'Then you're cracked. You've read that book. We couldn't even get started. The idea would be to work it so you could say to the FBI, 'Lay off,' and make it stick. Nuts. Merely raising a stink wouldn't do it. They would have to be actually cornered, the whole damn outfit. Out on a limb. All right, say we try to start. We pick one of these affairs'-I tapped the torn sheets from the notebook-'and make some kind of a stab at it. From then on, whenever I left the house I'd spend all my time ditching tails, and good ones. Everyone connected with that affair would be pegged. Our phone would be tapped. So would other phones-for instance, Miss Rowan's, and Saul's and Fred's and Orrie's, whether we got them in or not. And of course Parker's. They might or might not try a frame, probably they wouldn't have to, but if they did it would be good. I'd have to sleep here in the office. Windows and doors, even one with a chain bolt, are pie for them. They could monitor our mail. I am not piling it on. How many of those things they would do would depend, but they can do all of them. They have all the gimmicks there are, including some I have never heard of.'
I crossed my legs. 'We'd never get to first base. But say we did, say we actually got a wedge started in some kind of a crack, then they would really operate. They have six thousand trained men, some of them as good as they come, and three hundred million dollars a year. I would like to borrow the dictionary to look up a stronger word than 'preposterous.' '
I uncrossed my legs. 'Also, what about her? I do not believe that she is merely being annoyed. One will get you twenty that she's scared stiff. She knows there's some dirt somewhere, if not on her then on her son or daughter or brother, or even on her dead husband, and she's afraid they'll find it. She knows they're not just riding her; they're after something that would really hurt, and that would take a lot of sting out of the book. As for the hundred grand, for her that's peanuts, and anyway she's in a tax bracket that makes it petty cash.'
I crossed my legs. 'That's what I would say.'
Wolfe grunted. 'The last part was irrelevant.'
'I'm often irrelevant. It confuses people.'
'You keep waving your legs around.'
'That confuses them too.'
'Pfui. You're fidgety, and no wonder. I thought I knew you, Archie, but this is a new facet.'
'It's not new at all. It's merely horse sense.'
'No. Dog sense. You are moving your legs around because your tail is between them. This is what you said, in effect: I am offered a job with the largest retainer in my experience and no limit on expenses or fee, but I should decline it. I should decline it, not because it would be difficult and perhaps impossible-I have taken many jobs that seemed impossible-but because it would give offense to a certain man and his organization and he would retaliate. I decline it because I dare not take it; I would rather submit to a threat than-'
'I didn't say that!'
'It was implicit. You are cowed. You are daunted. Not, I concede, without reason; the hands and voices of many highly placed men have been stayed by the same trepidation. Possibly mine would be too if it were merely a matter of declining or accepting a job. But I will not return that check for one hundred thousand dollars because I am afraid of a bully. My self-esteem won't let me. I suggest that you take a vacation for an indefinite period. With pay; I can afford it.'
I uncrossed my legs. 'Beginning now?'
'Yes.' He was grim.
'These notes are in my personal code. Shall I type them?'
'No. That would implicate you. I'll see Mr Cohen again.'
I clasped my hands behind my head and eyed him. 'I still say you're cracked,' I said, 'and I deny that my tail was between my legs, since they were crossed, and it would be a ball to step aside and see how you went at it without me, but after all the years in the swim with you it would be lowdown to let you sink alone. If I get daunted along the way I'll let you know.' I picked up the torn sheets. 'You want this typed?'
'No. For our discussion you will translate as required.'
'Right. A suggestion. The mood you're in, do you want to declare war by phoning the client? She left her unlisted number, and of course it's tapped. Shall I get her?'
'Yes.'
I got at the phone and dialed.
3
Going to the kitchen before going up to bed, around midnight, to check that Fritz had bolted the back door, I was pleased to see that batter for sour-milk buckwheat cakes was there in a bowl on the range. In that situation nice crisp toast or flaky croissants would have been inadequate. So when I descended the two flights a little after nine o'clock Wednesday morning I knew I would be properly fueled. As I entered the kitchen Fritz turned up the flame under the griddle, and I told him good morning and got my orange juice from the refrigerator. Wolfe, who breakfasts in his room from a tray taken up by Fritz, had gone up to the plant rooms on the roof for his two morning hours with the orchids; I had heard the elevator as usual. As I went to the little table by the wall where I eat breakfast I asked Fritz if there was anything stirring.
'Yes,' he said, 'and you are to tell me what it is.'
'Oh, didn't he tell you?'
'No. He said only that the doors are to be bolted and the windows locked at all times, that I am to
