his eyes around and said, “This shouldn’t take long.”

He was in the biggest chair Saul had, by a floor lamp, almost big enough for him. I was on a stool to his left and front, and Saul was off to his right, on the piano bench. The chairs of the five customers were in an arc facing him. Of course it would have been sensible and desirable to arrange the seating so that the murderer was next to either Saul or me, but that wasn’t practical since we had no idea which one it was, and neither did Wolfe.

“Where’s the witness?” Griffin demanded. “Goodwin said she’d be here.”

Wolfe nodded. “I know. Mr. Goodwin is sometimes careless with his pronouns. The witness is present.” He aimed a thumb at the piano bench. “There. Mr. Saul Panzer, who is not only credible and confident but—”

“You said it was a woman!”

“There is another witness who is a woman; doubtless there will be others when one of you goes on trial. The urgency Mr. Goodwin spoke of relates to what Mr. Panzer will tell you. Before he does so, some explanation is required.”

“Let him talk first,” Dick Vetter said, “and then explain. We’ve heard from you already.”

“I’ll make it brief.” Wolfe was unruffled. “It concerns the tape fastening on the flap of the rear entrance of the tent. As you know, Mr. Goodwin tied it before we left to go to the platform, and when he and I entered the tent later and left by the rear entrance it had been untied. By whom? Not by someone entering from the outside, since there is a witness to testify that no one had—”

James Korby cut in. “That’s the witness we want to see. Goodwin said she’d be here.”

“You’ll see her, Mr. Korby, in good time. Please bear with me. Therefore the tape had been untied by someone who had entered from the front — by one of you four men. Why? The presumption is overwhelming that it was untied by the murderer, to create and support the probability that Philip Holt had been stabbed by someone who entered from the rear. It is more than a presumption; it approaches certainty. So it seemed to me that it was highly desirable, if possible, to learn who had untied the tape; and I enlisted the services of Mr. Panzer.” His head turned. “Saul, if you please?”

Saul had his hand on a black leather case beside him on the bench. “Do you want it all, Mr. Wolfe? How I got it?”

“Not at the moment, I think. Later, if they want to know. What you have is more important than how you got it.”

“Yes, sir.” He opened the lid of the case and took something from it. “I’d rather not explain how I got it because it might make trouble for somebody.”

I horned in. “What do you mean ‘might’? You know damn well it would make trouble for somebody.”

“Okay, Archie, okay.” His eyes went to the audience. “What I’ve got is these photographs of fingerprints that were lifted from the tape on the flap of the rear entrance of the tent. There are some blurry ones, but there are four good ones. Two of the good ones are Mr. Goodwin’s, and that leaves two unidentified.” He turned to the case and took things out. He cocked his head to the audience. “The idea is, I take your prints and—”

“Not so fast, Saul.” Wolfe’s eyes went right, and left again. “You see how it is, and you understand why Mr. Goodwin said it was urgent. Surely those of you who did not untie the tape will not object to having your prints compared with the photographs. If anyone does object he cannot complain if an inference is made. Of course there is a possibility that none of your prints will match the two unidentified ones in the photographs, and in that case the results will be negative and not conclusive. Mr. Panzer has the equipment to take your prints, and he is an expert. Will you let him?”

Glances were exchanged.

“What the hell,” Vetter said. “Mine are on file anyway. Sure.”

“Mine also,” Griffin said. “I have no objection.”

Paul Rago abruptly exploded. “Treeks again!”

All eyes went to him. Wolfe spoke. “No, Mr. Rago, no tricks. Mr. Panzer would prefer not to explain how he got the photographs, but he will if you insist. I assure you—”

“I don’t mean treeks how he gets them.” The sauce chef uncrossed his legs. “I mean what you said, it was the murderer who untied the tape. That is not necessary. I can say that was a lie! When I entered the tent and looked at him it seemed to me he did not breathe good, there was not enough air, and I went and untied the tape so the air could come through. So if you take my print and find it is like the photograph, what will that prove? Nothing at all. Nuh-theeng! So I say it is treeks again, and in this great land of freedom—”

I wasn’t trying to panic him. I wasn’t even going to touch him. And I had the Marley .38 in my pocket, and Saul had one too, so if he had tried to start something he would have got stopped quick. But using a gun, especially in a crowd, is always bad management unless you have to, and he was twelve feet away from me, and I got up and moved merely because I wanted to be closer.

Saul had the same notion at the same instant, and the sight of us two heading for him, with all that he knew that we didn’t know yet, was too much for him. He was out of his chair and plunging toward the door as I took my second step.

Then, of course, we had to touch him. I reached him first, not because I’m faster than Saul but because he was farther off. And the damn fool put up a fight, although I had him wrapped. He kicked Saul where it hurt, and knocked a lamp over, and bumped my nose with his skull. When he sank his teeth in my arm I thought, That will do for you, mister, and jerked the Marley from my pocket and slapped him above the ear, and he went down.

Turning, I saw that Dick Vetter had also wrapped his arms around someone, and she was neither kicking nor biting. In moments of stress people usually show what is really on their minds, even important public figures like TV stars. There wasn’t a word about it in the columns next day.

Chapter 7

I have often wondered how Paul Rago felt when, at his trial a couple of months later, no evidence whatever was introduced about fingerprints. He knew then, of course, that it had been a treek and nothing but, that no prints had been lifted from the tape by Saul or anyone else, and that if he had kept his mouth shut and played along he might have been playing yet.

I once asked Wolfe what he would have done if that had happened.

He said. “It didn’t happen.”

I said, “What if it had?”

He said, “Pfui. The contingency was too remote to consider. It was as good as certain that the murderer had untied the tape. Confronted with the strong probability that it was about to be disclosed that his print was on the tape, he had to say something. He had to explain how it got there, and it was vastly preferable to do so voluntarily instead of waiting until evidence compelled it.”

I hung on. “Okay, it was a good trick, but I still say what if?”

“And I still say it is pointless to consider remote contingencies. What if your mother had abandoned you in a tiger’s cage at the age of three months? What would you have done?”

I told him I’d think it over and let him know.

As for motive, you can have three guesses if you want them, but you’ll never get warm if you dig them out of what I have reported. In all the jabber in Wolfe’s office that day, there wasn’t one word that had the slightest bearing on why Philip Holt died, which goes to show why detectives get ulcers. No, I’m wrong; it was mentioned that Philip Holt liked women, and certainly that had a bearing. One of the women he had liked was Paul Rago’s wife, an attractive blue-eyed number about half as old as her husband, and he was still liking her, and, unlike Flora Korby, she had liked him and proved it.

Paul Rago hadn’t liked that.

Content

Rex Stout
The Labor Union Murder

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7