Rex Stout - Final Deduction

Wolfe tilted his chair back, then his head, pursed his lips, and examined the ceiling. Cramer took a cigar from a pocket, rolled it between his palms, which was silly with a cigar that wasn't going to be lit, held it at an angle with his thumb and forefinger, frowning at it, and returned it to his pocket. Evidently he had asked it an impertinent question and it had refused to answer. Wolfe let his chair come forward and said, "The paper, Archie." I went to the safe and got it from the shelf and took it to him. He put it on his desk pad and turned to Cramer.

"I think you have the notion that I have withheld information from you on various occasions just to be contrary. I haven't. I have reserved details only when I wanted them, at least temporarily, for my exclusive use, or when you have been excessively offensive. Today you have been reasonably civil, though of course not affable; imparting it will not make it less useful to me; and if it furthers your investigation, though I confess I don't see how it can, it will serve a double purpose." He picked up the paper. "I'll read it. I won't hand it to you because you would probably say it may be needed as evidence, which would be absurd, and pocket it."

He read it, ending, "Signed by Noel Tedder. It isn't holograph; Mr Goodwin wrote it. I answered that question by Mr Draper ambiguously because if I had told him of my arrangement with Mr Tedder he would have kept me up all night, thinking that I had some knowledge, at least an inkling, of where the money might be found. I have no commitment to Mrs Vail, but I do have a client: Noel Tedder."

"Yeah." It came out hoarse, and Cramer cleared his throat. He always gets a little hoarse when he talks with Wolfe, probably a certain word or words sticking in his throat. "And either you have some idea where the money is or this is a cover for something else. Does Mrs Vail know about that agreement?"

"Yes."

"And that's what Goodwin and Tedder were discussing last night?"

"Yes."

"What else were they discussing?"

Wolfe turned. "Archie?"

I shook my head. "Nothing. We touched on mothers some, his and mine, but that was in connection with the agreement."

"So your question is answered," Wolfe told him. "I'm aware that you'll pass it on to Mr Draper, but he isn't here, and if he comes he won't get in. We have given him all the information we possess about the kidnaping, with no reservations. I do have an idea where the money is, but it is based-"

"By God, you admit it."

"I state it. It's based on deductions and assumptions I have made, not on any evidence I'm withholding. That applies not only to the kidnaping and the whereabouts of the money, but also to the death of Mr Vail. What would you say if I told you that I'm convinced that he was murdered, with premeditation, and that I think I know, I'm all but certain that I know, who killed him and why?"

"I'd say you were grandstanding. It wouldn't be the first time. I know you. God, do I know you! When you've really got something you don't say you're convinced and you're all but certain. You say you know. If you've got any evidence that he was murdered and that points to the murderer, I want it, and I want it now. Have you got any?"

"No."

"Then I'll leave you to your deductions and assumptions." He picked up his hat. "You're damn right I'll tell Draper." He rose. "But if he knew you as well as I do- Oh, nuts." He turned and marched out.

I stepped to the hall and saw him close the front door behind him, stepped back in, and asked Wolfe, "So you're all but certain? Do you know what `grandstanding' means? Where did you get the idea-"

"Get Saul."

He snapped it. I went and opened the door to the front room and told Saul to come. As he entered, Wolfe spoke. "Mr Frost has gone?"

Saul nodded. "He bent his ear for five minutes trying to hear you, found that he couldn't on account of the sound-proofing, and left."

"I want Fred. If Mr Purcell is at home, he will of course be nearby. Bring him as soon as possible." His eyes came to me. "Archie, I want Mr Tedder, and Orrie with him. Also as soon as possible. Don't stop to tell Fritz about the door. I'll see that it's bolted."

"You want me back," Saul said.

"Yes. Go."

We went.

CHAPTER 12

It wouldn't do, of course, for me to ring the Vail house and get Noel and tell him Wolfe wanted to see him. One, he might not come without some fancy persuading. Two, Wolfe wanted Orrie too, and Orrie, tailing him, might possibly lose him on the way downtown. Three, Saul had to go there to get Fred, and the taxi fare is the same for two as for one. So we walked to Tenth Avenue and flagged a cab.

It was 11:23 of a sunny Sunday morning, nice and warm for the last of April, when we stopped at the kerb in front of 994 Fifth Avenue, paid the hackie, and got out. When we're going on with the program, the method of getting in touch with a tail, understood by all of us, is a little complicated, but in that case it was simple. We merely raised an arm to wave at a squirrel in a tree in the park and started to stroll downtown. Before we had taken twenty steps Fred appeared from behind a parked car across the street and came over to us and said if we had come an hour sooner he could have gone to church.

"It would take more than church to square you," I told him. "Purcell hasn't shown?"

"No."

"What about Orrie?"

"His subject showed at ten fifty-one and led him away." Fred looked at Saul. "And yours came at eleven-fifteen in a cab and went in. So you got shook for once?"

"No," I said, "he got called off. Did Tedder ride or walk?"

"Walked. Turned east at Seventy-eighth Street. Orrie was keeping distance. Something happened? What's up?"

"God doesn't know, but Mr Wolfe does. Everybody in for a conference." I turned to Saul. "If you and Fred go on down, you can read the Bible until I bring Tedder and Orrie. There are five versions in four different languages on the second shelf from the top near the left end. I'm thinking where to start looking for him. I think better when I talk."

"We can't help you think," Saul said, "because you know him and we don't, but we can help you look. Of course, if he wanted a taxi, it's Sunday and he could have got one here on Fifth, or if he thought he'd get one quicker on Madison he wouldn't have gone to Seventy-eighth to turn east. But if he has a car and it's garaged on Seventy-eighth, he-"

"No," Fred said. "Four cars garaged on Eighty-second Street. I've seen three of them." As I said, Fred was a little too solid for quick reactions, but give him time and he would collect a lot of miscellaneous information that might be useful.

"Okay," I said, "thanks a lot for doing my thinking. Now I know where he is, maybe. If you've thought wrong and he's not there, we might as well go back to Thirty-fifth Street and sing hymns until Orrie phones. Come along."

It was one chance in a thousand, but it was the only chance there was. I led them south to Seventy-eighth Street and east to Madison Avenue, halted in front of Barney's, and told them, "We might as well give Orrie the high sign first and have him join us. Then when I bring-"

"There he is," Saul said.

I turned. Orrie had emerged from a doorway across the street and was crossing the sidewalk. "All I need," I said, "is someone to do my thinking," and stepped to Barney's door and entered.

There was no one at the bar, since it was Sunday morning, and there weren't many at the tables or in the booths, but the top of a head was showing in the booth at the far end and I went to it. It was Noel, with a plate of roast turkey and trimmings in front of him, untouched, and a nearly empty glass in his hand. He looked up at me, blinked, and squeaked, "Well, for God's sake!"

I gave him a friendly grin, hero to hero. "This isn't luck," I said, "it's fate. When I learned you had gone out, it wasn't that I had a hunch, I just started to walk, and there I was in front of Barney's, and I came in, and here you are. Have you-uh-spoken to your mother?"