Death Times Three SSC (18 page)

"And I find you here. And you're obstructing justice and withholding evidence, as usual."

"Nuts. What evidence?"

"I don't know, but I'll find out. I'm not going to waste time horsing around with you." He moved. "Miss Gallant, what has this guy been saying to you?"

That would not do. Wolfe hadn't told me he wanted to keep his conjecture to himself, but I took it for granted that he did, since he hadn't even told me, and he certainly wouldn't want Purley Stebbins sticking his

big thumb in, not to mention Cramer and the rest of the Homicide gang. And if Flora didn't spill it, one of the others probably would.

Action was called for. I stepped in front of Purley and told Flora, "Come on, I want to tell your brother something I want you to hear. Come along." She took half a second for a glance at Purley, then left her chair, and I took her arm. As we headed for the door I told Carl Drew and Emmy Thorne, "You too. I want you all to hear. Come along.

They came. Going down the hall they were right behind Flora and me, and on their heels was Stebbins. On past the elevator. At Gallant's room I turned the knob and swung the door wide, and stood on the sill to say my piece.

"Sorry to interrupt you again, Mr. Gallant, but Sergeant Stebbins is trying to exceed his authority, as usual. He wants me to tell him what I came to see you people about, and I won't, and he thinks he's going to squeeze it out of you. Of course you can tell him if you want to, but there's no reason why you should, and if you ask me, I wouldn't. Sometimes the police are entirely too inquisitive. They mean well, but so did the boy who aimed a rock at a rabbit and hit his sister."

Flora slid past me to enter the room. Carl Drew wanted in, too, and I moved aside for him, and Stebbins followed him, glaring at me as he passed. I felt a touch on my elbow and turned.

"That was quite a speech," Emmy Thorne said. "I would have clapped if I had known you were through."

"Glad you liked it. Absolutely unrehearsed. No script."

"Wonderful. If you want some words in private, my room is at the end of the hall. This way."

Her room was about half the size of the two others I had seen, and there was no display of either women or clothes. A table had piles of magazines and portfolios, and there was only one chair besides the one at her desk. I stood until she was seated and then pulled the other chair up.

"Flora says you dance well," she said.

"Good for her. I can chin myself twenty times too."

"I've never tried that." Her left eye had more blue in it than the right one, or maybe it was the light. "What is this nonsense about letters from Sarah Yare?"

"You know," I said, "my tie must be crooked or I've got a grease spot. Mr. Drew resented me, and Mr. Gallant was going to throw an ash tray at me. Now you start in. Why is it nonsense to ask a simple question politely and respectfully?"

"Well," she conceded, "maybe. 'nonsense' isn't exactly the word. Maybe 'gall' would be better. What right have you to march in here and ask questions at all? Polite or not."

"None. It's not a right, it's a liberty. And you're at liberty to tell me to go climb a tree if you find the question ticklish. Have you any letters from Sarah Yare?"

She laughed. She had good teeth. Then, abruptly, she cut the laugh off. "Good Lord," she said, "I didn't think I would ever laugh again. This awful business, what happened here yesterday, and then Sarah. No, I have no letters from her." Her blue eyes, straight at me, were cool and keen. "Why should I find the question ticklish?"

"No reason that I know of. You said I had gall to ask

it."

"If it hurt your feelings I take it back. What else?"

Again I had to resist temptation. With Drew the temptation had been purely professional; with her it was only partly professional and only partly pure. Cramer had said she was in charge of contacts, and one more might be good for her.

Having resisted, I shook my head. "Nothing else, unless you know of something. For instance, if you know of anyone who might have letters."

"I don't." She regarded me. "Of course I'm curious. I'm wondering what it's about--your coming here. You told Mr. Drew that you don't know, that you don't even know who hired Nero Wolfe to inquire about her."

"That's right. I don't."

"Then you can't tell me. I can't turn on the charm and coax it out of you. Can I?"

"I'm afraid not." I stood up. "Too bad. I would enjoy seeing you try. You're probably pretty good at it."

In the hall, on my way to the elevator, I stopped at Gallant's door and cocked an ear. I heard a rumble (that was Purley); and a soprano murmur (that was Anita Prince); and a bellicose baritone (that was Gallant). But the door was too thick for me to get the words.

Emerging from the building, I turned left, found a phone booth on Madison Avenue, dialed the number I knew best, got Fritz and asked for Wolfe.

His voice came, "Yes, Archie?"

"It's full of fish. Swarming. Sarah Yare bought her clothes there for two years and they all loved her. Apparently she never wrote letters. They all want to know who hired you and why, especially Flora Gallant. I've had no lunch and I'm half starved, but I stopped to phone because there may be some urgency. Stebbins walked in on me, and of course he wanted to know what I was doing there."

"You didn't tell him?"

"Certainly not. When he said he would get it out of them, I got them all together and made a speech--you know, a man's brain is his castle. But one of them might spill it any minute, and I thought you ought to know right away, in case that would mess up your program, if you've really got one."

"It won't. Not if I get on with it. I have further instructions for you. You will go--"

"No, sir. I can kid my stomach along with a sandwich and a glass of milk, but no more errands until I get some idea of where we're headed for. Do you want to tell me on the phone?"

"No. But very well. It is not exigent, and Fritz is keeping your lunch warm. Come home."

"Right. Fifteen minutes."

I hung up and went out and flagged a taxi.

Ordinarily Wolfe and I lunch in the dining room, but when I'm eating solo I prefer the kitchen, so I headed for it. When I was ready for coffee, I took it to the office with me.

"I feel better," I told Wolfe. "I wish Purley were here now. How do you want it, from start to finish?"

"No." He put his book down. "You've told me all I need to know."

"You don't want any of it? Not even the speech I made?"

"You can type it for the files, for posterity. As I told you, I have instructions."

"Yeah." I sipped coffee. "But first what are we doing and why?"

"Very well." He leaned back. "As I told you this morning, I thought I might have been hoodwinked and I intended to find out. It was quite possible that that performance here yesterday--getting us on the phone

just in time to hear a murder committed--was flummery. Indeed, it was more than possible. Must I expound that?"

"No. Even Cramer suspected it."

"So he did. But his theory that Bianca Voss had been killed earlier and that another woman, not the murderer, was there beside the corpse, waiting for a phone call, was patently ridiculous. Must I expound that?"

"No, unless it was a lunatic. Anyone who would do that, even the murderer, with the chance that someone might come in any second, would be batty."

"Of course. But if she wasn't killed at the time we heard those sounds, she must have been killed earlier, since you phoned almost immediately and sent someone to that room. Therefore the sounds didn't come from there. Miss Gallant did not dial that number. She dialed the number of some other person whom she had persuaded to perform that hocus-pocus."

He turned a hand over. "I had come to that conclusion, or call it conjecture, before I went to bed last night, and I had found it intolerable. I will not be mistaken for a jackass. Reading the paper at breakfast this morning, I came upon the item about the death of Sarah Yare, and my attention was caught by the fact that she had been an actress. An actress can act a part. Also she had been in distress. Also she had died. If she had been persuaded to act that part, it would have been extremely convenient--for the one who persuaded her --for her to die before she learned that a murder had been committed and that she had been an accessory after the fact. Certainly that was mere speculation, but it was not idle, and when I came down to the office I looked in the phone book to see if Sarah Yare was

listed, found that she was, and dialed her number. Algonquin nine, one-eight-four-seven."

"What for? She was dead."

"I didn't lift the receiver. I merely dialed it, to hear it. Before doing so I strained my memory. I had to recall a phenomenon that was filed somewhere in my brain, having reached it through my ears. As you know, I am trained to attend, to observe and to register. So are you. That same phenomenon is filed in your brain. Close your eyes and find it. Stand up. Take your ears back to yesterday, when you were standing there, having surrendered your chair to Miss Gallant, and she was at the phone, dialing. Not the first number she dialed; you dialed that one yourself later. Concentrate on the second one, when, according to her, she was dialing the number of the direct line to Bianca Voss' office."

I did so. I got up and stood where I had stood while she was dialing, shut my eyes and brought it back. In ten seconds I said, "O.K. Shoot."

The sound came of his dialing. I held my breath till the end, then opened my eyes and said positively, "No. Wrong. The first and third and fourth were wrong. I'm not sure about the second, but those three "

"Close your eyes and try it again. This will be another number."

The dialing sound came, the seven units. I opened my eyes. "That's more like it. I would say that was it; anyway the first four. Beyond that, I'm a little lost. But in that case--"

"Satisfactory." He pushed the phone away and sat back. "The first four were enough. The first number, which you rejected, as I did this morning, was Plaza two, nine-oh-two-two, the number of Bianca Voss' direct line according to the phone book--the number which Miss Gallant pretended to be dialing. The sec

ond, which you accepted, was Sarah Yare's number, Algonquin nine, one-eight-four-seven."

"I see." I sat down and took a gulp of coffee, which had cooled enough for gulping. "Quite a performance."

He didn't acknowledge the applause. "So it was still a plausible conjecture, somewhat strengthened, but no more than that. If those people, especially Miss Gallant, could not be shown to have had some association with Sarah Yare, it would be untenable. So I sent you to inquire, and what you found promoted the conjecture to an assumption, and surely a weighty one. What time is it?"

He would have had to twist his neck a whole quarter turn to look at the wall clock. I obliged. "Five to four."

"Then instructions for your errand must be brief, and they can be." He mustn't be late for his afternoon session in the plant rooms. "You will go to Sarah Yare's address on Thirteenth Street and look at her apartment. Her phone might have been discontinued since that book was issued. I need to know that the instrument is still there and operable before I proceed. If I intend to see that whoever tried to make a fool of me regrets it, I must take care not to make a fool of myself." He pushed his chair back, gripped the arms and hoisted his bulk. "Have I satisfied you?"

I drank the last of the coffee, now cold, then went to the hall for my coat and hat, and departed.

It was not my day. At the address of the late Sarah Yare on East 13th Street I stubbed my toe again. I was dead wrong about the janitor of that old walk-up. He looked as if anything would go, so I merely told him to let me into Sarah Yare's apartment to check the tele

phone, and the bum insisted on seeing my credentials. So I misjudged him again. I offered him a sawbuck and told him I only wanted two minutes for a look at the phone with him at my elbow, and he turned me down. The upshot was that I went back home for an assortment of keys, returned, posted myself across the street, waited a full hour to be sure the enemy was not peeking, and broke and entered, technically.

I won't describe it; it was too painful. It was an awful dump for a Sarah Yare--even for a down-andouter who had once been Sarah Yare. But the telephone was there, and it was working. I dialed to make sure, and got Fritz, and told him I just wanted to say hello and would be home in fifteen minutes, and he said that would please Mr. Wolfe because Inspector Cramer was there.

"Is Stebbins with him?"

"No, he's alone."

"When did he come?"

"Ten minutes ago. At six o'clock. Mr. Wolfe said to admit him and is with him in the office. Their voices are very loud. Hurry home, Archie."

I did so. Ascending the stoop and letting myself in, not banging the door, I tiptoed down the hall and stopped short of the office door, thinking to get a sniff of the atmosphere before entering.

Wolfe's voice came: ". . . and I didn't say I have never known you to be right, Mr. Cramer. I said I have never known you to be more wrong. That is putting it charitably, under provocation. You have accused me of duplicity. Pfui! "