of my uncle, Mr. Nero Wolfe, I have shaken your hand and so has my wife, and we have shared bread with you. But for the sake of what he believed in and supported, I will not run the risk of betraying one of our most carefully guarded secrets. It is not necessary to question your good faith, your rashness is enough. You may already have been recognized.'
Wolfe snorted. 'In this outlandish getup? Nonsense. Besides, I have arranged for a diversion. Paolo Telesio communicates with you by mail, using this address, and those communications are intercepted by the secret police and inspected before they are delivered to you, and you and Telesio, knowing that, have occasionally taken advantage of it. Is that true?' 182 Danilo was frowning. 'Apparently Paolo has higher regard for your discretion than I have.' 'He knew me before you were born. Does the interception delay delivery to you considerably?'
'No. They work it fairly well.' 'Did you get a letter from Telesio today?' 'No.' 'Then tomorrow, I suppose. He mailed it in Bari yesterday afternoon. In it he tells you that he has just received a cablegram from New York, signed Nero Wolfe, reading as follows: 'Inform proper persons across Adriatic I am handling Vukcic's affairs and assuming obligations. Two hundred thousand dollars available soon. Will send agent conference Bari next month.5 Telesio's letter will say that it came in English and he has put it in Italian. As I say, it is a diversion for the police. For you it has no validity. I promised Telesio I would make that plain. To the interceptors it should be plain that Nero Wolfe is in New York and has no intention of crossing an ocean.' Danilo, still frowning, objected, 'Belgrade has people in New York. They'll learn you're not there.' 'I doubt it. I rarely leave my house, and the man in my office, answering my tele183 phone, named Saul Panzer, could flummox Tito and Molotov put together. There's another purpose the cablegram may possibly serve, but that's an off-chance. Now for Josip Pasic. I intend to see him. You spoke of the risk of betraying a carefully guarded secret, but if it's what I assume it is, I already know it. Marko never told me explicitly that weapons and ammunition were being smuggled in to you, but he might as well have. He said that certain costly and essential supplies were being stored at a spot in the mountains less than three kilometers from the place where I was born, and he identified the spot. We both knew it well in boyhood. It must have been near there that Caria was killed. It must be there, or nearby, that this Josip Pasic is so importantly engaged that you refuse to call him away. So my course is simple. I don't fancy spending another night cruising the mountains, and we'll stay the night in Titograd, heaven knows where, and go tomorrow. We shall betray no secrets heedlessly, but we have to find Pasic.' He pushed back his chair and stood up. 'Thank you again, Mrs. Vukcic, for your hospitality. And you, Danilo, thank you for whatever you consider to deserve thanks.' He switched to English. 'If you'll get the 184 knapsacks, Archie? We're leaving. What time is it?' I looked at my wrist as I arose. 'Quarter to ten.' 'Sit down, you fools,' Danilo growled. Wolfe ignored it. 'You can do us one more favor,' he suggested. 'Tell me, is there a hotel in town with good beds?' 'By God,' Danilo growled. In SerboCroat 'by God' is 'Boga ti' -- good for growling. Danilo repeated it. 'By God, without papers, with nothing but money, you would go to a hotel! You'd get a good bed all right! Gospo Stritar is a man who is capable of a thought, or you would be in jail now, and not in bed either! He merely decided you would be more interesting loose, and by God he was correct! You tell me to my face you know where our cache is, and tomorrow in the sunshine, like going to a picnic, you will go there, doubtless to the very spot, and shout for Josip Pasic!' He calmed down a little. 'Only,' he said, 'you would be dead before you got there, and that would be nothing to regret. You may be fit to live in America, but not here. There are only twenty-two men in Montenegro who know where that cache is, and you two are not with us, so obviously you must die. Damn it, sit down!' 185 'We're going, Danilo.' 'You can't go. While I was out I made other arrangements besides Jube. There are men out front and out back, and if you leave and I don't go to the door with you and give a signal, you won't get far. Sit down.' Wolfe told me, 'There's a snag, Archie,' and sat, and I followed suit. 'I would like to say something, Danilo,' Mrs. Vukcic said quietly. He frowned at her. 'Well?' he demanded. She looked at Wolfe, at me, and back at her husband. 'These men are not crazy like you and me,' she told him. 'They are not doomed like us. We try to pretend there is hope, but our hearts are dead, and we can only pray that someday there will be real life for Ivan and Zosha, but we know there can be none for us. Oh, I don't complain! You know I love you for fighting instead of giving in like the others, and I'm proud of you ? I am, Danilo ? but I don't want to be afraid of you. It is too easy for you to say these men must die, and it makes me afraid, because they are the only hope for Ivan and Zosha, men like them. I know you had to kill Jube Bilic, I can understand that, but these men are our friends, or anyway they are the friends of our children. Do you love anybody?' 186 'Yes. I love you.' 'And the children, I know. Do you love anybody else?' 'Who else would I love?' She nodded, her black eyes flashing. 'That's what I mean, you see? These men can still love people! They came so far, so many thousands of miles into danger, because they loved your Uncle Marko and they want to find the man who killed him. What else did they come for? All I want -- I want you to understand that, and I know it isn't easy because it wasn't easy for me -- we can't have that kind of love, but we can understand it, and we can hope for Ivan and Zosha to grow up to have it someday. You can't just say these men must die.' 'I can say whatever is necessary.' 'But it isn't. And anyway, you didn't mean it. I know how you say a thing when you mean it. You must forgive me, Danilo, for speaking, but I was afraid you would go H on like that until you couldn't back down. | It made my heart stop beating to hear you j say these men must die, because that is exactly wrong. The real truth is that these men must not die.' 'Bah.' He was scowling at her. 'You talk like a woman.' 'I talk like a mother, and if you think that 187 is something no fine, brave man should listen to, I ask you, who made me a mother? You can't wipe it out now.' All I knew was that it was no longer a very nice party, and all I could do was watch their faces, including Wolfe's, and listen to their voices, and try to guess what was up. Also I had to keep an eye on Wolfe's left hand, because we had arranged that he would close his left fist and open it again if a conversation reached a point where I should be ready to join in with the Marley or the Colt. It was damned unsatisfactory. As far as I knew, Danilo might be scowling at his wife because she was begging him to stick a knife in me so she could have my green jacket to make over for Ivan and Zosha. I heard their names three times. Wolfe put in, 'You're in a fix, Danilo,' he said sympathetically. 'If you let us go we might unwittingly endanger your plans, I admit it. If you have us removed, you will affront the memory of Marko and all he did for you, and also, if you listen to your wife, you will forfeit your claim on the future. I suggest a compromise. You say it is always best to go there at night. Take us there now. If it is impossible for you to leave, get someone to take us. We will be as circumspect as occasion will permit.' 188 'Yes, Danilo!' Meta cried. 'That would be the best --' 'Be quiet,' he commanded her. He leveled his deepset eyes at Wolfe. 'It would be unheard of, to take strangers there.' 'Pfui. A stranger to my own birthplace?' 'I'll take you to the coast instead, tonight, and arrange for you to cross to Bari. You can wait there for word from me. I promise to do all I can to find the man who killed Marko, and to deal with him.' 'No. I have made a promise to myself that has priority, and I will not delegate it. Besides, if you failed I would have to come back, and anyway, if you sent me a finger how would I know who it had belonged to? No, Danilo. I will not be diverted.' Danilo got up, went to the stove, opened the door, and looked in at the fire. I suppose Wolfe's mention of a finger had reminded him that he had a cremation under way and he wanted to check. Apparently he thought it needed stoking, for he got some sticks of wood from a box and poked them in before he closed the door. Then he came and stood directly behind my chair. Since Wolfe's last words had sounded like an ultimatum, and since I didn't care for the idea of a knife in my back without even catching sight of it, I twisted around enough to get a glimpse 189 of it on its way. His hands were buried in his pockets. 'You're barely able to stand up,' he told Wolfe. 'What about your feet?' 'I'll manage,' Wolfe said without a quaver. 'Must we walk the whole way?' 'No. We'll ride twenty kilometers along the Cijevna, as far as the road goes. From there it's rough and steep.' 'I know it is. I herded goats there. Do we leave now?' 'No. Around midnight. I must go and make arrangements for a car and driver. Don't step outside while I'm gone.' He went. I must say for him that once he had accepted a situation he didn't waste any time bellyaching. As soon as the door had closed behind him I went at Wolfe. 'Now what? Has he gone for another finger?'
He said something to Meta, and she replied, and he pushed back his chair and stood up, flinching only a little. 'We'll go in the other room,' he told me, and moved, and I followed, leaving the door open, not to be rude to our hostess. He lowered himself onto his former chair, put his palms on his knees, and sighed as far down as it would go. 'We're in for another night of it,' he said glumly, and proceeded to report. First 190 he sketched it, and then, when I insisted, filled it in. He was in no humor to oblige me or anyone else, but I was in no humor to settle for a skeleton. When he had finished I sat a minute and turned it over. I had certainly seen sweeter prospects. 'Is there such a thing,' I asked, 'as a metal dinar any more? A coin?' 'I doubt it. Why?' 'I'd like to have one to toss, to decide which side Danilo is really on. I admit his wife thinks she knows, but does she? As it stands now, I could name at least fourteen people I would rather have take me for a ride than Marko's nephew.' 'I am committed,' he said
