Rex Stout - The Second Confession

“No, sir,” Wolfe said emphatically. “Without your statement it won’t be easy to get him charged. It can be done, but not just by snapping my fingers.”

“You said,” Harvey objected, “that if we sign that thing that will be all, but it won’t. We’d have to testify at the trial.”

“Probably,” Wolfe conceded. “But only you two, as friendly witnesses for the prosecution, helping to get a murderer punished. The other way it will be you two and many more, and, if you answer in the negative, you will be shielding a murderer merely because he is a fellow Communist, which will not raise you in public esteem — in addition to risking perjury.”

Stevens stood up. “We’ll let you know in half an hour, maybe less.”

“Good. The front room is soundproofed, or you can go upstairs.”

“There’s more room outdoors. Come on, Jerry.”

Stevens led the way. I went to the front to let them out and then returned to the office. What I saw, reentering, gave me an excuse to use the grin I had squelched. Wolfe had opened a drawer and got out a sheet of paper and the tube of paste.

“Before they’re hatched?” I inquired.

“Bah. The screw is down hard.”

“Taking candy from a baby,” I admitted. “Though I must say they’re no babies, especially Stevens.”

Wolfe grunted. “He’s third from the top in the American Communist hierarchy.”

“He doesn’t look it but he acts it. I noticed they didn’t even ask what evidence you’ve got that Reynolds did the killing, because they don’t give a damn. All they want is to get the articles stopped and him burned. What I don’t get, why did they just swallow the letter from a friend? Why didn’t they give Reynolds a chance to answer a question?”

“They don’t give chances.” Wolfe was scornful. “Could he have proved the letter was a lie? How? Could he have explained the photograph of his membership card? He could only have denied it, and they wouldn’t have believed him. They trust no one, especially not one another, and I don’t blame them. I suppose I shouldn’t put paste on this thing until they have written their names on it.”

I wasn’t quite as cocksure as he seemed to be. I thought they might have to take it to a meeting, and that couldn’t be done in half an hour. But apparently he knew more than I did about Stevens’s rank and authority. I had let them out at 6:34, and at 6:52 the bell rang and I went to let them in again. Only eighteen minutes, but the nearest phone booth was only half a block away.

They didn’t sit. Harvey stood gazing at me as if there were something about me he didn’t like, and Stevens advanced to the end of Wolfe’s desk and announced, “We don’t like the wording. We want it to read this way:

“As loyal American citizens, devoted to the public welfare and the ideals of true democracy, we believe that all lawbreakers should be punished, regardless of their political affiliations. Therefore, in the interest of justice, we have written our names on the above photograph, and we hereby attest that the man in that photograph is known to us as William Reynolds, and that to our knowledge he has been for eight years, until today, a member of the Communist Party of the USA. Upon learning that he was to be charged with murder, the Communist Party’s Executive Committee immediately expelled him.”

My opinion of Stevens went up a notch, technically. With nothing to refer to, not even a cuff, he rattled that off as if he had known it by heart for years.

Wolfe lifted his shoulders and dropped them. “If you like it better with all that folderol. Do you want Mr. Goodwin to type it, or will you write it by hand?”

I was just as well pleased that he preferred to use his pen. It would have been an honor to type such a patriotic paragraph, but I wouldn’t put anything beneath a Commie, and what if one of them happened to take a notion to pull the letter from a friend out of his pocket and compare the typing? Even with the naked eye it would have been easy to spot the n slightly off line and the faint defect in the w. So I gladly let Stevens sit at my desk to write it. He did so, and signed it, and wrote his name on the picture. Then Harvey did likewise. Wolfe and I signed as witnesses, after Wolfe had read it over. Having the tube of paste at hand, as I have said, he proceeded to attach the photograph to the top of the sheet.

“May I see it a moment?” Stevens asked.

Wolfe handed it to him.

“There’s a point,” Stevens said. “We can’t let you have this without some kind of guarantee that Reynolds will be locked up tonight. You said before midnight.”

“That’s right. He will be.”

“You can have this as soon as he is.”

I knew damn well they’d have a monkey wrench. If it had been something not tearable, a stone for instance, I would simply have liberated it, and Harvey could have joined in if he felt like it.

“Then he won’t be,” Wolfe said, not upset.

“Why not?”

“Because that’s the key I’m going to lock him in with. Otherwise, would I have gone to all this trouble to get it? Nonsense. I’m about to invite some people to come here this evening, but not unless I have that document. Please don’t crumple it.”

“Will Reynolds be here?”

“Yes.”

“Then we’ll come and bring this with us.”

Wolfe shook his head. “You don’t seem to listen to me. That paper stays here, or you’re out of it until you get a subpoena. Give it to me, and I’ll be glad to have you and Mr. Harvey come this evening. That’s an excellent idea. You will be excluded from part of it, but you can be comfortable in the front room. Why don’t you do that?”

That was the way it was finally compromised. They were plenty stubborn but, as Wolfe had said, the screw was down hard. They didn’t know what Reynolds might spill in the next article, and they wanted him nailed quick, and Wolfe stood pat that he wouldn’t move without the document. So he got it. It was arranged that they would return around ten o’clock and would stay put in the front room until invited to join the party.

When they had gone Wolfe put the document in his middle drawer.

“We’re overstocked on photographs,” I remarked. “So that’s why Mr. Jones didn’t need to load up. He knew him and one look was all he needed. Huh?”

“Dinner’s waiting.”

“Yes, sir. It would be a funny coincidence if Harvey or Stevens happened to be Mr. Jones. Wouldn’t it?”

“No. You can find coincidence in the dictionary. Get Mr. Archer on the phone.”

“Now? Dinner’s waiting.”

“Get him.”

That wasn’t so simple. At my first try, the District Attorney’s office in White Plains, someone answered but couldn’t help me any. I then got Archer’s home and was told that he was out for the evening, but I wasn’t to know where, and I had to press even to sell the idea that he should be informed immediately that Nero Wolfe wanted him to call. I hung up and settled back to wait for anything from five minutes to an hour. Wolfe was sitting up straight, frowning, with his lips tight; a meal was spoiling. After a while the sight of him was getting on my nerves, and I was about to suggest that we move to the dining room and start, when the phone rang. It was Archer.

“What is it?” He was crisp and indignant.

Wolfe said he needed his advice.

“What about? I’m dining with friends. Can’t it wait until morning?”

“No, sir. I’ve got the murderer of Louis Rony, with evidence to convict, and I want to get rid of him.”

“The murderer—” A short silence. Then, “I don’t believe it!”

“Of course you don’t, but it’s true. He’ll be at my office this evening. I want your advice on how to handle it. I can ask Inspector Cramer of the New York Police to send men to take him into custody, or I can—”