Rex Stout: Too Many Cooks

Berin was still frowning. He grunted, “I cook other things besides sausages.”

“Of course. You are a master.” Wolfe wiggled a finger at him. “I seem to have somehow displeased you; I must have been clumsy, because this was supposed to be a preamble to a request. I won’t discuss your consistent refusal, for twenty years, to disclose the recipe for that sausage; a chef de cuisine has himself to think of as well as humanity. I am acquainted of the efforts that have been made to imitate it-all failures. I can-”

“Failures?” Berin snorted. “Insults! Crimes!”

“To be sure. I agree. I can see that it is reasonable of you to wish to prevent the atrocities that would be perpetrated in ten thousand restaurant kitchens all over the world if you were to publish that recipe. There are a few great cooks, a sprinkling of good ones, and a pestiferous host of bad ones. I have in my home a good one. Mr. Fritz Brenner. He is not inspired, but he is competent and discriminating. He is discreet, and I am too. I beseech you-this is the request I have been leading up to-I beseech you, tell me the recipe for saucisse minuit.”

“God above!” Berin nearly dropped his pipe. He gripped it, and stared. Then he laughed. He threw up his hands and waved them around, and shook all over, and laughed as if he never expected to hear a joke again and would use it all up on this one. Finally he stopped, and stared in scorn. “To you ?” he wanted to know. It was a nasty tone. Especially was it nasty, coming from Constanza’s father.

Wolfe said quietly, “Yes, sir. To me. I would not abuse the confidence. I would impart it to no one. It would be served to no one except Mr. Goodwin and myself. I do not want it for display, I want it to eat. I have-”

“God above! Astounding. You really think-”

“No, I don’t think. I merely ask. You would, of course, want to investigate me; I would pay the expense of that. I have never violated my word. In addition to the expense, I would pay three thousand dollars. I recently collected a sizable fee.”

“Ha! I have been offered five hundred thousand francs.”

“For commercial purposes. This is for my guaranteed private use. It will be made under my own roof, and the ingredients bought by Mr. Goodwin, whom I warrant immune to corruption. I have a confession to make. Four times, from 1928 to 1930, when you were at the Tarleton, a man in London went there, ordered saucisse minuit, took away some in his pocket, and sent it to me. I tried analysis-my own, a food expert’s, a chef’s, a chemist’s. The results were utterly unsatisfactory. Apparently it is a combination of ingredients and method. I have-”

Berin demanded with a snarl, “Was it Laszio?”

“Laszio?”

“Phillip Laszio.” He said it as if it were a curse. “You said you had an analysis by a chef-”

“Oh. Not Laszio. I don’t know him. I have confessed that attempt to show you that I was zealous enough to try to surprise your secret, but I shall keep inviolate an engagement not to betray it. I confess again: I agreed to this outrageous journey, not only because of the honor of the invitation. Chiefly my purpose was to meet you. I have only so long to live-so many books to read, so many ironies to contemplate, so many meals to eat.” He sighed, half closed his eyes, and opened them again. “Five thousand dollars. I detest haggling.”

“No.” Berin was rough. “Did Vukcic know of this? Was it for this he brought me-”

“Sir! If you please. I have spoken of confidence. This enterprise has been mentioned to no one. I began by beseeching you; I do so again. Will you oblige me?”

“No.”

“Under no conditions?”

“No.”

Wolfe sighed clear to his belly. He shook his head. “I am an ass. I should never have tried this on the train. I am not myself.” He reached for the button on the casing. “Would you like some beer?”

“No.” Berin snorted. “I am wrong, I mean yes. I would like beer.”

“Good.” Wolfe leaned back and closed his eyes. Berin got his pipe lit again. The train bumped over a switch and swayed on a curve, and Wolfe’s hand groped for the arm of his seat and grasped it. The porter came and received the order, and soon afterward was back again with glasses and bottles, and served, and again I coughed up some jack. I sat and made pictures of sausages on a blank page of my expense book as the beer went down.

Wolfe said, “Thank you, sir, for accepting my beer. There is no reason why we should not be amicable. I seem to have put the wrong foot forward with you. Even before I made my request, while I was relating a tale which could have been only flattering to you, you had a hostile eye. You growled at me. What was my misstep?”

Berin smacked his lips as he put down his empty glass, and his hand descended in an involuntary movement for the comer of an apron that wasn’t there. He reached for a handkerchief and used it, leaned forward and tapped a finger on Wolfe’s knee, and told him with emphasis: “You live in the wrong country.”

Wolfe lifted his brows. “Yes? Wait till you taste terrapin Maryland. Or even, if I may say so, oyster pie a la Nero Wolfe, prepared by Fritz Brenner. In comparison with American oysters, those of Europe are mere blobs of coppery protoplasm.”

“I don’t speak of oysters. You live in the country which permits the presence of Phillip Laszio.”

“Indeed. I don’t know him.”

“But he makes slop at the Hotel Churchill in your own city of New York! You must know that.”

“I know of him, certainly, since he is one of your number-”

“My number? Pah!” Berin’s hands, in a wide swift sweep, tossed Phillip Laszio through the window. “Not of my number!”

“Your pardon.” Wolfe inclined his head. “But he is one of Les Quinze Maitres, and you are one. Do you suggest that he is unworthy?”

Berin tapped Wolfe’s knee again. I grinned as I saw Wolfe, who didn’t like being touched, concealing his squirm for the sake of sausages. Berin said slowly through his teeth, “Laszio is worthy of being cut into small pieces and fed to pigs!-But no, that would render the hams inedible. Merely cut into pieces.” He pointed to a hole in the ground. “And buried. I tell you, I have known Laszio many years. He is maybe a Turk? No one knows. No one knows his name. He stole the secret of Rognons aux Montagnes in 1920 from my friend Zelota of Tarragona and claimed the creation. Zelota will kill him; he has said so. He has stolen many other things. He was elected one of Les Quinze Maitres in 1927 in spite of my violent protest. His young wife-have you seen her? She is Dina, the daughter of Domenico Rossi of the Empire Cafe in London; I have had her many times on this knee!” He slapped the knee. “As you no doubt know, your friend Vukcic married her, and Laszio stole her from Vukcic. Vukcic will kill him, undoubtedly, only he waits too long!” Berin shook both fists. “He is a dog, a snake, he crawls in slime! You know Leon Blanc, our beloved Leon, once great? You know he is now stagnant in an affair of no reputation called the Willow Club in a town by the name of Boston? You know that for years your Hotel Churchill in New York was distinguished by his presence as chef de cuisine? You know that Laszio stole that position from him-by insinuation, by lies, by chicanery, stole it? Dear old Leon will kill him! Positively. Justice demands it.”