Рекс Стаут - The Final Deduction

“No,” Frost said, and left the chair. Wolfe told Saul to take him to the front room, and when Saul had gone to the connecting door and opened it, and Frost was moving, I went to admit the law. From the expression on Cramer’s face I expected him to march on by to the office, but when I turned after shutting the door, he was there facing me.

“What were you doing with Noel Tedder last night?” he demanded.

“Don’t snap my head off,” I said. “I’d rather tell you before a witness. Mr. Wolfe will do.” I walked to the office, entered, and told Wolfe, “He wants to know what I was doing with Noel Tedder last night. He didn’t say please.”

Cramer was at my elbow. “The day I say please to you,” he growled, and went to the red leather chair, sat, and put his hat on the stand.

“I suppose,” Wolfe said, “it’s futile to complain. You have been a policeman so long, and have asked so many people so many impertinent questions, and so frequently have got answers to them, that it has become spontaneous. Have you any ground at all for expecting Mr. Goodwin to answer that one?”

“We might arrange a deal,” I suggested. “I’ll ask an impertinent question. Why have you got a tail on Noel Tedder if Jimmy Vail’s death was an accident?”

“We haven’t got a tail on him.”

“Then how did you know he was with me?”

“A detective happened to see you with him on the street and followed you.” Cramer turned to Wolfe. “Day before yesterday you refused to tell me where you and Goodwin had been for twenty-four hours. You said you had no further commitment to Mrs. Vail and you had no client. You repeated that in your signed statement. You did not repeat it to Draper of the FBI when he asked you last night. Your answer was evasive. That’s not like you. I have never known you to hedge on a lie. Now this, Goodwin with Noel Tedder. You’re not going to tell me that was just social. Are you?”

“No.”

“Goodwin?”

“No.”

“Then what was it?”

Wolfe shook his head. “You have a right to expect answers only to questions that are relevant to a crime. What crime are you investigating?”

“That’s typical. That’s you. I’m investigating the possibility that Jimmy Vail didn’t die by accident.”

“Then you aren’t satisfied that he did.”

“Satisfied, no. The District Attorney may be, I don’t know, you can ask him. I say I have a right to expect Goodwin to answer that question. Or you.”

Wolfe tilted his chair back, then his head, pursed his lips, and examined the ceiling. Cramer took a cigar from a pocket, rolled it between his palms, which was silly with a cigar that wasn’t going to be lit, held it at an angle with his thumb and forefinger, frowning at it, and returned it to his pocket. Evidently he had asked it an impertinent question and it has refused to answer. Wolfe let his chair come forward and said, “The paper, Archie.” I went to the safe and got it from the shelf and took it to him. He put it on his desk pad and turned to Cramer.

“I think you have the notion that I have withheld information from you on various occasions just to be contrary. I haven’t. I have reserved details only when I wanted them, at least temporarily, for my exclusive use, or when you have been excessively offensive. Today you have been reasonably civil, though of course not affable; imparting it will not make it less useful to me; and if it furthers your investigation, though I confess I don’t see how it can, it will serve a double purpose.” He picked up the paper. “I’ll read it. I won’t hand it to you because you would probably say it may be needed as evidence, which would be absurd, and pocket it.”

He read it, ending, “Signed by Noel Tedder. It isn’t holograph; Mr. Goodwin wrote it. I answered that question by Mr. Draper ambiguously because if I had told him of my agreement with Mr. Tedder he would have kept me up all night, thinking that I had some knowledge, at least an inkling, of where the money might be found. I have no commitment to Mrs. Vail, but I do have a client: Noel Tedder.”

“Yeah.” It came out hoarse, and Cramer cleared his throat. He always gets a little hoarse when he talks with Wolfe, probably a certain word or words sticking in his throat. “And either you have some idea where the money is or this is a cover for something else. Does Mrs. Vail know about that agreement?”

“Yes.”

“And that’s what Goodwin and Tedder were discussing last night?”

“Yes.”

“What else were they discussing?”

Wolfe turned. “Archie?”

I shook my head. “Nothing. We touched on mothers some, his and mine, but that was in connection with the agreement.”

“So your question is answered,” Wolfe told him. “I’m aware that you’ll pass it on to Mr. Draper, but he isn’t here, and if he comes he won’t get in. We have given him all the information we possess about the kidnaping, with no reservations. I do have an idea where the money is, but it is based—”

“By God, you admit it.”

“I state it. It’s based on deductions and assumptions I have made, not on any evidence I’m withholding. That applies not only to the kidnaping and the whereabouts of the money, but also to the death of Mr. Vail. What would you say if I told you that I’m convinced that he was murdered, with premeditation, and that I think I know, I’m all but certain that I know, who killed him and why?”

“I’d say you were grandstanding. It wouldn’t be the first time. I know you. God, do I know you! When you’ve really got something you don’t say you’re convinced and you’re all but certain. You say you know. If you’ve got any evidence that he was murdered and that points to the murderer, I want it, and I want it now. Have you got any?”

“No.”

“Then I’ll leave you to your deductions and assumptions.” He picked up his hat. “You’re damn right I’ll tell Draper.” He rose. “But if he knew you as well as I do— Oh, nuts.” He turned and marched out.

I stepped to the hall and saw him close the front door behind him, stepped back in, and asked Wolfe, “So you’re all but certain? Do you know what ‘grandstanding’ means. Where did you get the idea—”

“Get Saul.”

He snapped it. I went and opened the door to the front room and told Saul to come. As he entered, Wolfe spoke. “Mr. Frost has gone?”

Saul nodded. “He bent his ear for five minutes trying to hear you, found that he couldn’t on account of the sound-proofing, and left.”

“I want Fred. If Mr. Purcell is at home, he will of course be nearby. Bring him as soon as possible.” His eyes came to me. “Archie, I want Mr. Tedder, and Orrie with him. Also as soon as possible. Don’t stop to tell Fritz about the door. I’ll see that it’s bolted.”

“You want me back,” Saul said.

“Yes. Go.”

We went.

It wouldn’t do, of course, for me to ring the Vail house and get Noel and tell him Wolfe wanted to see him. One, he might not come without some fancy persuading. Two, Wolfe wanted Orrie too, and Orrie, tailing him, might possibly lose him on the way downtown. Three, Saul had to go there to get Fred, and the taxi fare is the same for two as for one. So we walked to Tenth Avenue and flagged a cab.

It was 11:23 of a sunny Sunday morning, nice and warm for the last of April, when we stopped at the curb in front of 994 Fifth Avenue, paid the hackie, and got out. When we’re going on with the program, the method of getting in touch with a tail, understood by all of us, is a little complicated, but in that case it was simple. We merely raised an arm to wave at a squirrel in a tree in the park and started to stroll downtown. Before we had taken twenty steps Fred appeared from behind a parked car across the street and came over to us and said if we had come an hour sooner he could have gone to church.