Rex Stout - Three at Wolfe's Door

Lily Rowan doesn't treat laws as her father did while he was piling up the seventeen million dollars he left her, but she can take them or leave them. So when she learned that Harvey Greve was coming to New York for the rodeo, and she decided to throw a party for some of the cast, and she thought it would be nice to feed {tern young blue grouse, the law was merely a hurdle to hop over. Since I'm a friend of hers and she knows it, that will do for that I will add only a brief report of a scene in the office on the ground floor of the old brownstone. It was Wednesday noon. Wolfe, at his desk, was reading the Times. I, at my desk, finished a phone call, hung up, and swiveled.

130 3 at Wolfe's Door

"That's interesting," I said. "That was Lily Rowan. As I told you, I'm going to a roping contest at her place Monday afternoon. A cowboy is going to ride a horse along Sixty-third Street, and other cowboys are going to try to rope him from the terrace of her penthouse, a hundred feet up. Never done before. First prize will be a saddle with silver trimmings."

He grunted. "Interesting?"

"Not that. That's just games. But a few of them are coming earlier for lunch, at one o'clock, and I'm invited, and she just had a phone call from Montana. Twenty young blue grouse, maybe more, will arrive by plane Saturday afternoon, and Felix is going to come and cook them. I'm glad I'm going. It's too bad you and Lily don't get along--ever since she squirted perfume on you."

He put the paper down to glare. "She didn't squirt perfume on me."

I flipped a hand. "It was her perfume."

He picked up the paper, pretended to read a paragraph, and dropped it again. He passed his tongue over his lips. "I have no animus for Miss Rowan. But I will not solicit an invitation."

"Of course not. You wouldn't stoop. I don't--"

"But you may ask if I would accept one."

'Would you?"

"Yes."

"Good. She asked me to invite you, but I was afraid you'd decline and I'd hate to hurt her feelings. I'll tell her." I reached for the phone.

I report that incident so you'll understand why he got up and left after coffee. I not only wasn't surprised when he came and interrupted Cal Barrow and me, I was pleased, because Lily had bet me a sawbuck he wouldn't stay for coffee. Leaving him there with Cal, I went to the terrace.

In the early fall Lily's front terrace is usually sporting annual flowers along the parapet and by the wall of the penthouse, and a few evergreens in tubs scattered around, but for that day the parapet was bare, and instead of the evergreens, which would have interfered with rope whirling, there were clumps of sagebrush two feet high in pots. The sagebrush had come by rail, not by air, but

The Rodeo Murder

131

even so the part of Lily that had ordered it and paid for it is not my part. That will he no news to her when she reads this.

I glanced around. Lily was in a group seated to the right, with Wade Eisler on one side and Mel Fox on the other. In dash she wasn't up to the two cowgirls there, Nan Karlin in her pink silk shirt and Anna Casado, dark-skinned with black hair and black eyes, in her yellow one, but she was the hostess and not in competition. In situations that called for dash she had plenty. The other four were standing by the parapet at the left--Roger Dunning, the rodeo promoter, not in costume; his wife Ellen, former cowgirl, also not in costume; Harvey Greve in his brown shirt and red neck rag and corduroy pants and boots; and Laura Jay. Having Laura Jay in profile, I could see the bandage on her ear through the strands of her hair, which was exactly the color of the thyme honey that Wolfe gets from Greece. At the dinner table she had told me that a horse had jerked his head around and the bit had bruised her, but now I knew different.

Stepping across to tell Lily I was leaving but would be back in time for the show, I took a side glance at Wade Eisler's plump, round face. The scratch, which began an inch below his left eye and slanted down nearly to the corner of his mouth, hadn't gone very deep and it had had some fifteen hours to calm down by Cal Barrow's account, but it didn't improve his looks any, and there was ample room for improvement. He was one of those New York characters that get talked about and he had quite a reputation as a smooth operator, but he certainly hadn't been smooth last night--according to Laura Jay as relayed by Cal Barrow. The cave-man approach to courtship may have its points if that's the best you can do, but if I ever tried it I would have more sense than to pick a girl who could rope and tie a frisky calf in less than a minute.

After telling Lily I would be back in time for the show and was looking forward to collecting the sawbuck, I returned to the living room. Wolfe and Cal were admiring the saddle. I told Cal I would think it over and let him know, went to the foyer and got Wolfe's hat and stick, followed him down the flight of stairs to the tenth floor, and rang for the elevator. We walked the two blocks

132, 3 "* Wolfe's Door

to the parking lot where I had left the Heron sedan, which Wolfe had paid for but I had selected. Of course a taxi would have been simpler, but he hates things on wheels. To ride in a strange vehicle with a stranger driving would be foolhardy; with me at the wheel in a car of my choice it is merely imprudent.

Stopped by a red light on Park Avenue in the Fifties, I turned my head to say, "I'm taking the car back because I may need it. I may do a little errand for one of the cowboys. If so I probably won't be home for dinner."

"A professional errand?"

"No. Personal."

He grunted. "You have the afternoon, as agreed. If the errand is personal it is not my concern. But, knowing you as I do, I trust it is innocuous."

"So do I." The light changed and I fed gas.

ii

It was ten minutes to four when I got back to the parking lot on 63rd Street. Walking west, I crossed Park Avenue and stopped for a look. Five cops were visible. One was talking to the driver of a car who wanted to turn the corner, two were standing at the curb talking, and two were holding off an assortment of pedestrians who wanted to get closer to three mounted cowboys. The cowboys were being spoken to by a man on foot, not in costume. As I moved to proceed one of the cops at the curb blocked me and spoke. "Do you live in this block, sir?"

I told him no, I was going to Miss Lily Rowan's party, and he let me pass. The New York Police Department likes to grant reasonable requests from citizens, especially when the request comes from a woman whose father was a Tammany district leader for thirty years. There were no parked cars on that side of the street, but twenty paces short of the building entrance a truck with cameras was hugging the curb, and there was another one farther on, near Madison Avenue.

The Rodeo Murder

133

When I had left with Wolfe Lily had had nine guests; now she had twenty or more. Three of the new arrivals were cowboys, making six with Cal Barrow, Harvey Greve, and Mel Fox; die rest were civilians. They were all on the terrace. The civilians were at the parapet, half at one end and half at the other, leaving the parapet clear for thirty feet in the middle. The cowboys, their ten-gallon hats on their heads and their ropes in their hands, were lined up facing a tall skinny man in a brown suit. At the man's elbow was Roger Dunning, the promoter. The man was speaking.

". . . and that's the way it's going to be. I'm the judge and what I say goes. I repeat that Greve hasn't done any practicing, and neither has Barrow or Fox. I have Miss Rowan's word for that, and I don't think you want to call her a liar. I've told you the order, but you don't move in until I call your name. Remember what I said, if you take a tumble off a bronc it's four feet down; here it's a hundred feet down and you won't get up and walk. Once again, no hooligan stuff. There's not supposed to be any pedestrians on this side of the street from four o'clock to five, but if one comes out of a house and one of you drops a loop on him you won't sleep in a hotel room tonight. We're here to have some fun, but don't get funny." He looked at his watch. "Time to go. Fox, get--"