'How long did it run?'
'Six weeks. Pretty good for off-Broadway.'
'Do you favor any particular spot when you visit the docks?'
'No. I just move around and look and listen.'
'Do you do that every day?'
'Hell, no.'
'How many times in the past month?'
'Only once before today. A couple of times when I got the part, in November.'
I was thinking that at least he had one of the basic qualifications for an actor. He was ready and willing to answer any and all questions about his career, with or without a dare, whether they applied or not. If Wolfe thought it would help to have the plot of Do As Thou Wilt described in detail all he had to do was ask.
But apparently he didn't need it. His head moved. 'And you, Mr. Fen-is?'
'I'm feeling a lot better,' Noel Ferris said. 'When the questions they asked made me realize that I was actually suspected of murder, and I also realized that I had no alibi, it looked pretty dark. Believe me. What if the others had all been somewhere else and could prove it? So I thank you, Mr. Wolfe. I feel a lot better. As for me, I left the house a little after ten and called at four agencies. Two of them would remember I was there, but probably not the exact time. When I got hungry I went back to the house to eat. I can't afford five-dollar lunches, and I can't eat eighty-cent ones. When I entered the house a man was at the phone telling someone that
188 Rex Stout
Tammy Baxter had been murdered and her body was in the parlor.'
'What kind of agencies?'
'Casting. Theater and television.'
'Do you visit them daily?'
'No. About twice a week.'
'And the other five days? How do you pass the time?'
'I don't. It passes me. Two days, sometimes three, I make horses and kangaroos and other animals. I go to a workroom and model them and make molds. Something on the order of Cellini. I get eight dollars for a squirrel. Twenty for a giraffe.'
'Where is the workroom?'
'In the rear of a shop on First Avenue. The name of the shop is Harry's Zoo. The name of the owner is Harry Arkazy. He has a sixteen-year-old daughter as beautiful as a rosy dawn, but she lisps. Her name is Ilonka. His son's name-'
'This is not a comedy, Mr. Ferris,' Wolfe snapped. He twisted his neck to look at the wall clock. 'I engaged to act for Miss Annis only five hours ago and I haven't arranged my mind, so my questions may be at random, but they are not frivolous.' His eyes moved to take them in. 'Now that I have seen you and heard you I am better prepared, and I can consider how to proceed. I will leave it to Miss Annis to thank you-three of you- for coming.' He arose. 'I expect to see you again.'
Martha was gawking at him. 'But Hattie said to tell you everything we told the cops!'
He nodded. 'I know. It would take all night. I'll go to that extreme only by compulsion; and if you told them anything indicative they are hours ahead of me and I would only breathe their dust.'
Dell boomed. 'You call this investigating a murder? Asking me if I had paid my room rent and how I spend my afternoons?'
It was a little odd, the four suspects coming uninvited to empty the bag and being told to go almost before they got started. Noel Ferris, his lip twisted, got up and
The Homicide Trinity 189
headed for the hall. Martha Kirk, getting no satisfaction from Wolfe, appealed to me: didn't I realize that Hattie had been arrested for a murder she didn't commit? Paul Hannah sat and listened to us, chewing his lip, then got up and touched her arm and said they might as well go. Raymond Dell stood, lowered his chin, gazed at Wolfe half a minute, registering indignation, wheeled, and marched out. (Exit Dell, center.) I followed Martha and Hannah to the hall, but she preferred to put on her galoshes herself. When I opened the door for them a few snowflakes danced in.
Back in the office, Wolfe was sitting again, leaning back with his eyes closed. I asked if he wanted beer, got a nod, and went to the kitchen and brought a bottle and glass, and a glass of milk for me. He opened his eyes, took in a bushel of air through his nose and let it out through his mouth, straightened up, picked up the bot- tle, and poured.
He spoke. 'Saul and Fred and Orrie. At eight in the morning in my room.'
My brows went up. Saul Panzer is the best operative south of the North Pole. His rate is ten dollars an hour and he is worth twenty. Fred Durkin's rate is seven dollars and he is worth seven-fifty. Orrie Gather's rate is also seven dollars and he is worth six-fifty.
'Oh.' I took a sip of milk. 'Then you did get an inkling?'
'I got a conclusion: that it would be futile to go on pecking at them. Mr. Leach has been on their flanks for three weeks, and now Mr. Cramer's army has them under siege. My only chance of priority is to surprise him from the rear.'
The foam was down to the rim of his glass, and he lifted it and drank, a healthy gulp. 'It's a forlorn
