'Absolutely.' ‹(I am?';
'You know damn well you are.' 'Okay. Then I'm telling you, I didn't come here to lift the silver. I've been after Chapin more than six weeks, ever since Dreyer was croaked, and what I've got on him is exactly nothing. Maybe he killed Harrison, and I'm damn sure he killed Dreyer, and it looks like he got Hibbard, and he's got me feeling like a Staten Island flatfoot. He's as slick as a wet pavement. Right in a courtroom he confesses he committed murder, and the judge fines him fifty bucks for contempt of court! Later I find that he mentioned it beforehand to his publisher, as a publicity stunt! Covered everywhere. Is he slick?'
I nodded. 'He's slick.'
'Yes. Well, I've tried this and that. For one thing, I've got it figured that his wife hates him and she's afraid of him, and probably she knows enough about it to fill out a hand for us, if we could get her to spill it. So when I heard that she had dashed up here to see Wolfe, I naturally surmised that he had learned things. And I want to say this. You don't need to tell me a damn thing if you don't want to.
Pm not trying to horn in. But whatever you got out of that Chapin woman, maybe you can make better use of it if you see whether it fits a few pieces Pve got hold of, and you're welcome -'
'But, inspector. Wait a minute. If you think she came here friendly, to dump the can, how do you account for her calling up to get Wolfe arrested?' '
'Now, sonny.' Cramer's sharp eyes twinkled at me. 'Didn't I say I've known Nero Wolfe longer than you have? If he wanted me to think she hadn't got confidential with him, that would be .about exactly what he would tell her to do.'
I laughed. While I was laughing it occurred to me that it wouldn't do any particular harm if Cramer continued to nurse that notion, so I laughed some more. I said, 'He might, he sure might, but he didn't. Why she phoned you to arrest him – wait till I get a chance to tell Wolfe about it – why, she did that, she's psychopathic. So's her husband. They're both psychopathic.
That's Park Avenue for batty.',
Cramer nodded. 'I've heard the word.
We've got a department – oh, well…'
'And you're damn sure he killed
Dreyer.'
He nodded again. 'I think Dreyer was murdered by Paul Chapin and Leopold Elkus.'
'You don't say!' I looked at him.
'That might turn out to be right. – Elkus, huh?'
'Yeah. You and Wolfe won't talk. Do you want me to talk?'
'I'd love it.'
He filled his pipe again. 'You know about the Dreyer thing. Do you know who bought the nitroglycerin tablets? Dreyer did. Sure. A week before he died, the day after Elkus phoned him that the pictures were phony and he wanted his money back. Maybe he had ideas about suicide and maybe he didn't; I think he didn't; there's several things people take nitroglycerin for in small doses.'
He took a drag at the pipe, pulled it in until I expected to see it squirt out at his belly-button, and went on leaving it to find its way by instinct. 'Now, how did Chapin get the tablets out of the bottle that day? Easy. He didn't. Dreyer had had them for a week, and Chapin was in and out of the gallery pretty often. He had been there a couple of hours Monday afternoon, probably for a talk about Elkus's pictures. He could have got them then and saved them for an opening. The opening came Wednesday afternoon. – Wait a minute. I know what Elkus says.
That Thursday morning a detective questioned Santini too, the Italian expert, and it checked, but of course at that time it looked like nothing but routine. Since then I've sent a request to Italy, and they found Santini in Florence and had a good long talk with him. He says it was like he told the detective in the first place, but he forgot to mention that after they all left the office Elkus went back for something and was in the office alone for maybe half a minute. What if Dreyer's glass was there maybe half full, and Elkus, having got the tablets from Chapin, fixed it up for him?' ^ 'What for? Just for a prank?'
'I'm not saying what for. That's one thing we're working on now. For instance, what if the pictures Dreyer sold Elkus were the real thing – it was six years ago – and Elkus put them away and substituted phonies for them, and then demanded his money back? We're looking into that. The minute I get any evidence what for, I'll arrange for some free board and room for Elkus and Chapin.'
'You haven't got any yet.'
'No.' •: '
I grinned. 'Anyway, you're working in a lot of nice complications. I'll have to tell Wolfe about it; I hope to God it don't bore him. Why don't you just decide to believe it was suicide after all, and let it go at that?'
'Nothing doing. Especially since
Hibbard disappeared. And even if I wanted to, George Pratt and that bunch wouldn't let me. They got those warnings.
I don't blame them. Those things sound like business to me, even if they are dolled up. I suppose you've read them.'
I nodded. He stuck his paw in his breast pocket and pulled out some papers and began looking through them. He said,
'I'm a damn fool. I carry copies of them around with me, because I can't get rid of a hunch that there's a clue in them somewhere, some kind of a clue, if I could find it. Listen to this one, the one he sent last Friday, three days after Hibbard disappeared: \
T
