Рекс Стаут: Blood Will Tell

“I do.” He shook his head, jerked it from side to side several times. “What got me started?”

He could have meant either what got him started on that woman or what got him started talking about her. Wolfe, assuming the latter, said, “I asked you about Mr. Vance. Was he one of the objects of her curiosity?”

“Good Lord, no.”

“You can’t be sure of that.”

“Oh yes I can. She never bothered to pretend. I tell you, she had no sense. I did some work for Vance on a couple of buildings, and I had that apartment before I was married. For her he was a nice old guy, rather a bore, who let her use one of his pianos when she felt like it. I am sure.”

Wolfe granted. “Then X. He must meet certain specifications. It would be fatuous not to assume, tentatively at least, that whoever killed your wife sent the necktie to Mr. Goodwin, either to involve Mr. Vance or with some design more artful. So he had access to Vance’s stationery and either to his tie rack or to yours; and he had had enough association with your wife to want her dead. That narrows it, and you should be able to suggest candidates.”

Kirk was squinting, concentrating. “I don’t think I can,” he said. “I could name men who have been... associated with my wife, but none of them has ever met Vance as far as I know. Or I could name men I have seen at Vance’s place, but none of them has—”

He stopped abruptly. Wolfe eyed him. “His name?”

“No. He didn’t want her dead.”

“You can’t know that. His name?”

“I’m not going to accuse him.”

“Preserve your scruples by all means. I won’t accuse him either without sufficient cause. His name?”

“Paul Fougere.”

Wolfe nodded. “The tenant on the ground floor. As I said, I have read the morning paper. He was an object of your wife’s curiosity?”

“Yes.”

“Had the curiosity been satisfied?”

“If you mean was she through with him, I don’t know. I don’t think so. I’m not sure.”

“Had he had opportunities to get some of Vance’s stationery?”

“Yes. Plenty of them.”

“We’ll return to him later.” Wolfe glanced up at the clock and shifted his bulk in the chair. “Now you. Not to try you; to learn the extent of your peril. I want the answers you have given the police. I don’t ask where you were Monday afternoon because if you were excluded by an alibi you wouldn’t be here. Why did you move to a hotel room two weeks ago? What you have told the police.”

“I told them the truth. I had to decide what to do. Seeing my wife and hearing her, having her touch me — it had become impossible.”

“Did you decide what to do?”

“Yes. I decided to try to persuade her to have a baby. I thought that might make her... might change her. I realized I couldn’t be sure the baby was mine, but there was no way out of that. That’s what I told the police, but it wasn’t true. The baby idea was only one of many that I thought of, and I knew it was no good, I knew I couldn’t take it, not knowing if I was its father. I didn’t actually decide anything.”

“But you dialed her phone number six times between four o’clock Monday afternoon and ten o’clock Tuesday morning. What for?”

“What I told the police? To say I wanted to see her, to persuade her to have a baby.”

“Actually what for?”

“To hear her voice.” Kirk made fists and pressed them on his knees. “Mr. Wolfe, you don’t know. I was stuck. You could pity me or you could sneer at me, but I wouldn’t give a damn, it wouldn’t mean a thing. Say I was obsessed, and what does that mean? I still had my faculties, I could do my work pretty well, and I could even think straight about her, as far as thinking . went One of the ideas I had, I realized that the one thing I could do that would settle it was to kill her. I knew I couldn’t do it, but I realized that that was the one sure thing, and I wished I could do it.”

He opened the fists and closed them again. “I hadn’t seen her or heard her voice for two weeks, and I dialed the number, and when there was still no answer the sixth time I went there. When there was no answer to my ring from the vestibule and I went in and took the elevator I intended to use my key upstairs too, but I didn’t I simply couldn’t. She might be there and — and not alone. I left and went to a bar and bought a drink but didn’t drink it I wanted to know if her things were there, and I thought of phoning Jimmy Vance, but finally decided to phone police headquarters instead. Even if they found her there and someone with her, that might—”

The doorbell rang, and I went, again giving myself even money that it was Vance, and losing again. It was a girl, or woman, and she had a kind of eyes that I had met only twice before, once a woman and once a man. I have a habit, when it’s a stranger on the stoop, of taking a five-second look through the one-way glass and tagging him or her, to see how close I can come. From inside, the view through the glass is practically clear, but from the outside it might as well be wood. But she could see through. Of course she couldn’t, but she was face-to-face with me, and her eyes, slanted up, had exactly the look they would have if she were seeing me. They were nice enough hazel eyes, but I hadn’t liked it the other two times it had happened, and I didn’t like it then. Not trying to tag her, I opened the door.

“I beg your pardon,” she said. “I believe Mr. Kirk is here? Martin Kirk?”

It wasn’t possible. They wouldn’t put a female dick on his tail, and even if they did she wouldn’t be it, with that attractive little face and soft little voice. But there she was. “I beg your pardon,” I said, “but what makes you think so?”

“He must be. I saw him come in and I haven’t seen him come out.”

“Then he’s here. And?”

“Would you mind telling me whose house — who lives here?”

“Nero Wolfe. It’s his house and he lives here.”

“That’s an odd name. Nero Wolfe? What does he — Is he a lawyer?”

Either she meant it or she was extremely good. If the former, it would be a pleasure to tell Wolfe and see him grunt. “No,” I said. Let her work for it.

“Is Mr. Kirk all right?”

“We haven’t been introduced,” I said. “My name is Archie Goodwin and I live here. Your turn.”

Her mouth opened and closed again. She considered it, her eyes meeting mine exactly as they had when she couldn’t see me. “I’m Rita Fougere,” she said. “Mrs. Paul Fougere. Will you tell Mr. Kirk I’m here and would like to see him?”

It was my turn to consider. The rule didn’t apply — the rule that I am to take no one in to Wolfe without consulting him; she wanted to see Kirk, not Wolfe. And I was riled. The tie had been mailed to me, not him, but he hadn’t even glanced at me before taking Kirk on and feeding him. I was by no means satisfied that Kirk was straight, and I wanted to see how he took it when Paul Fougere’s wife suddenly appeared.

“You might as well tell him yourself,” I said. “Also you might as well know that Nero Wolfe is a private detective, and so am I. Come in.”

I made room for her and she entered, and after shutting the door I preceded her down the hall and into the office. As I approached Wolfe’s desk I said, “Someone to see Mr. Kirk,” and I was right there when he twisted around and saw her, said “Rita!” and left the chair. She offered both hands, and he took them. “Martin, Martin,” she said, low, with those eyes at him.

“But how...” He let her hands go. “How did you know I was here?”

“I followed you.”

“Followed me?”

She nodded. “From down there. I was there too, and when I left and had got into a taxi you came out I called to you but you didn’t hear me, and when you got another taxi I told my driver to follow. I saw you come in here, and I waited outside, and when you didn’t come out, a whole hour—”