Rex Stout: The Zero Clue

She drew herself up, but it wasn’t very impressive because she was pretty well fagged after her hard day. “You’re calling me a liar,” she accused Cramer, “and in front of witnesses.” She pointed a finger at the police stenographer. “You get that down just the way he said it!”

“He will,” Cramer assured her. “Look, Mrs. Tillotson. You admit you lied about going to see Heller until you saw it wouldn’t work, when you realized that the doorman would swear that you were there not only this morning but also previously. Now about your trying to bribe an officer. That’s a felony. If we charge you with it, and you go to trial, I can’t say who the jury will believe, you or the officer, but I know who I believe. I believe him, and you’re lying about it.”

“Get him in here,” she challenged. “I want to face him.”

“He wants to face you too, but that wouldn’t help any. I’m satisfied that you’re lying, and also that you’re lying about what you wanted to get from Heller’s files. He made his notes in a private code that it will take a squad of experts to decipher, and you knew that, and I do not believe that you took the risk of going there and trying to bribe an officer just to get his notes about you and your family. I believe there is something in his files that can easily be recognized as pertaining to you or your family, and that’s what you were after. In the morning we’ll have men going through the contents of the files, item by item, and if anything like that is there they’ll spot it. Meanwhile I’m holding you for further questioning about your attempt to bribe an officer. If you want to telephone a lawyer, you may — one phone call, with an officer present.”

Cramer’s head swiveled. “Stebbins, take her in to Lieutenant Rowcliff, and tell Rowcliff how it stands.”

Purley arose. Mrs. Tillotson was shrinking, looking less overfed every second, right in front of our eyes. “Will you wait a minute?” she demanded.

“Two minutes, madam. But don’t try cooking up any more lies. You’re no good at it.”

“That man misunderstood me. I wasn’t trying to bribe him.”

“I said you may phone a lawyer—”

“I don’t want a lawyer.” She was sure about that. “If they go through those files they’ll find what I was after, so I might as well tell you. It’s some letters in envelopes addressed to me. They’re not signed, they’re anonymous, and I wanted that Heller to find out who sent them.”

“Are they about your son?”

“No. They’re about me. They threaten me with something, and I was sure it was leading up to blackmail.”

“How many letters?”

“Six.”

“What do they threaten you with?”

“They — they don’t exactly threaten. They’re quotations from things. One of them says, ‘He that cannot pay, let him pray.’ Another one says, ‘He that dies pays all debts.’ Another one says, ‘So comes a reckoning when the banquet’s o’er.’ The others are longer, but that’s what they’re like.”

“What made you think they were leading up to blackmail?”

“Wouldn’t you? ‘He that cannot pay, let him pray.’ ”

“And you wanted Heller to identify the sender. How many times had you seen him?”

“Twice.”

“Of course you had given him all the information you could. We’ll get the letters in the morning, but you can tell us now what you told Heller. As far as possible, everything that was said by both of you.”

I permitted myself to grin, not discreetly, and glanced at Wolfe to see if he was properly appreciative of Cramer’s adopting his approach, but he was just sitting there looking patient.

It was hard to tell, for me at least, how much Mrs. Tillotson was giving and how much she was covering. If there was something in her past that someone might have felt she should pay for or give a reckoning of, either she didn’t know what it was, or she had kept it from Heller, or she had told him but certainly didn’t intend to let us in on it. It went on and on, with her concentrating hard on remembering her conversations with Heller and all the data she had given him for factors of his formulas, and with Cramer playing her back and forth until she was so tied up in contradictions that it would have taken a dozen mathematical wizards to make head or tail of it.

Wolfe finally intervened. He glanced up at the wall clock, shifted in his chair to get his seventh of a ton bearing on another spot, and announced, “It’s after midnight. Thank heaven you have an army to start sorting this out and checking it. If your Lieutenant Rowcliff is still here, let him have her, and let’s have some cheese. I’m hungry.”

Cramer, as ready for a recess as anybody, had no objection. Purley Stebbins removed Mrs. Tillotson. The stenographer went on a private errand. I went to the kitchen to give Fritz a hand, knowing that he was running himself ragged furnishing trays of sandwiches to flocks of Homicide personnel distributed all over the premises. When I returned to the office with a supply of provender, Cramer was riding Wolfe, pouring it on, and Wolfe was leaning back in his chair with his eyes shut. I passed around plates of Fritz’s il pesto and crackers, with beer for Wolfe and the stenographer, coffee for Cramer and Stebbins, and milk for me.

In four minutes Cramer inquired, “What is this stuff?”

Wolfe told him. “ Il pesto .”

“What’s in it?”

“Canestrato cheese, anchovies, pig liver, black walnuts, chives, sweet basil, garlic, and olive oil.”

“Good God.”

In another four minutes Cramer addressed me in the tone of one doing a gracious favor. “I’ll take some more of that, Goodwin.”

But while I was gathering the empty plates he started in on Wolfe again. Wolfe didn’t bother to counter. He waited until Cramer halted for breath and then growled, “It’s nearly one o’clock, and we have three more.”

Cramer sent Purley for another scared citizen. This time it was the thin tall bony specimen who, entering the lobby on Thirty-seventh Street that morning, had stopped to aim a rude stare at Susan Maturo and me seated on the bench by the fireplace. Having read his statement, I now knew that his name was Jack Ennis, that he was an expert diemaker, at present unemployed, that he was unmarried, that he lived in Queens, and that he was a born inventor who had not yet cashed in. His brown suit had not been pressed.

When Cramer told him that questions from Wolfe were to be considered a part of the official inquiry into Leo Heller’s death, Ennis cocked his head to appraise Wolfe, as if deciding whether or not such a procedure deserved his okay.

“You’re a self-made man,” he told Wolfe. “I’ve read about you. How old are you?”

Wolfe returned his gaze. “Some other time, Mr. Ennis. Tonight you’re the target, not me. You’re thirty-eight, aren’t you?”

Ennis smiled. He had a wide mouth with thin colorless lips, and his smile wasn’t especially attractive. “Excuse me if you thought I was being fresh, asking how old you are, but I don’t really give a damn. I know you’re right at the top of your racket, and I wondered how long it took you to get started up. I’m going to the top too, before I’m through, but it’s taking me a hell of a time to get a start, and I wondered about you. How old were you when you first got your name in the paper?”

“Two days. A notice of my birth. I understand that your call on Leo Heller was connected with your determination to get a start as an inventor?”

“That’s right.” Ennis smiled again. “Look. This is all a lot of crap. The cops have been at me now for seven hours, and where are they? What’s the sense in going on with it? Why in the name of God would I want to kill that guy?”