after a short wait I had him, and Wolfe got on, and Cramer greeted him with a growl, and Wolfe said he would need three minutes.
'I’ll take all I can stand,' Cramer said. 'What is it?'
'About Faith Usher. I am being pestered beyond endurance. Take yesterday. In the morning those four men insisted on seeing me. In the afternoon you barged in. In the evening Mr Goodwin and I were interrupted by a phone call summoning him to Mrs Robilotti’s house, and when he goes he finds Mr Skinner there, and he-'
'Do you mean the Commissioner?'
'Yes. He said it was unofficial and off the record, and made an offensive proposal which Mr Goodwin was to refer to me. I don’t complain of that to you, since he is your superior and you presumably didn’t know about it.'
'I didn’t.'
'But it was another thorn for me, and I have had enough. I would like to put an end to it. All this hullabaloo has been caused by Mr Goodwin’s conviction, as an eye-witness, that Faith Usher did not kill herself, and I intend to satisfy myself on the point independently. If I decide he is wrong I will deal with him. If I decide he is right it will be because I will have uncovered evidence that may have escaped you. I notify you of my intention because in order to proceed I must see all of the people involved, I must invite them to my office, and I thought you should know about it. I thought you might choose to be present, and if so you will be welcome, but in that case you should get them here. I will not ask people to my office for a conference and then confront them with a police inspector. Tomorrow morning at eleven o’clock would be a good time.'
Cramer made a noise, something like 'Wmgzwmzg'. Then he found words. 'So you’ve got your teeth in something. What?'
'It’s other people’s teeth that are in something. In me. And I’m annoyed. The situation is precisely as I have described it and I have nothing to add.'
'You wouldn’t have. Tomorrow is Sunday.'
'Yes. Since three of them are girls with jobs that is just as well.'
'You want all of them?'
'Yes.'
'Are any of them with you now?'
'No.'
'Is Commissioner Skinner in this?'
'No.'
'I’ll call you back in an hour.'
'That won’t do,' Wolfe objected. 'If I am to invite them I must start at once, and it’s late.'
Not only that, but he knew darned well that if he gave him an hour Cramer would probably ring our bell in about ten minutes and want in. Anyway, it was a cinch that Cramer would buy it, and after a few more foolish questions he did.
We hung up, and Wolfe turned to Byne, who had returned to his chair. 'Now for you,' he said, 'and Mrs Usher. I do not intend to let you communicate with anyone, and there is only one way to insure against it. She will spend the night here; there is a spare room with a good bed. It is a male household, but that shouldn’t disconcert her. There is another room you may use, or, if you prefer, Mr Panzer will accompany you home and sleep there, and bring you here in the morning. Mr Cramer will have the others here at eleven o’clock.'
'You can go to hell,' Byne said. He stood up. 'I’m taking Mrs Usher to her hotel.'
Wolfe shook his head. 'I know your mind is in disorder, but surely you must see that that is out of the question. I can’t possibly allow you an opportunity to repair any of the gaps I have made in your fences. If you scoot I shall move at once, and you’ll find you have no fences left at all. Only by my sufferance can you hope to get out of this mess without disfigurement, and you know it. Archie, bring Saul and Mrs Usher-no. First ring Mr Byne’s apartment and tell Orrie to come. Also tell him not to be disappointed at not finding the agreement; it isn’t there. If he has found any items that seem significant he might as well bring them.'
'You goddamn snoop,' Dinky said, merely repeating himself.
I turned to the phone.
Chapter Fifteen
For an hour and a half Sunday morning Fritz and I worked like beavers, setting the stage. The idea was-that is, Wolfe’s idea-to reproduce as nearly as possibly the scene of the crime, and it was a damn silly idea, since you could have put seven or eight of that office into Mrs Robilotti’s drawing-room. Taking the globe and the couch and the television cabinet and a few other items to the dining-room helped a little, but it was still hopeless. I wanted to go up to the plant rooms and tell Wolfe so, and add that if a play-back was essential to his programme he had better break his rule never to leave the house on business and move the whole performance uptown to Mrs Robilotti’s, but Fritz talked me out of it. To get fourteen chairs we had to bring some down from upstairs, and then it developed later that some of them weren’t really necessary. The bar was a table over in the far corner, but it couldn’t be against the wall because there had to be room for Hackett behind it. One small satisfaction I got was that the red leather chair had been taken to the dining-room with the other stuff, and Cramer wouldn’t like that a bit.
Furniture-moving wasn’t all. Mrs Usher kept buzzing on the house phone from the South Room, for more coffee, for more towels, though she had a full supply, for a section she said was missing from the Sunday paper I had taken her, and for an additional list of items I had to get from the drugstore. Then at ten-fifteen here came Austin Byne, escorted by Saul, demanding a private audience with Wolfe immediately, and to get him off my neck I had Saul take him up the three flights to the vestibule of the plant rooms, where they found the door locked,
