I Wolfe sighed. He murmured, i 'Nonsense.'
'Nonsense hell. Fred's not a genius, but I never saw him mistake a pinochle game for a murder. He's got good eyes. It looks like tailing Chapin wasn't such a bad idea after all, since it got Fred there on the spot. We've got him -' I ^Archie. Shut up.' Wolfe's lips were pushing out and in as fast as I had ever seen them. After ten seconds he said, 'Consider this, please. Durkin's conversation was interrupted?'
'Yeah, he was pulled off.'
'By the police, of course. The police take Chapin for murdering Burton; he is convicted and executed, and where are we? What of our engagements? We are lost.' T I stared at him. 'Good God. Damn that _ cripple -' I 'Don't damn him. Save him. Save him for us. The roadster is in front? Good. Go there at once, fast. You know what to do, get it, the whole thing. I need the scene, the minutes and seconds, the participants – I need the facts. I need enough of them to save Paul Chapin. Go and get them.'
I jumped.
17
I kept on the west side as far as Eightysixth Street and then shot crosstown and through the Park. I stepped on it only up to the limit, because I didn't want to get stopped. I felt pretty good and pretty rotten, both. She had cracked wide open and I was on my way, and that was all sweetness and light, but on the other hand Fred's story of the event decorated by Wolfe's comments looked like nothing but bad weather. I swung left into Fifth Avenue, with only five blocks to go. _I pulled up short of the Burton number on Ninetieth Street, locked the ignition and jumped to the sidewalk. There were Ganopies and entrances to big apartment houses all around. I walked east. I was nearly to the entrance I was headed for ^hen I saw Fred Durkin. From somewhere he came trotting towards me. I stopped, and he jerked his head back and started west, and I went along behind him. I followed him to the corner of Fifth, and around it a few feet.
I said, 'Am I poison? Spill it.'
He said, 'I didn't want that doorman to see you with me. He saw me getting the bum's rush. They caught me phoning you and kicked me out.'
'That's too bad. I'll complain at headquarters. Well?'
'Well, they've got him, that's all. We followed him up here, the town dick and me, got here at seven- thirty. It was nice and private, without Pinkie. Of course we knew who lived here, and we talked it over whether we ought to phone and decided not to. We decided to go inside the lobby, and when the hall flunkey got unfriendly Murphy – that's the town dick – flashed his badge and shut him up.
People were going and coming, there's two elevators. All of a sudden one of the elevator doors bangs open and a woman comesi;.running out popeyed and yells where's Dr. Foster, catch Dr. Foster, and the hall flunkey says he just saw him go out, and the woman runs for the street yelling Dr. Foster, and Murphy nabs her by the arm and asks why not try Dr.
Burton, and she looks at him funny and says Dr. Burton's been shot. He turns her loose and jumps for the elevator, and on the way up to the fifth floor discovers that Pm in it with him. He says -'
'Come on, for Christ's sake.'
'Okay. The door of Burton's apartment is open. The party's in the first room we go into. Two women is there, one of them whining like a sick dog and jiggling a telephone, and the other one kneeling by a guy laying on the floor. The lop is sitting in the chair looking like he's waiting his turn in a barber shop. We got busy. The guy was dead. Murphy got on the phone and I looked around. A gat, a Colt automatic, was on the floor by the leg of a chair next to a table in the-middle of the room. I went over and gave Chapin a rub to see if he had any more tools. The ^oman that was kneeling by the meat began to heave and I went and got her up ^d led her away. Two men came in, a »‹ ih
L
doctor and a house guy. Murphy got through on the phone and came over and slipped some irons on Chapin. I stayed with the woman, and when a couple of precinct cops came loping in I took the woman out of the room. The woman that had gone for Dr. Foster came back, she came running through the place and took the other woman away from me and took her off somewhere. I went into another room and saw books and a desk and a telephone, and called you up. One of the precinct men came snooping around and heard me, and that's when I left. He brought me downstairs and gave me the air.'
'Who else has come?'
'Only a couple of radios and some more precinct guys.' i 'Cramer or the D. A. office?'
'Not yet. Hell, they don't need to bother. A package like that, they could just have it sent parcel post.'
'Yeah. You go to Thirty-fifth Street and tell Fritz to feed you. As soon as Wolfe has finished his dinner, tell him about it. He may want you to get Saul and Orrie – he'll tell you.' 'Til have to phone my wife -' 'Wetl, you got a nickel? Beat it.' He v^ent downtown, towards Eightyninth, and I went around the corner and east ag.ain. I approached the entrance; I didn't s'ee any reason why I couldn't crash it, though I didn't know anyone up there.
Just as I was under the canopy a big car came allong and stopped quick, and two men gott out. I took a look, then I got in the way of one of them. I grinned at him:
'Inspector Cramer! This is luck.' I started tto walk along in with him.
He stcopped. 'Oh! You. Nothing doing.
Beat it.''
I starrted to hand him a line, but he got sharrp. 'Beat it, Goodwin. If there's anythingg up there that
