Rex Stout - Some Buried Caesar

"None."

"Good. Then tell me first, where were you bom?"

Bronson shook his head. "I said help you, not satisfy your curiosity."

"You've admitted I can trace you back if I care to take the trouble,"

"Then take the trouble."

"Very well, I'll be more direct. Have you ever handled cattle?"

Bronson stared, then let out a short laugh and said, "My God, must I take it back about your not being a fool? Do you mean to say you're trying to fit me in that thing?"

"Have you ever handled cattle?"

"I've never had the slightest association with cattle. I know where milk and beef come from only because I read it some- where."

"Where is the club you were carrying last night when you accompanied Clyde Osgood to Pratt's place?"

"Club?"

"Yes. A rough club, a length of sapling."

"Why… I don't think… Oh yes. Sure, I remember. It was leaning up against a shed as we went by, and I just-"

"Where is it?"

"You mean now? After all-"

"Where did you leave it?"

"Why… I don't… Oh! Sure. When we got to the fence, where the trees ended, Clyde went on and I came back. He took the club with him."

"What for?"

Bronson shrugged. He had himself collected again. "Just to have it, I suppose. I notice you carry a heavy walking stick. What for?"

"Not to knock myself unconscious with. Did Clyde ask for the club? Did you offer it to him?"

"I don't know. It was quite casual, one way or the other, Why, was he knocked on the head? I thought he was killed with a pick, according to your-"

"You're supposed to be helping, sir, not chattering. I need the truth about that club."

"You've had it."

"Nonsense. You were obviously disconcerted, and you stalled." Wolfe wiggled a finger at him. "If you don't want my antagonism, beware. This is the most favorable chance you'll have to tell the truth, here privately with me in comparative amity. Isn't it a fact that you yourself carried the club to Mr. Pratt's place?"

"No. I didn't go there."

"You stick to that?"

"It's the truth."

"I warn you again, beware. But say we take that, for the moment, for truth, tell me this: why was Clyde going to Pratt's? What was he going to do there?"

"I don't know."

"What did he say he was going to do?"

"He didn't say."

Wolfe shut his eyes and was silent. I saw the tip of his index finger making little circles on the arm of his chair, and knew he was speechless with fury. After a minute Bron- son began:

"I may as well-"

"Shut up!" Wolfe's lids quivered as he opened his eyes. "You're making a mistake. A bad one. Listen to this. You were demanding immediate repayment of your money. Clyde, unable to raise the sum in New York, came here to appeal to his father, and you were in such a hurry, or mistrusted him so greatly, or both, that you came along. You wouldn't let him out of your sight. His father refused his appeal, since Clyde wouldn't tell him what the money was needed for-to save the Osgood honor would be correct phrasing-and you were ready to disclose the facts to the father and collect your debt direct from him. Then Clyde, in desperation, made a bet. He couldn't possibly win the bet and pay you for 6 days, until the week expired, and what acceptable assurance could he give you that he would win it at all? Only one assurance could have induced you to wait: a satisfactory explanation of the method by which he expected to win. So he gave it to you. Don't try to tell me he didn't; I'm not a gull. He told you how he expected to win, and the steps he proposed to take. Very well, you tell me."

Bronson shook his head. "All I can say is, you're wrong. He didn't tell-"

"Pfui. I'm right. I know when I'm right. Beware, sir."

Bronson shrugged. "It won't get you anywhere to keep telling me to beware. I can't tell you what I don't know."

"Did Clyde Osgood tell you how and why he expected to win the bet?"

"No."

"Or what he intended to do at Pratt's or whom he expected to see there?"

"No."

"Did he make any remark, drop any hint, that led you to guess?"

"No."

"You're making a bad blunder."

"No, I'm not. I may be getting in bad with you, but I can't help it. For God's sake-"

"Shut up. You're a fool after all." Wolfe turned and snapped at me: "Archie, get that paper."

He might have prepared me by one swift glance before putting it into words, but when I complained to him about such things he always said that my speed and wit required no preparation, and I retorted that I could put up with less sarcastic flattery and more regard for my convenience.

On this occasion it didn't matter much. Bronson was about my size but I doubted if he was tough. However, it was a murder case, and Wolfe had just been insinuating that this gentleman had been on the scene of hostilities with a club in his hand, so I got upright and across to his neighborhood quick enough to forestall any foolish motions he might make. I stuck my hand out and said:

"Gimme."

He shook his head and got up without haste, kicking his chair back without looking at it, looking instead at me with his eyes still steady and clever.

"This is silly," he said. "Damned silly. You can't bluff me like this."

I asked without turning my head, "Do you want it, Mr. Wolfe?"

"Get it."

"Okay. – Reach for the moon. I'll help myself."

"No you won't." His eyes didn't nicker. "If you try taking it away from me, I won't fight. I'm not much of a coward, but I'm not in condition and I'd be meat for you. Instead I'll yell, and Osgood will come, and of course he'll want a look at the paper that's causing the trouble." He smiled.

"You will?"

"I will."

"Back at you. If you do, I'll show you how I make sausage. I warn you, one bleat and I'll quit only when the ambulance comes. After Osgood reads the paper he'll offer to pay me to do it again. Hold that pose."

I started to reach, and I'll be damned if he didn't try a dive with his knee up, and without flashing a flag. He was- fairly quick, but I side-stepped in time. It wasn't absolutely essen- tial to punch him, but a guy as tricky as he was needed a lesson anyway, so I let him have it, a good stiff hook that lifted him out of his dive and turned him over. I was beside him, bending over him, by the time he got his eyes open again.

"Stay there," I told him. "I don't know which pocket it's in. Do you think you can remember that? If so, gimme."

His hand started for his inside breast pocket, and I reached in ahead of him and pulled out something that proved to be a handsome brown leather wallet with a monogram on it in platinum or maybe tin. He grabbed for it and I jerked away and told him to get up and sit down, and backed off a little to examine the loot.

"My word." I whistled. "Here's an accumulation of cur- rency out of all proportion. A couple of thousand or more. Pipe down, you. I don't steal from blackguards. But I don't see… ah, here we are. Secret compartments you might say." I unfolded it and ran my eye over it, and handed it to Wolfe. "Return the balance?"