Rex Stout: Nero Wolfe and the Vanishing Clue

“Go ahead.”

“Righto. I went down to the bar and sat at a table and had a drink. Two or three drinks. Something made me remember the ice cream I had put in the refrigerator in the apartment, and I was deciding whether to go up and get it, when suddenly Arrow was there telling me to stand up. He grabbed my shoulder and yanked me up and told me to put up my hands and get set, and then he hauled off and socked me. I don’t know how many times he hit me, but look at me. Finally they blocked him off and a cop came. I edged out, on out of the bar, and took an elevator up to the apartment, and Vince let me in. That part is a little hazy, but I know they put me on a couch because I woke up by falling off it, only I wasn’t really awake. I had some kind of idea about being hurt and wanting to see the nurse, and I went to Bert’s room and on in. The window curtains were drawn, and I turned on a light and went to the bed. He looked dead, with his mouth open, and I pulled the covers down and felt for his heart and he felt dead. There were two hot-water bags there, one on each side of him. They looked empty, and I picked one up and it was empty, and I thought to myself, she was careless because I made her sore and that won’t do, and the other one was empty too, and I took them to the bathroom before I went—”

“Paul!” It was Louise, staring at him. “You told me you emptied them!”

“Sure I did.” He grinned at her, or tried to. “I didn’t want you to report her to the doctor. What the hell, can’t a man be gallant?” He returned to Wolfe. “You said I had to tell you something else. Okay, that’s something else. Like it?”

“So you lied to Louise,” Tuttle rumbled.

“Or you’re lying now,” David said, not tired at all. “You have said nothing about this to me.”

“Of course not. Damn it, I was being gallant.”

They all pitched in, cawing at one another, all in the family. With Louise’s high soprano, Paul’s baritone, Tuttle’s rumble, and David’s falsetto, it made quite a quartette.

Wolfe shut his eyes and tightened his lips, took it up to a point, and then crashed the sound barrier. “Jabber! Stop it, please.” He picked on Paul. “You, sir, speak of gallantry. I didn’t mention that Miss Goren was here with Doctor Buhl. She was, and she told me of your visits to her apartment and your phone calls, so we’ll leave gallantry out, but there are two points at issue. First, the fact: did you find the bags empty, or did you empty them?”

“I found them empty. I told my sister—”

“I know what you told your sister, and the reason you give. Taking it that you found the bags empty, surely it is frivolous to offer that as an item for the police. Doctor Buhl told me that even if Miss Goren neglected to put hot water in them, which he doesn’t believe, it would have had no appreciable effect on the patient, so it has no appreciable effect on me. That is the second point. But your conjecture that something was substituted for the morphine — that might indeed have an effect if you can give it any support. Can you?”

“I don’t have to. Let the police see if they can.”

“No. That won’t do. A conjecture is well enough for private exploration, but using it to put a man under official suspicion of homicide is inadmissible. For example, it would not be a fatuous conjecture if I guessed that you, not knowing of the agreement between your brother and Mr. Arrow, and assuming that you would inherit a third of his fortune, killed him; but certainly I would not proceed—”

“You’d better not,” Paul cut in. His mug was contorted again, trying to grin. “I did know about the agreement.”

“Yes? Who told you?”

“I did,” David said. “Bert told me, and I told Paul and Louise.”

“You see?” Wolfe turned a hand over. “There goes my conjecture. If I were stubborn I could of course still cling to it, guessing that you had anticipated it and conspired to meet it, knowing that your dead brother can’t testify, but that would be witless if I had no single fact in support.” He shook his head at Paul. “I’m afraid you’re trying to open fire without ammunition. But I have been engaged to investigate, so I won’t scrimp it.” He went to David. “I know how you feel about this, Mr. Fyfe, so I don’t expect anything significant from you, but a few questions won’t hurt. What do you know about the morphine?”

“Nothing. Nothing at all, except that Doctor Buhl told us he had left some with the nurse to be given to Bert after we left.”

“Did you go in your brother’s room after Doctor Buhl left?”

“Yes, we all did — Paul and Louise and Vincent and I. We told him the dinner was excellent and we were sorry he couldn’t be with us at the theater.”

“Where was Mr. Arrow?”

“I don’t know. I believe he had said something about changing his shirt.”

“Did he go in your brother’s room after Doctor Buhl left?”

“I don’t know.” David shook his head. “I’m sure I don’t know.”

Wolfe grunted. “Not that that would indict him. How about later, when you returned from the theater? Did he go in your brother’s room then?”

“I don’t think so. If he did I didn’t see him.” David was frowning. “I told you about the situation. The nurse was very upset and said she had phoned Doctor Buhl to send a replacement. When she told us what had happened Arrow left — that is, he left the apartment. Then my sister and the nurse had some words, and my sister told the nurse to go, and after she went my sister phoned Doctor Buhl and told him she and her husband would stay until a replacement came. Shortly after that I went home. I live in Riverdale.”

“But before leaving you went to your brother’s room?”

“Yes.”

“How was he then?”

“He was sound asleep, making some noise breathing, but he seemed all right. When Louise phoned Doctor Buhl he told her that Bert had had half a grain of morphine and would probably not wake before morning.”

Wolfe’s head moved. “Mrs. Tuttle. You have heard what your brothers have said. Have you any corrections or additions?”

She was having a little trouble. Her mouth was working and her hands, in her lap, were clasped tight. She met Wolfe’s look but didn’t reply, until suddenly she cried, “It’s not my fault! No one is going to blame it on me!”

Wolfe made a face. “Why should they, madam?”

“Because they did about my father! Do you know about my father?”

“I know how he died. Your brother told me.”

“Well, they blamed me then — everybody did! Because I was taking care of him and I slept and didn’t go to his room and find the open windows! They even asked me if I put a drug in my chocolate so I would sleep! A twenty-four-year-old girl doesn’t have to take drugs to sleep!”

“Now, my dear.” Tuttle patted her shoulder. “That’s all in the past, it’s all forgotten. There were no open windows in Bert’s room Saturday night.”

“But I sent the nurse away.” She was talking to Wolfe. “And I told Doctor Buhl I would be responsible, and I went to bed and went to sleep without even looking at the hot-water bags, and they were empty.” She jerked her head around to her younger brother. “Tell the truth, Paul, the real truth. Were the bags empty?”

He patted her too. “Take it easy, Lou. Sure they were empty, on my word of honor as a Boy Scout, but that didn’t kill him and I never said it did.”

“No one’s blaming you,” Tuttle assured her. “As for your going to sleep, why shouldn’t you? It was after one o’clock, and Doctor Buhl had said Bert would sleep all night. Believe me, my dear, you’re making a mountain out of a molehill.”

Her head went down and her hands came up to cover her face, and her shoulders began to tremble. To Wolfe a lady in distress is a female having a fit, and if she starts yowling he gets to his feet faster than seems practical for his bulk and makes for the door and the elevator. Louise wasn’t yowling. He eyed her sharply and warily for a moment, decided she probably wouldn’t go off, and went to her husband.