Rex Stout - The Golden Spiders (Crime Line)

“What dough?”

I shrugged. “So you ask for it, huh? Take his arms, Saul.”

I got his ankles, and we lugged him across to the opposite wall and put him down alongside a little stand that held a telephone. He started to wriggle around to prop himself against the wall, but I told Saul, “Keep him flat while I see if this phone’s connected,” and lifted the receiver and dialed a number. After only two whirrs a voice said, “Nero Wolfe speaking.”

“Archie. I’m just testing a phone.”

“It’s midnight. Where the devil are you?”

“We’re here together, all four of us, operating a garage on Tenth Avenue. We have customers waiting, and I’m too busy to talk. You’ll hear from us later.”

“I’m going to bed.”

“Sure. Sleep tight.”

I cradled the receiver, lifted the instrument, slid the stand along the wall out of the way, put the instrument on the floor a foot from Egan’s shoulder as he lay, and called to Fred, “Bring that ball of cord.”

He came with it, asking, “The crisscross?”

“Right. A piece about eight feet long.”

While he was cutting it off I explained to Egan. “I don’t know whether you’ve been introduced to this or not. It’s a scientific method of stimulating the vocal cords. If and when you find you don’t like it, the phone’s right there by you. You can dial either police headquarters, Canal six-two-thousand, or the Sixteenth Precinct, Circle six-oh-four-one-six, which is right near here, but don’t try dialing any other number. If you ring the cops we’ll turn off the science and you can tell them anything you want to without interference. That’s guaranteed. All right, Saul, pin his shoulders. Here, Fred.”

We squatted by Egan’s ankles, one on each side. It isn’t complicated, but it’s a little delicate if the patient has brittle bones. First you double the cord and noose it around the left ankle. Then you cross the legs, the right one over the left one, and work the toe of the right shoe under the left heel and around to the right side of it. For that the knees have to be bent. Pull the right ankle down as nearly even with the left ankle as possible, wind the doubled cord around them both, three tight turns, take a half-hitch and you’ve got it. If you grab the free ends of the cord and give a healthy yank straight down, away from the feet, the patient will probably pass out, so you don’t do that. Even a gentle yank is not good technique. You merely hold the cord taut to maintain the tension. Meanwhile your colleague keeps the patient’s shoulders in place, though even without him you have complete control. If you doubt it, try it.

With Saul at the shoulders and Fred at the end of the cord, I brought a chair over, sat, and watched Egan’s face. He was trying to keep it from registering. “This hurts you more than it does me,” I told him, “so any time you want to call the cops say so. If your legs are too uncomfortable to turn over to dial I’ll cut the cord. A little tighter, Fred, just a little. Was Birch in on your racket?”

I waited ten seconds. His face was twisting, and he was breathing fast. “Did you see Birch in that car Tuesday afternoon?”

His eyes were shut, and he was trying to move his shoulders. Another ten seconds. “Who gave you the tip on Leopold Heim?”

“I want the cops,” he said hoarsely.

“Right. Cut it, Fred.”

Instead of cutting it, he undid the half-hitch, unwrapped the wind, and eased the left toe back under the heel. Egan started to pump his knees, slowly and carefully.

“No calisthenics,” I told him. “Dial.”

He turned on his side, lifted the receiver, and started to dial. Saul and I both watched. He hit the right holes, CA 6-2000. I heard him get an answer, and he said, “Police headquarters?” Then he dropped the receiver back in place and said to me, “You sonofabitch, you would?”

“Certainly,” I told him, “I guaranteed it. Before we stimulate you again, a couple of points. You get one more chance to call the cops, that’s all. You could keep this up all night. Second, it might be slick to come across now. If you’re taking it for granted that your address book will get to the cops anyway, you’re wrong. I’ll give it to Mr. Wolfe, and he’s working on a murder, and I don’t think he’ll feel like turning all those people over to the law. That’s not his lookout. I make no promise, but I’m telling you. All right, Fred. Pin him, Saul.”

That time we reversed it, crossing his left leg over his right, and we made the turns slightly tighter. Fred took the cord ends, and I returned to the chair. The reaction came quicker and stronger. In ten seconds his face began to twist. In ten more his forehead and neck went wet with sweat. His gray face got grayer, and his eyes opened and started to bulge. I was about to tell Fred to ease it a little when he gasped, “Let up!”

“Off a little, Fred. Just hold it. Was Birch in on the racket?”

“Yes!”

“Who’s the boss?”

“Birch was. Take that cord off!”

“In a minute. It’s better than pliers. Who’s the boss now?”

“I don’t know.”

“Nuts. The cord had better stay a while. Did you see Birch in a car with a woman last Tuesday afternoon?”

“Yes, but it wasn’t parked in front of Danny’s.”

“Slightly tighter, Fred. Where was it?”

“Going down Eleventh Avenue in the Fifties.”

“A dark gray Caddy sedan with a Connecticut plate?”

“Yes.”

“Was it Birch’s car?”

“I never saw it before. But Birch worked with a hot-car gang too, and of course that Caddy was hot. Everything Birch had a hand in was hot.”

“Yeah, he’s dead now, so why not? Who was the woman with him?”

“I don’t know. I was across the street and didn’t see. Take the cord off! No more until it’s off!”

He was breathing fast again, and his face was grayer, so I told Fred to give him a recess. When his legs had been unwound Egan thought he would bend them, then thought he would straighten them, then decided to postpone trying to move them.

I continued. “Didn’t you recognize the woman?”

“No.”

“Could you identify her?”

“I don’t think so. They just went by.”

“What time Tuesday afternoon?”

“Around half-past six, maybe a little later.”

I would take that, anyhow on consignment. Pete Drossos had said it was a quarter to seven when the woman in the car had told him to get a cop. I almost hated to ask the next question for fear of Egan disqualifying himself by answering it wrong.

“Who was driving, Birch?”

“No, the woman. That surprised me. Birch wasn’t a guy to have a woman driving him.”

I could have kissed the louse. He had made it twenty to one on Wolfe’s hit-or-miss assumption. I had a notion to get the photos of Jean Estey, Angela Wright, and Claire Horan from Fred’s envelope and ask Egan if the woman in the car had resembled one of them, but skipped it. He had said he couldn’t identify her, and he certainly wasn’t going to take on more load than he already had.