'Archie Goodwin.' r ^ ^
'Thank you. I should know your name.
Strange things can happen, can't they?
Why did you tell me not to talk to Mr.
Cabot?'. 'No special reason. Right now I don't want you to be talking to anybody but me.' She nodded. 'And I'm doing it. Mr.
Goodwin, you're not much over half my age and I never saw you before. You seem to be clever. You realized, I suppose, what the shock of seeing my husband dead, shot dead, has done to me. It has shaken Ithings loose. I am doing something very remarkable, for me. I don't usually talk, below the su^6- Inever have' smce childhood, ex^ with tw0 P^P16- ^ husband, my dear husballd- and pau1 Chapin. But ^e aren't talking about my husband, the^'8 nothln8 to say about him. He's de^- He is dead l sha11 have to tell nt^ many tlmes he is dead. He wan^s to go on living in me or I want him to. ^ tmnk -thls is what Iam really saying ^ I thmk I would want pau1, _ ^ ^*s impossible!' She jerked herself up,' ^d her hands g0^^ again 'It's ^bsurd to ^ to talk about this – even to a stranger – and with Lorriedead^.^y,1-'1.,,„,., t ^;^ '/f‹iVbe it s absurd not to. Let it l said, m»/.. crack open o^'^P11111 0^, „.
She shook her head- There s notmng to crack ope^- There s n0 reason why I should want to ^abo} lt lt' but 1 d0;
Otherwise why should I let you q11^10' me? I saw fart^1-inside myself thls evelung to I have ever seen t)efore; I wasn when I saw»W husband dead' ltwasnt i. t a. a alone m my room, looking when I stood,,…', ',.,,, at a picture ^ hu' rymg to reahze he was dead. It was ^^S here with that police inspector, with him telling me that a plea of guilty is not accepted in first degree murder, and that I would have to talk with a representative of the District Attorney, and would have to testify in court j so that Paul Chapin can be convicted and punished. I don't want him punished. My husband is dead, isn't that enough? And if I don't want him punished, what is it I want to hold onto?
Is it pity? I have never pitied him. I have been pretty insolent with life, but not insolent enough to pity Paul Chapin. You told me that he has a box filled with my gloves and stockings which Dora stole for p him, and that Nero Wolfe said it holds his J soul. Perhaps my soul has been put away in ' a box too, and I didn't even know it…'
She got up, abruptly. The ash tray slid off the couch to the floor. She stooped over, and with deliberate fingersi;that showed no sign of trembling picked up the burnt match stick and the cigarette and Put them on the tray. I didn't move to help her. She went to the table with the l^ay and then came back to the couch and , sat down again. She said:; ‹I have always disliked Paul Chapin.
Once, when I was eighteen years old, I promised to marry him. When I learned of his accident, that he was crippled for life, I was delighted because I wouldn't have to keep my promise. I didn't know that then but I realized it later. At no time have I pitied him. I claim no originality in that, I think no woman has ever pitied him, only men. Women do not like him – even those who have been briefly fascinated by him. I dislike him intensely.;^ I have thought about this; I have had occasion to analyze it; it is his deformity that is intolerable. Not his physical deformity.
The deformity of his nervous system, of his brain. You have heard of feminine cunning, but you don't understand it as Paul does, for he has it himself. It is a hateful quality in a man. Women have been fascinated by it, but the two or three who surrendered to it – I not among them, not even at eighteen – got only contempt for a reward. ''wS| 'Hep^married Dora Ritter. She's a» woman?'
'Oh yes, Dora's a woman. But she is consecrated to a denial of her womanhood.
I am fond of her, I understand her. She knows what beauty is, and she sees herself.
That forced her, long ago, to the denial, and her strength of will has maintained it.
Paul understood her too. He married her to show his contempt for me; he told me so. He could risk it with Dora because she might be relied upon never to embarrass him with the only demand that he would find humiliating. And as for Dora – she hates him, but she would die for him.
Fiercely and secretly, against her denial, she longed for the dignity of marriage, and it was a miracle of luck that Paul offered it under the only circumstances that could make it acceptable to her. Oh, they understand each other!'
I said, 'She hates him, and she married him.' ‹-f B'Yes. Dora could do that.'
'I'm surprised she was here today. I understood she had a bad accident Wednesday morning. I saw her. She seems ^ have some character.' | 'It could be called that. Dora is insane.
Legally, I suppose not, but nevertheless she is insane. Paul has told her so many times. She tells me about it, in the same tone she uses for the weather. There are two things she can't bear the thought of: that any woman should suspect her of being capable of tenderness, or that any man should regard her as a woman at all.
Her character comes from her indifference to everything else, except Paul Chapin.'
'She bragged to Nero Wolfe that she was married.'
'Of course. It removes her from the field. – Oh, it is impossible to laugh at her, and you can't pity her any more than you can Paul. A monkey might as well pity me because I haven't got a tail.'
I said, 'You were talking about your soul.';
'Was I? Yes. To you, Mr. Goodwin. I could not speak about it to my friend, Alice – I tried but nothing came. Wasn't I saying that I don't want Paul Chapin punished? Perhaps that's wrong, perhaps I ^, do want him punished, but not crudely by r killing him. What have I in my mind?
What is in my heart? God knows. But I started to answer your questions when you said something – something about his punishment -'
I nodded. ‹I said he shouldn't get more than is coming to him. Of course to you it looks open and shut, and apparently it looks the same way to the cops. You heard shots and ran to the foyer and there it was, a live man and a dead man and a gun. And of course Inspector Cramer has already got the other fixings, for instance the motive all dressed up and its shoes shined, not to mention a willingness to even up with Chapin for
