Rex Stout - Prisoner's Base

“Look at me.” I pointed to my shirt and tie. “Doesn’t it show?”

“Yeah, let me touch you. I was going to send out a general alarm. They want you down at the Commissioner’s office.”

“Who wants me?”

“Stebbins phoned twice. He’s there with the inspector. There’s a car down front. Come on.”

Some chauffeurs of PD cars like to have an excuse to step on it, and some don’t. That one did. He didn’t use much noise, but plenty of gas, and when he was in the fourth grade a maladjusted schoolteacher had made him write five hundred times, “A miss is as good as a mile,” and it sank in. I should have clocked us from 230 West Twentieth Street to 24 °Centre Street. As I got out I told him he should have an insurance vending machine, like those at airports, installed on his dash, and he grinned sociably. “Impressed you, did it, bud?”

It did, at that, but not as much as the assortment I found waiting for me in the spacious and well-furnished office of Police Commissioner Skinner. Besides Skinner and District Attorney Bowen, there were two deputy commissioners, Cramer and another inspector, a deputy inspector, a captain, and Sergeant Purley Stebbins — and they were certainly waiting for me, from the way all faces turned and stayed turned as I entered and advanced.

Skinner told me to sit, and they had a chair waiting too. He asked Bowen, “You want to take it, Ed?”

“No, go ahead,” the DA told him.

Skinner eyed me. “I guess you know as much about where we stand as I do.”

I lifted my shoulders and let them down. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m flat on my back.”

He nodded. “We all are, not for quotation. Most of us gave up our weekends, but we might as well not have. During the last forty hours we’ve had more men on this case than any other in my time, and I can’t see that we’ve gained an inch, and the others agree with me. It is an extremely bad situation, it couldn’t be worse, and something has to be done. We’ve been discussing it here at length, and various proposals have been made and some adopted, and one of them concerns you. We want your help on it.”

“I’ve been trying to help.”

“I know you have. Ever since I read your report last Friday I have thought that our best single chance was the keys. Those keys were lifted from a lady’s bag while twelve people were present in the room. I don’t think it’s possible that no one saw any significant glance or movement. As you know, they have been questioned over and over, and the only result has been to focus suspicion on Hagh, the ex-husband, because he was nearer Mrs. Jaffee than anyone else for most of the evening. But all of them had opportunities, as you make clear in your report — and in fact they don’t deny it. We certainly can’t charge Hagh just because he had more chances than the rest of them; and, besides that, what was his motive, and where would that leave us on the first two murders? Do you argue with that?”

“No, I’ve got no arguments left.”

“And arguments don’t catch murderers anyway. I agree. We want to make an all-out effort to get a line on the lifting of the keys. More questions won’t do it. We want to take them to Nero Wolfe’s office and have them go through it, with Wolfe and you taking part, of course. Words and actions. We want them to repeat, as closely as they can, everything they said and did Thursday evening, with three or four of us present, and we want to take a tape recording of it.”

I lifted my brows at him.

“Mostly,” he said, “to try to spot who took the keys, but there’s another thing. If someone wanted to kill Mrs. Jaffee, why did he wait until then to do it? Why didn’t he kill her before? Was it because he had no motive before? Was it something that happened that evening that gave him the motive? We want to watch for that too. We haven’t found it in any of the reports or statements, but we might possibly get it this way. We want to try, and we’ll have to have Wolfe’s and your cooperation. We can’t compel him to let us in his place with them, much less compel him to do his part. We want you to phone him or go to see him, whichever you think is better, and make the request of him.”

“I want to say, Goodwin,” the DA put in, “that I regard it as extremely important that this be done. It must be done.”

“You guys,” I said emphatically, “have one hell of a nerve.”

“Come on,” Cramer rasped, “don’t start, that hard-to-get stuff, and don’t be witty.”

“Poops.” I took them in. “Last Tuesday, six days ago, I sat on a bench in this building with handcuffs on. You may remember also that Mr. Wolfe was conveyed to Leonard Street under a warrant, and you know how he felt about that. Wanting to make a scene, he announced that I was his client, and he was stuck. He had to go through some motions, and he did; and acting for him, I pulled Sarah Jaffee in, and she got it. That threw me off balance, and I made a mistake. I asked to work with you because I thought that way I would be in it more, and I guess I have been, but where are we? And Mr. Wolfe is sore as a pup, and you know damn well he is, and yet you have the gall to ask me to ask him this, because you think if you ask him he’ll say no. I think so too, but I also think he’ll say no if I ask him. Take your pick — would you rather have him say no to you or to me?”

“We want him to say yes,” Skinner declared.

“So do I, but I don’t think there’s a glimmer. Do you want me to try?”

“Yes.”

“When do you want to stage it? Today?”

“As soon as possible. We can have them there in half an hour.”

I looked at my wrist; it was ten to nine. I might catch him before he went up to the plant rooms. “Which phone do I use?”

Skinner indicated one of the five on his desk, even going so far as to lift the receiver and hand it to me as I stepped over. I gave the number and soon had Wolfe’s voice.

“Archie. Have you finished breakfast?”

“Yes.” He didn’t sound so peevish. I knew him so well, and all the thousand shades and keys of his voice, that one “yes” gave me the tune. He added, “Fritz tells me you had yours here.”

“Yeah, I needed to rinse off. I’m calling you at the request of the People of the State of New York.”

“Indeed.”

“As requested by quite a mixture — the Police Commissioner and two of his deputies, the District Attorney, a bunch of inspectors and deputy inspectors, not to mention Sergeant Purley Stebbins. I’m talking from the private office of the Commissioner — you know it; you’ve been here. After these days and nights of camaraderie with them — is that the way to pronounce it?”

“Almost.”

“Good. I am held in high esteem by the whole shebang, from Commissioner all the way down to Lieutenant Rowcliff, which is quite a distance. Wanting to show me what they think of me, they are bestowing a great honor on me. Having a request to make of you, they are letting me make it. They’re all sitting here gazing at me so tenderly I’ve got a lump in my throat. You ought to see them.”

“How long are you going to drag this out?”

“I’m through dragging. Here’s the point. We’re flumped. We have got to try something different-like this, for instance. We want to do a playback of the session at the office Thursday evening, with the original cast, and take a tape recording of it. We’ll bring the personnel, with the exception of Sarah Jaffee, and the recorder, and all you will have to do is let us in and play your part. I have told my associates, who have done me the favor of letting me make this phone call, that I am practically certain you will tell us to go to hell; and since nothing gives you more pleasure than to prove me wrong, here’s a chance for some good clean fun. All you have to do—”