Rex Stout - The Second Confession

“Nonsense. You didn’t drag him a yard or two, it was fifty feet or more. You couldn’t possibly forget. Did you take him by the feet? The head? The coat collar? An arm?”

“I don’t remember.”

“I don’t see how you could help remembering. Perhaps this will bring it back to you: when you got him behind the shrub was his head pointing toward the house or away from the house?”

Kane was frowning. “I should remember that.”

“You should indeed.”

“But I don’t.” Kane shook his head. “I simply don’t remember.”

“I see.” Wolfe leaned back. “That’s all, Mr. Kane.” He flipped a hand. “Go and get on with your work.”

Kane was on his feet before Wolfe had finished. “I did the best I could,” he said apologetically. “As I said, I don’t seem to measure up very well in a crisis. I must have been so rattled I didn’t know what I was doing.” He glanced at Sperling, got no instructions one way or another, glanced again at Wolfe, sidled between two chairs, headed for the door, and was gone.

When the door closed behind him Sperling looked down at Wolfe and demanded, “What good did that do?”

Wolfe grunted. “None at all. It did harm. It made it impossible for me, when I return home, to forget all this and set about restoring my plants.” He slanted his head back to get Sperling’s face. “He must owe you a great deal — or he would hate to lose his job. How did you get him to sign that statement?”

“I didn’t get him to. As it says, he wrote and signed it of his own free will.”

“Pfui. I know what it says. But why should I believe that when I don’t believe anything in it?”

“You’re not serious.” Sperling smiled like an angel. “Kane is one of this country’s leading economists. Would a man of his reputation and standing sign such a statement if it weren’t true?”

“Whether he would or not, he did,” Wolfe was getting peevish. “With enough incentive, of course he would; and you have a good supply. You were lucky he was around, since he was ideal for the purpose.” Wolfe waved a hand, finishing with Mr. Kane. “You handled it well; that statement is admirably drafted. But I wonder if you fully realize the position you’ve put me in?”

“Of course I do.” Sperling was sympathetic. “You engaged to do a job and you did it well. Your performance here yesterday afternoon was without a flaw. It persuaded my daughter to drop Rony, and that was all I wanted. The accident of his death doesn’t detract from the excellence of your job.”

“I know it doesn’t,” Wolfe agreed, “but that job was finished. The trouble is, you hired me for another job, to investigate Mr. Rony’s death. I now—”

“That one is finished too.”

“Oh, no. By no means. You’ve hoodwinked Mr. Archer by getting Mr. Kane to sign that statement, but you haven’t gulled me.” Wolfe shook his head and sighed. “I only wish you had.”

Sperling gazed at him a moment, moved to the chair Archer had used, sat, leaned forward, and demanded, “Listen, Wolfe, who do you think you are, Saint George?”

“I do not.” Wolfe repudiated it indignantly. “No matter who killed a wretch like Mr. Rony, and whether by accident or design, I would be quite willing to let that false statement be the last word. But I have committed myself. I have lied to the police. That’s nothing, I do it constantly. I warned you last night that I withhold information from the police only when it concerns a case I’m engaged on; and that commits me to stay with the case until I am satisfied that it’s solved. I said you couldn’t hire me one day and fire me the next, and you agreed. Now you think you can. Now you think you can drop me because I can no longer get you in a pickle by giving Mr. Archer a true account of the conversation in this room yesterday afternoon, and you’re right. If I went to him now and confessed, now that he has that statement, he would reproach me politely and forget about it. I wish I could forget about it too, but I can’t. It’s my self-conceit again. You have diddled me; and I will not be diddled.”

“I’ve paid you fifty-five thousand dollars.”

“So you have. And no more?”

“No more. For what?”

“For finishing the job. I’m going to find out who killed Mr. Rony, and I’m going to prove it.” Wolfe aimed a finger at him. “If I fail, Mr. Sperling—” He let the finger down and shrugged. “I won’t. I won’t fail. See if I do.”

Suddenly, without the slightest preliminary, Sperling got mad. In a flash his eyes changed, his color changed — he was a different man. Up from the chair, on his feet, he spoke through his teeth.

“Get out! Get out of here!”

Evidently there was only one thing to do, get out. It was nothing much to me, since I had had somewhat similar experiences before, but for Wolfe, who had practically always been in his own office when a conference reached the point of breaking off relations, it was a novelty to be told to get out. He did well, I thought. He neither emphasized dignity nor abandoned it, but moved as if he had taken a notion to go to the bathroom but was in no terrible hurry. I let him precede me, which was only proper.

However, Sperling was a many-sided man. His flare-up couldn’t possibly have fizzled out as quick as that, but as I hopped ahead of Wolfe to open the door his voice came.

“I won’t stop payment on that check!”

The package arrived a little before noon on Wednesday.

We hadn’t got back to normal, since there was still a small army busy up in the plant rooms, but in many respects things had settled down. Wolfe had on a clean shirt and socks, meals were regular and up to standard, the street was cleared of broken glass, and we had caught up on sleep. Nothing much had yet been done toward making good on Wolfe’s promise to finish the Rony job, but we had only been home fourteen hours and nine of them had been spent in bed.

Then the package came. Wolfe, having been up in the plant room since breakfast, was in the office with me, checking invoices and shipping memos of everything from osmundine fiber to steel sash putty. When I went to the front door to answer the bell, and a boy handed me a package about the size of a small suitcase and a receipt to sign, I left the package in the hall because I supposed it was just another item for the operations upstairs, and I was busy. But after I returned to the office it struck me as queer that there was no shipper’s name on it, so I went back to the hall for another look. There was no mark of any kind on the heavy wrapping paper but Wolfe’s name and address. It was tied securely with thick cord. I lifted it and guessed six pounds. I pressed it against my ear and held my breath for thirty seconds, and heard nothing.

Nuts, I thought, and cut the cord with my knife and slashed the paper. Inside was a fiber carton with the flaps taped down. I got cautious again and severed the flaps from the sides by cutting all the way around, and lifted one corner for a peek. All I saw was newspaper. I inserted the knife point and tore a piece of it off, and what I saw then made me raise my brows. Removing the flaps and the newspaper, and seeing more of the same, I got the carton up under my arm, marched into the office with it, and asked Wolfe, “Do you mind if I unpack this on your desk? I don’t want to make a mess in the hall?”

Ignoring his protest, I put the package down on his desk and started taking out stacks of twenty-dollar bills. They were used bills, not a new one among them as well as I could tell from the edges, and they were banded in bundles of fifty, which meant a thousand bucks to a bundle.

“What the devil is this?” Wolfe demanded.

“Money,” I told him. “Don’t touch it, it may be a trap. It may be covered with germs.” I was arranging the bundles ten to a pile, and there were five piles. “That’s a coincidence,” I remarked. “Of course we’ll have to check the bundles, but if they’re labeled right it’s exactly fifty grand. That’s interesting.”