When he left, half an hour later, his check was under a paperweight on my desk, along with the copy of Joan Well-man's last letter home, and there was an assortment of facts in my notebook-plenty, as Wolfe had said, for a start. I went to the hall with him and helped him on with his coat. When I opened the door to let him out he wanted to shake hands, and I was glad to oblige.
'You're sure you won't mind,' he asked, 'if I ring you fairly often? Just to find out if there's anything new? I'll try not to make a nuisance of myself, but I'm like that. I'm persistent.'
'Any time,' I assured him. 'I can always say 'no progress'.'
'He is good, isn't he? Mr. Wolfe?'
'He's the best.' I made it positive,
'Well-I hope-all right.' He crossed the sill into an icy wind from the west, and I stood there until he had descended from the stoop to the sidewalk. The shape he was in, he might have tumbled down those seven steps.
Returning down the hall, I paused a moment before enter-ing the office, to sniff. Fritz, as I knew, was doing spareribs with the sauce Wolfe and he had concocted and, though the door to the kitchen was closed, enough came through for my nose, and it approved. In the office, Wolfe was leaning back with his eyes closed. I picked up Wellman's check, gave it an admiring glance, went and put it in the safe, and then crossed to Wolfe's desk for another look at one of the prints of Joan Wellman's likeness. As near as you can tell from a picture, it would have been nice to know her.
I spoke. 'If you're working, knock off. Dinner in ten minutes.'
Wolfe's eyes opened.
I asked, 'Have we got a murder or not?'
'Certainly we have.' He was supercilious.
'Oh. Good for us. Because she wouldn't go for a walk in the park in February?'
'No.' He humphed. 'You should have a better reason.'
'Me? Thanks. Me have a reason?'
'Yes. Archie. I have been training you for years to ob-serve. You are slacking. Not long ago Mr. Cramer showed us a list of names on a sheet of paper. The seventh name on that list was Baird Archer. The evening she was killed Miss Wellman had an appointment with a man named Baird Archer. Leonard Dykes who wrote that list of names was murdered. It would be silly not to hypothesize that Miss Well-man was also murdered.'
I turned on my heel, took the two paces to my swivel chair, turned it so I would face him, and sat. 'Oh, that,' I said carelessly. 'I crossed that off as coincidence.'
'Pfui. It never struck you. You're slacking.'
'Okay. I am not electronized.'
'There is no such word.'
'There is now. I've used it.' I was getting indignant. 'I mean I am not lightning. It was six weeks ago that Cramer showed us that list of names, and I gave it the merest glance.
I know you did too, but look who you are. What if it were the other way around? What if I had remembered that name from one short glimpse of that list six weeks ago, and you hadn't? I would be the owner of this house and the bank ac-count, and you would be working for me. Would you like that? Or do you prefer it as it is? Take your pick.' He snorted. 'Call Mr. Cramer.' 'Right.' I swiveled to the phone and dialed.
3
IF YOU like Anglo-Saxon, I belched. If you fancy Latin, I eructed. No matter which, I had known that Wolfe and Inspector Cramer would have to put up with it that evening, because that is always a part of my reaction to sauerkraut. I don't glory in it or go for a record, but neither do I fight it back. I want to be liked just for myself.
If either Cramer or Wolfe noticed it he gave no sign. I was where I belonged, during an evening session in the office and, with Wolfe behind his desk and Cramer in the red leather chair, I was to one side of the line of fire. It had started off sociably enough, with Wolfe offering refreshment and Cramer choosing bourbon and water, and Fritz bringing it, and Cramer giving it a go and saying it was good whisky, which was true.
'You said on the phone,' he told Wolfe, 'you have some-thing I can use.'
Wolfe put his beer glass down and nodded. 'Yes, sir. Un-less you no longer need it. I've seen nothing in the paper re-cently about the Leonard Dykes case-the body fished out of the river nearly two months ago. Have you got it in hand?'
'No.'
'Any progress?'
'Nothing-no.'
'Then I would like to consult you about something, be-cause it's a little ticklish.' Wolfe leaned back and adjusted himself for comfort. 'I have to make a choice. Seventeen days ago the body of a young woman named Joan Wellman was found on a secluded road in Van Cortlandt Park. She
had been struck by an automobile. Her father, from Peoria, Illinois, is dissatisfied with the way the police are handling the matter and has hired me to investigate. I saw him just this evening; he left only two hours ago, and I phoned you immediately. I have reason to think that Miss Wellman's death was not an accident and that there was an important connection between the two homicides-hers and Dykes's.'
'That's interesting,' Cramer conceded. 'Something your client told you?'
