was that buzz that started the ball rolling. Though at the time it appeared to be nothing interesting, just Durkin asking a favor.
Durkin was all right up to the neck. When I consider how thick he was in most respects I am surprised how he could tail. I know bull terriers are dumb, but good tailing means a lot more than just hanging on, and Fred Durkin was good. I asked him once how he did it, and he said, 'I just go up to the subject and ask him where he's headed for, and then if I lose him I know where to look.' I suppose he knew how funny that was; I don't know, I suspect him. When things got so Wolfe had to cut down expenses like everybody else from bankers to bums, Saul Panzer and I got our weekly envelopes sliced, but Durkin's was stopped altogether. Wolfe called him in when he was needed and paid him by the day, so I still saw him off and on and knew he was having hard sledding. Things had been slow and I hadn't run across him for a month or more when the buzzer sounded that day and Fritz brought him to the door of the office.
Wolfe looked up and nodded. 'Hello, Fred. Do I owe you something?'
Durkin, approaching the desk with his hat in his hand, shook his head. 'How are you, Mr. Wolfe. I wish to God you did. If there was anybody owed me anything I'd be with him like a saddle on a horse.'
'Sit down. Will you sample some beer?'
'No, thanks.' Fred stayed on his feet. 'I've come to ask a favor.'
Wolfe looked up again, and his big thick lips pushed out a little, tight together, just a small movement, and back again, and then out and back again. How I loved to watch him doing that! That was about the only time I ever got excited, when Wolfe's lips were moving like that. It didn't matter whether it was some little thing like this with Durkin or when he was on the track of something big and dangerous. I knew what was going on, something was happening so fast inside of him and so much ground was being covered, the whole world a flash, that no one else could ever really understand it even if he had tried his best to explain, which I never did. Sometimes, when he felt patient, he explained to me and it seemed to make sense, but I realized afterward that that was only because the proof had come and so I could accept it. I said to Saul Panzer once that it was like being with him in a dark room which neither of you has ever seen before, as he describes all of its contents to you, and then when the light is turned on his explanation of how he did seems sensible because you see everything before you just as he described it.
Wolfe said to Durkin, 'You know my failing on the financial side. But since you haven't come to borrow money, your favor is likely granted. What is it?'
Durkin scowled. Wolfe always upset him. 'Nobody needs to borrow money worse than I do. How do you know it's not that?'
'No matter. Archie will explain. You're not embarassed enough, and you wouldn't have brought a woman with you. What is it?'
I leaned forward and broke in, 'Damn it, he alone! My ears are good anyhow!'
A little ripple, imperceptible except to eyes like mine that had caught it before, ran over Wolfe's enormous bulk. 'Of course, Archie, splendid ears. Bv there was nothing to hear; the lady made no sound audible at this distance. And Fritz did not speak to her; but in greeting Fred there was a courtesy in his tone which he saves for softer flesh. If I should hear Fritz using that tone to a lone man I'd send him to psychoanalyst at once.'
Durkin said, 'It's a friend of my wife's. Her best friend, you know my wife's Italian. Maybe you don't know, but she is. Anyway, this friend of hers is in trouble, or thinks she is. It sounds to me like a washout. Maria keeps after Fanny and Fanny keeps after me and they both keep after me together, all because I told Fanny once that you've got a devil in you that can find out anything in the world. A boob thing to say, Mr. Wolfe, but you know how a man's tongue will get started.'
Wolfe only said, 'Bring her in.'
Durkin went out to the hall and came right back with a woman in front of him. She was little but not skinny, with black hair and eyes, and Italian all over though not the shawl kind. She was somewhere around middle age and looked neat and clean in a pink cotton dress and a black rayon jacket. I pulled over a chair and she sat down facing Wolfe and the light.
Durkin said, 'Maria Maffei, Mr. Wolfe.'
She tossed Fred a smile, showing little white teeth, and then said to Wolfe, 'Maria Maffei,' pronouncing it quite different.
Wolfe said, 'Not Mrs. Maffei.'
She shook her head. 'No, sir. I'm not married.'
'But in trouble anyhow.'
'Yes, sir. Mr. Durkin thought you might be good enough-'
'Tell us about it.'
'Yes, sir. It's my brother Carlo. He has gone.'
'Gone where?'
'I don't know, sir. That's why I am afraid. He has been gone two days.'
Where did he-no, no. These are not phenomena, merely facts.' Wolfe turned to me. 'Go on, Archie.'
By the time he had finished his 'no, no' I had my notebook out. I enjoyed this sort of business in front of Wolfe more than at any other time because I knew damn well I was good at it. But this wasn't much of a job; this woman knew what to get down as well as I did. She told her tale quick and straight. She was housekeeper at a swell apartment on Park Avenue and lived there. Her brother Carlo, two years older than her, lived in a rooming-house on Sullivan Street. He was a metal-worker, first class she said; for years he had made big money working on jewelry for Rathbun & Cross, but because he drank a little and occasionally didn't turn up at the shop he had been one of the first to go when the depression came. For a while after that he had got odd jobs here and there, then he had used up his small savings, and for the past winter and spring he had been kept going by his sister. Around the middle of April, completely discouraged, he had decided to return to Italy and Maria had agreed to furnish the necessary funds; she had, in fact, advanced the money for the steamship ticket. But a week later he
