'I have a proposal to make, but first a question or two. My objective, of course, is to demonstrate that Mrs. Hazen did not kill her husband. Yesterday evening you dined at her table. After dinner she went to her room, and soon after that Mr. Weed left. I'm not going to ask about the sequence and the times of your departures, or where you went and what you did; the police have got all that from you, and if the matter can be resolved by such details they are extremely compe- tent at that sort of thing, and they are ahead of me, with an army. But I want to know about your conversation
The Homicide Trinity 111
with Mr. Hazen after his wife and Mr. Weed left. What was said?'
'Nothing,' Khoury declared.
'Nonsense. Mr. Hazen had told his wife he was going to discuss something with you. What?'
'Nothing of any importance. He opened champagne. We discussed the stock market. He asked Mrs. Talbot what plays she had seen. He got Perdis talking about ships.'
'He talked about poisons,' Perdis said.
'He talked about his wife's father,' Mrs. Oliver said. 'He said his wife's father was a great inventor, a ge- nius.'
Wolfe scowled at them. 'This is egregious. If he discussed some aspect of his peculiar relations with you, naturally you didn't tell the police about it. But I know of those relations and the police don't. I intend to know what was said.'
'You don't understand, Mr. Wolfe.' It was Anne Talbot. She was leaning forward, appealing to him. 'You didn't know him. He was a monster. He was a demon. He didn't want to discuss anything, he just wanted to have us there together, and we had to go. It was his special kind of torture. He wanted each of us to know about the others and to know that the others knew about us. He liked to see us trying to act as if it were just a… just a dinner party. You didn't know him.'
'He was a devil,' Perdis said.
Wolfe surveyed them. 'Did he reveal to any of you the nature of his hold on the others, last evening or any other time? Or hint at it?'
Anne Talbot and Khoury shook their heads. Mrs. Oliver said, 'No, oh, no.' Perdis said, 'I think he hinted. For instance, poison. I thought he hinted.'
'But no particulars?'
'No.'
'I must concede that he was not an estimable man. Very well, he is dead, and here we are. As I said, I have a proposal. It is highly likely, all but certain, that he
112 Rex Stout
kept in that box whatever support he had for his de- mands on you. The box is in my safe. I don't desire or intend to inspect its contents. But Mrs. Hazen is my client and I am committed to protect both her person and her property. She is not bound to follow her hus- band's instructions to bum the contents of the box, and it would be quixotic to destroy anything so valuable. I will surrender it to you, you four, for one million dol- lars.'
They gawked at him.
'That's a large sum, but it is not exorbitant. In an- other seven years, if Mr. Hazen had lived, you would have paid him more than that, and that wouldn't have ended it. This will; this will be final. If I left it to you to apportion the burden you would probably haggle, and time is short, so I shall expect one quarter of the million from each of you, either in currency or certified checks, within twenty-four hours. There is no question of ex- tortion by Mrs. Hazen or me; we haven't seen the contents of the box; I only say, as her agent, you may have them at that price if you want them.'
'You haven't opened the box,' Perdis said.
'No, I haven't.'
'What if it's empty?'
'You get nothing and you pay nothing.' Wolfe looked up at the clock. 'The box will be opened here tomorrow at midnight, with all of you present, or earlier if and when you meet the terms. If it is empty, so much for that. If it isn't, there will of course be a difficulty. None of you will want the others to inspect the items that pertain to him. I don't want to look at any of them. I suggest that Mr. Goodwin, who is thoroughly discreet, may remove the items singly, examine each one only enough to determine whom it applies to, and hand it over. If you have a better procedure to suggest, do so.'
Mrs. Oliver was licking her lips and swallowing, by turns. Perdis was hunched over, his lips tight, his heavy broad shoulders rising and falling with his breathing. Khoury had his chin up, his narrowed eyes aimed at Wolfe past the tip of his long thin nose. Anne Talbot's
The Homicide Trinity 113
eyes were closed, and a muscle at the side of her pretty neck was twitching.
'I realize,' Wolfe said, 'that it may not be easy to produce so large a sum in so short a time, but it is not impossible, and I dare not give you longer. While it is true that the box and its contents are the property of Mrs. Hazen, the police would no doubt regard it as evidential in their investigation of a murder, and I can't undertake to withhold my knowledge of it longer than twenty-four hours.' He pushed his chair back and rose. 'I shall await your pleasure.'
But if he was through they weren't. Mrs. Oliver wanted the box opened then and there, and a display of its contents by me. Khoury said that there was a ques- tion of extortion, that they were being told to fork over a million dollars in twenty-four hours or else. Perdis demanded that they be given the time and opportunity to talk with Mrs. Hazen, but of course she was in the coop. Anne Talbot was the only one who had nothing to say; she was on her feet, gripping the back of the chair, the muscle in her neck still twitching. Thinking it might help if I went and brought their coats, I did so, and it took Anne Talbot three tries to find the armhole.
