Рекс Стаут: A Right to Die

“Sit down,” Oster said.

“I’d just have to get up again to go with you. You realize it’s urgent. There’s no telling how soon the cops will get here, and then you won’t be available. If no one here knows where you’ve gone you won’t be available to them for a while. If you think I’m pushing, I am.”

Henchy started, “You certainly—” but Oster cut in, “I’ll handle it, Tom. Keep your shirt on, Goodwin. If and when the police learn that Vaughn came here yesterday, we’ll answer any questions they may care to ask. He merely wanted to inquire about Dunbar Whipple and Susan Brooke, how intimate they had been. He insisted on it and he was a damned nuisance. Nothing he said or did here could possibly have any connection with his murder. Tell Wolfe I’ll see him later, at six o’clock, when he’s available.”

“He’s available now.” I focused on Henchy. “All right, I’ll mention something that Mr. Wolfe would have preferred to mention himself, but it doesn’t matter. Vaughn called me on the phone at ten minutes past five yesterday afternoon and said something that makes it extremely probable that he was murdered because of something that happened when he was here. Not only do Mr. Wolfe and I assume that, the cops do too.”

“They don’t know he was here,” Oster said.

“They’ll find out, and it may not take them long. They know what Vaughn told me on the phone. What they assume is that his murder resulted from his contacts yesterday, and when they learn he was here — well. Talk about questions. The whole damn ROCC staff material witnesses. The bail—”

“Good God,” Henchy blurted.

“I don’t believe it,” Oster said. “What did Vaughn tell you on the phone?”

“Mr. Wolfe may tell you. I won’t.”

“I don’t believe it.”

“Okay. It will be interesting to see who comes first, Homicide or the DA’s bureau.” I went to a chair and sat. “It will also be interesting to see how they handle it. Would you rather I wait outside?”

“Yes,” Oster said. “We’ll consider it.”

“You’d better consider fast.” I stood up. “I don’t know how long Mr. Wolfe will hold on.”

“I’m going.” Henchy got to his feet. His pudgy cheeks were sagging. “I’m going to see him. You too, Harold.”

“I want to consider it.”

“No. I’m the responsible head of this organization. You come with me.” Henchy moved.

“And the others,” I said. “Everyone who spoke with Vaughn, even one word. Including Miss Jordan. Do you want to leave them here to deal with the cops if they come? With you not here?”

“No,” Oster said. “Of course. If we go, Tom, they must go too. Wait in the anteroom, Goodwin.”

“I advise you to step on it.”

“We will. If we’re going, the sooner the better.”

I went. When I got to the anteroom Maud Jordan was busy on the phone, telling people to go to Henchy’s room, and in a few minutes a girl came from inside, with very smooth dark skin and a little turned-up nose, to take over the switchboard, and Miss Jordan went inside. I decided to give them twenty minutes for their huddle and then go in after them, and began exercising my neck by turning my head about ten times a minute to look at the entrance door, hoping it wouldn’t open. It did once, and my belly muscles tightened, but it was only a man with a package. Just one minute of the twenty was left when I heard footsteps in the hall, and they came, Henchy in the lead, then Oster, Cass Faison, Adam Ewing, Beth Tiger, and Maud Jordan. No strangers.

Rising, I asked Henchy, “Miss Kallman?”

“She isn’t here. She wasn’t here yesterday.” He turned to the girl at the switchboard. “Miss Bowen, you don’t know where we’re going.”

“Well, I don’t,” she said.

“Also,” I suggested, “you don’t know my name, and if you’re asked to describe me you’re not much good at describing people.”

“Do I describe him wrong?” she asked Henchy.

“Yes,” Oster said. “Within reason.”

I made another suggestion, that they go ahead and I would take another elevator and also another taxi. You may think I was overdoing it, but I knew darned well what would happen the minute Cramer learned that Vaughn had gone there, if it was still office hours. I was pleased to find that there was room in my skull for still another suggestion, even though I had to veto it — the suggestion that one of them, namely Miss Tiger, might ride with me. It was nice to know that even in a crisis I didn’t totally exclude consideration of such matters as companionship. I admit it was a factor that she had not yet given the slightest indication that she was aware that I was human.

But I rode alone, and as my cab pulled up in front of the old brownstone I was afraid there would be more delay. It was five minutes past four, and it was at least even money that Wolfe had gone up to the plant rooms. Three of them were standing at the foot of the stoop steps, and the other three were climbing out of their taxi. I paid the hackie and went and led the way up, and as I reached the top the door was opened by Saul Panzer. “Mr. Henchy to the office,” he told me, “and the others to the front room.”

Lawyers can be pests and often are. Eight people in the end of that hall disposing of coats are a crowd, and when I got Henchy separated and started him down the hall to the office, there somehow was Oster, moving like a man who intends to stay in charge. I thought, What the hell, it will be simpler to use the connecting door, and let him come; and sure enough, he went straight to the red leather chair, stood in front of it, and told Wolfe, “Whipple’s not here to interfere this time. You’ll listen to me. ”

Relieved that Wolfe was there and my errand was done, I sat down and got my notebook and pen. Let him do the reacting.

He didn’t crane to look up at Oster but focused on Henchy, who was in one of the yellow chairs Saul had moved up. “This is going to be unpleasant for all of us,” he said. “Has Mr. Goodwin made the situation clear?”

Henchy nodded. “Clear enough so we’re here. We came.”

“You’ll listen to me,” Oster said, in charge. “We want to know what Vaughn said to Goodwin on the phone yesterday. What you say he said.”

Wolfe slanted his head back. “Mr. Oster. I don’t ask you to sit because I don’t want you to. You will join the others in the front room. I am no longer acting in cooperation with you; henceforth my only commitment is to Mr. Paul Whipple. With me your status is now, to use a cant term, that of a murder suspect.” He pointed. “That door.”

Oster made a noise, part snort and part snarl. He sat. “That crap,” he said. “The Great White Whosis. I’m a member of the bar, and what are you?”

Wolfe regarded him. “I really can’t blame you. If I were a Negro I would have been locked up long ago — or I would be dead. You actually believe that your skin color and mine are factors in my treatment of you. Pfui. I’m not a troglodyte. Archie, the relevant portion of your telephone conversation with Mr. Vaughn yesterday afternoon.”

I recited it for them as I had for Cramer, but slower and emphasizing “important,” and adding at the end that he hadn’t rung again. Henchy was frowning at me, concentrating. Oster was looking skeptical, but he was getting it. Wolfe spoke.

“Those were the last words, for us, from Mr. Vaughn. ‘It’s probably nothing.’ But unfortunately for him it wasn’t. It’s a conclusion, more than an assumption, that he was going to see again someone he had seen earlier, or at least explore some suspicion resulting from an earlier contact. It’s possible that that contact had not been at your office, but I know of none other he might have made relevant to the fate of Susan Brooke, and I doubt if the police do. It’s also a conclusion, not lightly to be abandoned, that he was killed by the person who killed Miss Brooke. Do you reject that, Mr. Oster?”