Rex Stout - Over My Dead Body

"But you said I would only have to see Mr Wolfe-"

"I said Wolfe wants to talk with you first. Come on."

I got out and went around to her side and opened the door. She had her teeth sunk into her lip. She sat that way a minute, then climbed out and followed me. I let her down the sidewalk to the entrance to the passageway between a warehouse building and a garage, and along the dark passage until we came to the door in the board fence. It was the door Zorka had used after her trip down the fire escape, only from the inside she had only needed to turn the knob of the spring lock, whereas I had to use my key. I guided her across the court and up the steps to the little porch, and used another key, and entered the kitchen ahead of her. No one was in there but Fritz.

He stared at me. "Now, Archie, you ought to tap-"

"Okay. I forgot. No cause for alarm. Keep Miss Lovchen here on the quiet for about four minutes till I get back."

He stared again, at her. "Miss Lovchen?"

"Right. You'd better hide her in the pantry."

I put the parcel on a chair, went out the way I had come, through the door in the fence and along the passage to 34th Street, got in the roadster and drove around two corners into 35th Street, and rolled to the kerb in front of the house. The police car there had been joined by another one, and the taxi was still parked down a ways, and as I crossed the sidewalk to the stoop I saw the dick there with his foot on the running-board, chinning with Cramer's chauffeur. I was in too much of a hurry to toss them anything, because I had one more lap to go. I let myself in, shed my coat and hat, and went to the office.

"Oh," I said. "Hallo."

There was the explanation of the second police car. Over in a corner was a dick looking bored, and on one of the yellow leather chairs sat Neya Tormic, not looking bored. The way her eyes darted at me, I had to control an impulse to side-step to get out of the line of fire.

The dart was a question, and I knew what it was, but I ignored it and spoke to Fred Durkin, who was seated at my desk:

"Get out of my chair, you big bum, and come out here and help me a minute."

He arose and lumbered across, and I steered him into the hall and shut the office door.

"Are Wolfe and Cramer upstairs?"

"Yes."

"Anyone in the front room?"

"No."

"Stand here and hold this door-knob, in case that dick should get a sudden notion to stretch his legs."

He got his paw on it, and I went to the kitchen. Fritz put down a pan he was stirring and came close to me and whispered, "In the pantry." I pushed the swinging door and there she was, on a chair he had put there for her, with the parcel at her feet. I got the parcel and told her to follow me and keep quiet. In the hall Fred was hanging on to the door-knob and I winked at him as we passed. Up one flight of stairs, down the hall six paces, through a door-and I closed it behind us, turned on the light, put the parcel on a table, and shut the window curtains.

"Hvala Bogu," I said. "This is Mr Wolfe's room. Don't leave it. If you open a window, bells ring all over the house. It's five thirty-five, and he will be here shortly after six. You might as well put your own clothes on. That door there is a bathroom. Okay?"

She just looked at me, and I saw she was concentrating so hard on keeping a stiff jaw that she couldn't even nod her head, so I went on out. At the head of the stairs I called down, "All right, Fred, go back in and try another chair," and then proceeded to the next flight up. Two of them took me to the narrow door at the top which opened into the plant-rooms. I had to go all the way through to the potting-room to find Wolfe. He was at the bench with Theodore, inspecting some recent sprouts with a magnifying glass, and Cramer was on a stool with his back propped against the wall, chewing on a cigar.

I hoisted myself on to the free end of the bench and sat swinging my legs. In a few minutes Wolfe came out of a coma, shook his head disapprovingly at something he saw through the glass, sighed, and muttered at me, "Did you get the goose?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good."

He got busy with the glass again. I swung my legs. After a while the phone rang. Theodore went to his desk to answer it and told Cramer it was for him. The inspector went and grunted into it for three or four minutes, then hung up and returned to the stool. I knew he was glaring at me, but I was interested in the tips of my number nines swinging back and forth.

He said, and I knew what it must be costing him to restrain himself like that, "You, Goodwin." There was even a suggestion of a tremble in his voice. "When did they move the Washington Market to the Maidstone Building?"

"Why," I said in a friendly tone, "that must have been Sergeant Stebbins on the phone! How's that for deduction?"

"Fine." Cramer threw his cigar at the trash basket, missed, went and picked it up and dropped it in, and returned to the stool. "Don't think I'm going to blow up, because I'm not. I'm beyond that. Ten minutes after you left I told Wolfe that Carla Lovchen was trailed to the Maidstone Building this morning and was holed up there, but that was after you left, as I say. All I'm going to do is ask a simple question: Why did you go to the Maidstone Building?"

I grinned at him. "Here's the first answer that occurs to me: There was a phone call here at noon from a certain party, and it was traced to a public phone at that building. All right?"

"No."

I shrugged. "Get Mr Wolfe to tell you one."

Wolfe, going on with his work, paid no attention. Cramer said, "I still am not going to blow up. I have planted myself here on two assumptions: The first is that Wolfe has got something on this case that I stand damn little chance of getting unless and until the break comes and he loosens up. The second is, inasmuch as I have never yet found him picking up pieces for a murderer, that he's not doing that now. If my first assumption is wrong, I'm just out of luck. If my second one is, you are. Both of you. That's all. Now you can take the Maidstone Building and stick it up your chimney. But in case you don't already know it, Carla Lovchen went in that place on 38th Street at eleven o'clock this morning and came out again in ten minutes. I want her, and I want her plenty. I'm telling you. So if it turns out that she has actually pulled a getaway and you helped her do it. "

"The man's mad," I declared.

"Shut up. That's all "

I continued to admire my feet.

At five minutes to six Wolfe put the magnifying glass away in the drawer, gave Theodore a few instructions regarding the sprouts, and announced that it was time to descend. Never having felt full confidence in the capacity of the elevator as posted on its wall, I left it to him and took to the stairs and Cramer joined me. Two flights down we saw that the elevator had stopped there and Wolfe was emerging. We halted as he approached us.

"I'll go to my room and clean up a little. Archie, will you come with me? We'll be with you in the office shortly, Mr Cramer. Miss Tormic is there, you know "

Cramer hesitated, looked at him suspiciously, and then tramped to the stairs and started down. We waited till we heard the office door close behind him and then went to the door of Wolfe's room and entered. Carla was in a straight-backed chair by the wall, her shoulders hunched over, her hands clenched in her lap, her chin down; but she was wearing her own clothes. The bellboy's outfit, neatly folded, was on the table.

Wolfe stopped in front of her and said, "How do you do, Miss Lovchen "

She looked up at him for an instant, then let her head fall again and made no reply.

Wolfe said, "I have no time now because I am expected downstairs. Mr Goodwin told me he brought a goose. He did. Whether you killed Mr Ludlow and Mr Faber or not, you are pure imbecile. Most people are, under great stress, but that merely gives you company. I don't know how or where Mr Goodwin found you, but you must have been making an awful fool of yourself or he wouldn't have found you at all Even though he is fairly good at finding things. If you think I am severe, it is because I have no sympathy to waste on people who come and ask my help and tell me nothing but lies. For the present you will stay in this room. I'll come back pretty soon and ask you some questions "