Rex Stout - Murder by the Book

That was all for Sunday, exsept that after dinner I got invited to the pool game and made a run of twenty-nine, and after supper I was instructed to tell Saul and Fred and Orrie to report in at eleven in the morning.

They were there when Wolfe came down from the plant

rooms: Saul Panzer, small and wiry, in his old brown suit; Fred Durkin, with his round red face and spreading bald spot, in the red leather chair by right of seniority; and Orrie Gather, with his square jaw and crew cut, looking young enough to still be playing pro football. Wolfe took Fred first, then Orrie, and Saul last.

Adding what they told us to what we already knew from the police file and the girls and the firm members, including Blanche's little contribution Saturday evening, we were certainly up on Leonard Dykes. I could give you fifty pages on him, but it would leave you just where we were, so what's the use? If anyone who had known him had any idea who had killed him or why, they weren't saying. Saul and Fred and Orrie were three good men, and they hadn't got the faintest glimmer, though they had covered every possible source except Dykes's sister, who was in California. Wolfe kept them till lunchtime and then cut them loose. Saul, who hated to turn in an empty bag even more than I did, offered to spend another day or two at it on his own, but Wolfe said no.

When they had gone Wolfe sat and stared across the room at nothing a full three minutes before he pushed back his chair, though Fritz had announced lunch. Then he heaved a deep sigh, got himself up, and growled at me to come on.

We had just returned to the office after a silent meal that was anything but convivial when the doorbell rang and I went to answer it. Not many times has it given me pleasure to see a cop on that stoop, but that was one of them. Even a humble dick would have been a sign that something had happened or might be ready to happen, and this was Inspector Cramer himself. I opened up and invited him to cross the sill, took his hat and coat, and escorted him to the office without bothering to announce him.

He grunted at Wolfe, and Wolfe grunted back. He sat, got a cigar from his vest pocket, inspected it, stuck it between his teeth, moved his jaw to try it at various angles, and took it out again.

"I'm deciding how to start this," he muttered.

"Can I help?" Wolfe asked politely.

"Yes. But you won't. One tiling, I'm not going to get sore. It wouldn't do any good, because I doubt if I've got anything on you that would stick. Is that deal we made still on?"

"Of course. Why not?"

"Then you will kindly fill me in. When you decided to trick

us into taking a jab at someone, why did you pick Corrigan?"

Wolfe shook his head. "You had better start over, Mr. Cramer. That's the worst possible way. There was no trick-"

Cramer cut in rudely and emphatically with a vulgar word. He went on. "I said I'm not going to get sore, and I'm not, but look at it. You get hold of that letter with that notation on it, the first real evidence anyone has seen that links someone in that office with Baird Archer and therefore with the murders. A real hot find. There were several ways you could have used it, but you pass them all up and send the letter down to me. I sent Lieutenant Rowcliff up there this morning. Corrigan admits the notation resembles his handwriting, but absolutely denies that he made it or ever saw it or has any idea what it stands for. The others all make the same denials."

Cramer cocked his head. "I've sat here many a time and listened to you making an assumption on poorer ground than what I've made this one on. I don't know how you got hold of a sample of Corrigan's handwriting, but that would have been easy. And I don't know whether it was you or Goodwin who made that notation on that letter, and I don't care. One of you did. All I want to know is, why? You're too smart and too lazy to play a trick like that just for the hell of it. That's why I'm not sore and I'm not going to get sore. You expected it to get you something. What?"

He put the cigar in his mouth and sank his teeth in it.

Wolfe regarded him. "Confound it," he said regretfully, "we're not going to get anywhere."

"Why not? I'm being goddam reasonable."

"You are indeed. But we can't meet. You will listen to me only if I concede your assumption that Mr. Goodwin or I made the notation on the letter, imitating Corrigan's hand. You will not listen to me if I deny that and substitute my own assumption, that the notation was in fact a trick but not mine. Will you?"

'Try it."

"Very well. Someone wanted to provide me with evidence that would support the line I was taking, but of such a nature and in such a manner that I would be left exactly where I was. Its pointing at Corrigan may have been deliberate or merely adventitious; it had to point at someone, and it may be that Corrigan was selected because he is somehow invulnerable. I preferred not to make an ass of myself by acting on it. All I would have got was a collection of denials. As it now stands,

Lieutenant Rowcliff got the denials, and I am uncommitted. They don't know-he doesn't know-how I took it. For my part, I don't know who he is or what is moving him or why he wants to prod me, but I would like to know. If he acts again I may find out."

Wolfe upturned a palm. "That's all."

"I don't believe it."

"I didn't expect you to."

"Okay. I've listened to it on your assumption, now try mine. You made the notation on the letter yourself and made me a present of it. Why?"

"No, Mr. Cramer. I'm sorry, but that's beyond my powers. Unless you also assume that I've lost my senses, and in that case why waste time on me?"

"I won't." Cramer left his chair, and as he did so his determination not to get sore suddenly went up the flue. He hurled his unlit cigar at my wastebasket, missed by a yard, and hit me on the ankle. "Fat bloated lousy liar," he rasped, and turned and tramped out.

Thinking that under the circumstances it was just as well to let him wriggle into his coat unaided, I stayed put. But also thinking that he might take a notion to try a simple little trick himself, when the front door slammed I got up and moseyed to the hall for a look through the one-way glass panel, and saw him cross to the sidewalk and get into his car, the door of which had been opened for an inspector.

When I returned to the office Wolfe was leaning back with his eyes closed and his brow creased. I sat. I hoped to God he didn't feel as helpless and useless as I did, but from the expression on his face I had another hope coming. I looked at my wrist and saw 2:52. When I looked again it said 3:06. I wanted to yawn but thought I didn't deserve to, and choked it.

Wolfe's voice blurted, "Where's Mr. Wellman?"

"In Peoria. He went Friday."

He had opened his-eyes and straightened up. "How long does it take an airplane to get to Los Angeles?"

"Ten or eleven hours. Some of them more."

"When does the next one go?"

"I don't know."

"Find out. Wait. Have we ever before been driven to extremities as now?"

"No."

"I agree. His gambit of that notation on that letter-what for? Confound him! Nothing but denials. You have the name and address of Dykes's sister in California."