Rex Stout - Murder by the Book

It was then two in the morning, and I was not through. I drove downtown to Sullivan Street and let myself into Dykes's apartment with the key I had taken from his pocket. With my bare hands an hour there would have been enough, but with gloves on it took three hours to • make a thorough search. I found only three items, but they were well worth it. Two of them were receipts signed by Rachel Abrams for payments for typing made by Baird Archer, and the third was a letter addressed to (Baird Archer at General Delivery, Clinton Station, on the letterhead of Scholl Hanna, signed by Joan Well-man. I said I made a thorough search, but there were many books on the shelves, and there wasn't time to turn through every page of them even if I had thought it necessary. If I had done so I would have found the sheet of paper on which Dykes made that list of names with Baird Archer among them, and you would never have seen it, and I wouldn't be writing you this now.

For a while, a week or so, I had no intention of doing anything about Joan Wellman or Rachel Abrams, but then I began to worry. One of them had typed the script and the other had read it. The trial of O'Malley and the juror and the disbarment proceedings had of course been fully reported in the papers, only a year ago. What if one of those women or both of them had noticed the similarity, or rather the sameness, between the actual happening and Dykes's novel? What if they had mentioned it or an occasion arose for them to mention it in the future? They were less dangerous than Dykes, but they were dangerous, or might be.

That was more and more on my mind, and finally I did something about it. The last day of January, a Wednesday, I phoned Joan Wellman at her office. I told her I was Baird Archer, and offered to pay her for advice about my novel, and made an appointment with her for the next day but one, Friday, at five-thirty. We met in the Ruby

Room at the Churchill and had drinks and talked. She was attractive and intelligent, and I was thinking that it would be impossible to do her any serious harm, when she asked me point blank about the remarkable resemblance between the plot of my novel and an occurrence in real life here in New York a year ago. She said she wasn't sure she remembered the name of the disbarred lawyer, she thought it was O'Mara, but probably I remembered it.

I said I didn't. I said I hadn't consciously used any happening in real life when I was plotting the novel, but of course it might have been in my subconscious. She said that as far as she remembered it hadn't come out that O'Mara had been betrayed by one of his partners, and it would be interesting to look into it and see if my subconscious had not only copied what had been published but had also, by insight or intuition, divined what had not been published. That was enough for me, more than enough.

I guided the talk, while we were having dinner, to a point where it was appropriate for me to suggest that we drive to my apartment in the Bronx so I could get the manuscript. She gave me a bad moment when she asked, if I lived in the Bronx, why had I given my address as General Delivery, Clinton Station, but I gave her an answer that satisfied her. She said she would go with me to get the manuscript but let me know that she wouldn't go up to my apartment. I was sorry I had met her in so public a place as the Ruby Room, but neither of us had seen anyone we knew and I resolved to go ahead.

I went alone to get my car and picked her up in front of the Churchill and drove to Washington Heights. There, in a side street, it was as simple as it had been with Dykes. I remarked that the windshield was misted on the inside and reached behind me as if for my handkerchief, got a heavy wrench I had placed there when I went for my car, and hit her with it. She didn't even groan. I tried to prop her up but couldn't, and lifted her over into the back onto the floor. On the way to Van Cortlandt Park I stopped several times to take a look at her. Once she seemed to be stirring, and I had to hit her again.

I drove to a secluded road in the park. There was no one in sight, but it was only ten o'clock and there was a

chance that a car might come along at the worst moment, even in February, so I left the park, drove around for two hours, and then returned to the park and the secluded road. The risk was then at a minimum, and anyhow I had to take it. I took her out of the car, put her on the road near the edge, and ran the car over her. Then I drove away fast. When I was miles away I stopped under a light and inspected the car for signs of blood or other evidence, but I had been careful to go slowly when passing over her and I could find nothing.

I put the thing down on my desk, looked at my watch, and saw 9:35. In Peoria, Illinois, it was 8:35, and John R. Well-man, according to the schedule he had given me, would be at his place of business. I reached for the phone and put in a call and soorrhad him.

"Mr. Wellman? Archie Goodwin. I promised to let you know immediately if anything broke. Corrigan, senior partner in that law firm, was found dead on the floor of his apartment last night with a hole in his head and a gun lying nearby. I would-"

"Did he shoot himself?"

"I don't know. As a purely personal opinion, it looks like it. I would call that a break, but whether good or bad is for Mr. Wolfe to decide, not me. I'm just keeping my promise and telling you. As it stands this minute, that's all I can say. Mr. Wolfe is busy upstairs."

"Thank you, Mr. Goodwin. Thank you very much. I'll go to Chicago and take a plane. I'll call you when I reach New York."

I told him that would be fine, hung up, and returned to my reading.

There was only one other living person who knew the contents of that manuscript, Rachel Abrams, who had typed it. There was only one logical and sensible thing to do.

Until three months ago I had never been conscious of anything in my mind or heart to justify any concept of myself as a potential murderer. I believed that I understood myself at least as well as most people. I was aware that there was an element of casuistry in my self-justification for what I had done to O'Malley, but without

that intellectual resource no man could preserve his self-esteem. At any rate, I was an altogether different being from the moment I rolled Dykes's body from the pier into the water. I didn't know it at the time, but I do now. The change was not so much in my conscious mind as in the depths. If the processes of the subconscious can be put into rational terms at all, I think mine were something like this: (a) I have murdered a man in cold blood; (b) I am a decent and humane person, as men go, certainly not vicious or depraved; therefore (c) the conventional attitude toward the act of murder is invalid and immoral.

My inner being could not permit me to feel any moral repulsion at the thought of killing Joan Wellman, certainly not enough to restrain me, for if killing her was morally unacceptable how could I justify the killing of Dykes? By killing Joan Wellman the process was completed. After that, given adequate motive, I could have killed any number of people without any sign of compunction.

So in contemplating the murder of Rachel Abrams my only concerns were whether it was necessary and whether it could be performed without undue risk. I decided it was necessary. As for the risk, I left that to circumstances. With her I could not use the same kind of subterfuge I had used with Joan Wellman, since she had known Dykes as Baird Archer. My plan was so simple that it was really no plan at all. I merely went to her office one rainy afternoon, unannounced. If she had had an associate there with her, or if any one of a dozen other possible obstacles had arisen, I would have gone away and devised a procedure. But she had only one room and was there alone. I told her I wanted a typing job done, approached her to show her what it was, grasped her throat, had her unconscious in half a minute, opened the window, and lifted her and pushed her out. Unfortunately I had no time to search for records; of course I had no time at all. I left, ran down the stairs to the next floor, and took the elevator there, having got off there on my way up. When I left the building her body was on the sidewalk and a crowd was already collecting. Three days later, when my associates and I came to see you, I learned that I had been ahead of your man Goodwin by not