Rex Stout - And Four to Go

“Certainly we’re friends. I’m taking her to lunch.”

“Are you devoted to her?”

His smile wasn’t quite so indulgent, but it was still a smile. “Now that’s a delicate question,” he said. “I’ll tell you how it is. I’m a public figure and I have to watch my tongue. If I said yes, I’m devoted to Miss Korby, it would be in all the columns tomorrow and I’d get ten thousand telegrams and a million letters. If I said no, I’m not devoted to Miss Korby, that wouldn’t be polite with her here at my elbow. So I’ll just skip it. Come on, Flora.”

“One more question. I understand that your father works in a New York restaurant. Do you know whether he is involved in any of the charges Mr. Korby spoke of?”

“Oh, for God’s sake. Talk about hooey.” He turned and headed for the door, taking Flora with him. I got up and went to the hall and on to the front door, opened it for them, closed it after them, put the chain-bolt on, and returned to the office. Wolfe was speaking.

“… and I assure you, Mr. Rago, my interest runs with yours-with all of you except one. You don’t want the police crawling over you and neither do I.”

The sauce chef had straightened up in the red leather chair, and the points of his mustache seemed to have straightened up too. “Treeks,” he said.

“No, sir,” Wolfe said. “I have no objection to tricks, if they work, but this is merely a forthright discussion of a lamentable situation. No trick. Do you object to telling us what dealings you had with Philip Holt?”

“I am deesappointed,” Rago declared. “Of course I knew you made a living with detective work, everybody knows that, but to me your glory is your great contributions to cuisine-your sauce printemps, your oyster pie, your artichauts drigants, and others. I know what Pierre Mondor said of you. So it is a deesappointment when I am in your company that the only talk is of the ugliness of murder.”

“I don’t like it any better than you do, Mr. Rago. I am pleased to know that Pierre Mondor spoke well of me. Now about Philip Holt?”

“If you insist, certainly. But what can I say? Nothing.”

“Didn’t you know him?”

Rago spread his hands and raised his shoulders and brows. “I had met him. As one meets people. Did I know him? Whom does one know? Do I know you?”

“But you never saw me until two weeks ago. Surely you must have seen something of Mr. Holt. He was an important official of your union, in which you were active.”

“I have not been active in the union.”

“You were a speaker at its picnic yesterday.”

Rago nodded and smiled. “Yes, that is so. But that was because of my activity in the kitchen, not in the union. It may be said, even by me, that in sauces I am supreme. It was for that distinction that it was thought desirable to have me.” His head turned. “So, Mr. Korby?”

The president of URWA nodded yes. “That’s right,” he told Wolfe. “We thought the finest cooking should be represented, and we picked Rago for it. So far as I know, he has never come to a union meeting. We wish he would, and more like him.”

“I am a man of the kitchen,” Rago declared. “I am an artist. The business I leave to others.”

Wolfe was on Korby. “Did Mr. Rago’s name appear in any of the charges you spoke of?”

“No. I said I wouldn’t give names, but I can say no. No, it didn’t.”

“You didn’t say no when I asked about Mr. Griffin.” Wolfe turned to the importer. “Do you wish to comment on that, sir?”

I still hadn’t decided exactly what was wrong with Griffin’s left eye. There was no sign of an injury, and it seemed to function okay, but it appeared to be a little off center. From an angle, the slant I had from my desk, it looked normal.

He lifted his long narrow chin. “What do you expect?” he demanded.

“My expectations are of no consequence. I merely invite comment.”

“On that, I have none. I know nothing about any charges. What I want, I want to see that witness.”

Wolfe shook his head. “As I said, I will not produce the witness-for the present. Are you still skeptical?”

“I’m always skeptical.” Griffin’s voice would have suited a man twice his size. “I want to see that witness and hear what she has to say. I admit I can see no reason why you would invent her-if there is one it’s too deep for me, since it puts you in the same boat with us-but I’m not going to believe her until I see her. Maybe I will then, and maybe I won’t.”

“I think you will. Meanwhile, what about your relations with Philip Holt? How long and how well did you know him?”

“Oh, to hell with this jabber!” Griffin bounced up, not having far to bounce. “If there was anything in my relations with him that made me kill him, would I be telling you?” He flattened his palms on Wolfe’s desk. “Are you going to produce that witness? No?” He wheeled. “I’ve had enough of this! You, Jim? Rago?”

That ended the party. Wolfe could have held Korby and Rago for more jabber, but apparently he didn’t think it worth the effort. They asked some questions, what was Wolfe going to do now, and what was the witness going to do, and why couldn’t they see her, and why did Wolfe believe her, and was he going to see her and question her, and of course nobody got anything out of that. The atmosphere wasn’t very cordial when they left. After letting them out I returned to the office and stood in front of Wolfe’s desk. He was leaning back with his arms folded.

“Lunch in twenty minutes,” I said cheerfully.

“Not in peace,” he growled.

“No, sir. Any instructions?”

“Pfui. It would take an army, and I haven’t got one. To go into all of them, to trace all their connections and dealings with the man one of them murdered…” He unfolded his arms and put his fists on the desk. “I can’t even limit it by assuming that it was an act of urgency, resulting from something that had been said or done that day or in the immediate past. The need or desire to kill him might have dated from a week ago, or a month, or even a year, and it was satisfied yesterday in that tent only because circumstances offered the opportunity. No matter which one it was-Rago, who visited the tent first, or Korby or Griffin or Vetter, who visited it after him in that order-no matter which, the opportunity was tempting. The man was there, recumbent and disabled, and the weapon was there. He had a plausible excuse for entering the tent. To spread the cloud of suspicion to the multitude, all he had to do was untie the tape that held the flap. Even if the body was discovered soon after he left the tent, even seconds after, there would be no question he couldn’t answer.”

He grunted. “No. Confound it, no. The motive may be buried not only in a complexity of associations but also in history. It might take months. I will have to contrive something.”

“Yeah. Any time.”

“There may be none. That’s the devil of it. Get Saul and Fred and Orrie and have them on call. I have no idea for what, but no matter, get them. And let me alone.”

I went to my desk and pulled the phone over.