Rex Stout - The Second Confession

“What convinced you?”

“The way he talks, the way I’ve sized him up, the way he practices his profession — and there are things in Bascom’s reports, you’ll see that when you read them—”

“But Mr. Bascom got no proof.”

“No. Damn it.”

“Whom do you call a Communist? A liberal? A pink intellectual? A member of the party? How far left do you start?”

Sperling smiled. “It depends on where I am and who I’m talking to. There are occasions when it may be expedient to apply the term to anyone left of center. But to you I’m using it realistically. I think Rony is a member of the Communist party.”

“If and when you get proof, what are you going to do with it?”

“Show it to my daughter. But it has to be proof. She already knows what I think; I told her long ago. Of course she told Rony, and he looked me in the eye and denied it.”

Wolfe grunted. “You may be wasting your time and money. Even if you get proof, what if it turns out that your daughter regards a Communist party card as a credential for romance?”

“She doesn’t. Her second year in college she got interested in communism and went into it, but it didn’t take her long to pull out. She says it’s intellectually contemptible and morally unsound. I told you she’s smart enough.” Sperling’s eyes darted to me and went back to Wolfe. “By the way, what about you and Goodwin? As I said, I looked you up, but is there any chance I’m putting my foot in it?”

“No,” Wolfe assured him. “Though of course only the event can certify us. We agree with your daughter.” He looked at me. “Don’t we?”

I nodded. “Completely. I like the way she put it. The best I can do is ‘a Commie is a louse’ or something like that.”

Sperling looked at me suspiciously, apparently decided that I merely had IQ trouble, and returned to Wolfe, who was talking.

“Exactly what,” he was asking, “is the situation? Is there a possibility that your daughter is already married to Mr. Rony?”

“Good God, no!”

“How sure are you?”

“I’m sure. That’s absurd — but of course you don’t know her. There’s no sneak in her — and anyhow, if she decides to marry him she’ll tell me — or her mother — before she tells him. That’s how she’d do it—” Sperling stopped abruptly and set his jaw. In a moment he let it loose and went on, “And that’s what I’m afraid of, every day now. If she once commits herself it’s all over. I tell you it’s urgent. It’s damned urgent!”

Wolfe leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. Sperling regarded him a while, opened his mouth and closed it again, and looked at me inquiringly. I shook my head at him. When, after another couple of minutes, he began making and unmaking fists with his big bony hands, I reassured him.

“It’s okay. He never sleeps in the daytime. His mind works better when he can’t see me.”

Finally Wolfe’s lids went up and he spoke. “If you hire me,” he told Sperling, “it must be clear what for. I can’t engage to get proof that Mr. Rony is a Communist, but only to find out if proof exists, and, if it does, get it if possible. I’m willing to undertake that, but it seems an unnecessary restriction. Can’t we define it a little better? As I understand it, you want your daughter to abandon all thought of marrying Mr. Rony and stop inviting him to your home. That’s your objective. Right?”

“Yes.”

“Then why restrict my strategy? Certainly I can try for proof that he’s a Communist, but what if he isn’t? Or what if he is but we can’t prove it to your daughter’s satisfaction? Why limit the operation to that one hope, which must be rather forlorn if Mr. Bascom has spent a month at it and failed? Why not hire me to reach your objective, no matter how — of course within the bounds permitted to civilized man? I would have a much clearer conscience in accepting your retainer, which will be a check for five thousand dollars.”

Sperling was considering. “Damn it, he’s a Communist!”

“I know. That’s your fixed idea and it must be humored. I’ll try that first. But do you want to exclude all else?”

“No. No, I don’t.”

“Good. And I have — yes, Fritz?”

The door to the hall had opened and Fritz was there.

“Mr. Hewitt, sir. He says he has an appointment. I seated him in the front room.”

“Yes,” Wolfe glanced at the clock on the wall. “Tell him I’ll see him in a few minutes.” Fritz went, and Wolfe returned to Sperling.

“And I have correctly stated your objective?”

“Perfectly.”

“Then after I’ve read Mr. Bascom’s reports I’ll communicate with you. Good day, sir. I’m glad you like my office—”

“But this is urgent! You shouldn’t waste an hour!”

“I know.” Wolfe was trying to stay polite. “That’s another characteristic of matters discussed in this office — urgency. I now have an appointment, and shall then eat lunch, and from four to six I shall be working with my plants. But your affair need not wait on that. Mr. Goodwin will read the reports immediately, and after lunch he will go to your office to get all required details — say two o’clock?”

James U. Sperling didn’t like it at all. Apparently he was set to devote the day to arranging to save his daughter from a fate worse than death, not even stopping for meals. He was so displeased that he merely grunted an affirmative when, as I let him out the front door, I courteously reminded him that he was to expect me at his office at 2:15 and that he could save himself the trouble of mailing the check by handing it to me then. I took time out for a brief survey of the long black Wethersill limousine waiting for him at the curb before I returned to the office.

The door to the front room was open and Wolfe’s and Hewitt’s voices came through. Since their mutual interest was up in the plant rooms and they wouldn’t be using the office, I got the bulky envelope Sperling had left on Wolfe’s desk and made myself comfortable to read Bascom’s reports.

A couple of hours later, at five to two, Wolfe returned his empty coffee cup to the saucer, pushed his chair back, got all of him upright, walked out of the dining room, and headed down the hall toward his elevator. I, having followed, called to his half an acre of back, “How about three minutes in the office first?”

He turned. “I thought you were going to see that man with a daughter.”

“I am, but you won’t talk business during meals, and I read Bascom’s reports, and I’ve got questions.”

He shot a glance at the door to the office, saw how far away it was, growled, “All right, come on up,” and turned and made for the elevator.

If he has his rules so do I, and one of mine is that a three-by-four private elevator with Wolfe in it does not need me too, so I took the stairs. One flight up was Wolfe’s bedroom and a spare. Two flights up was my bedroom and another spare. The third flight put me on the roof. There was no dazzling blaze of light, as in winter, since this was June and the shade slats were all rolled down, but there was a blaze of color from the summer bloomers, especially in the middle room. Of course I saw it every day, and I had business on my mind, but even so I slowed up as I passed a bench of white and yellow Dendrobium bensoniae that were just at their peak.

Wolfe was in the potting room, taking his coat off, with a scowl all ready for me.

“Two things,” I told him curtly. “First, Bascom not only—”

He was curter. “Did Mr. Bascom get any lead at all to the Communist party?”

“No. But he—”

“Then he got nothing for us.” Wolfe was rolling up his shirt sleeves. “We’ll discuss his reports after I’ve read them. Did he have good men on it?”