'Yes and no. It's hard to tell because they're half batty. A year ago their senior partner disbarred, and now their new senior partner confessing to three murders and killing himself-they're in a hell of a fix. Briggs thinks they ought to denounce the confession as a fake and hold you liable, but he's just babbling. He doesn't say you or Goodwin shot Corrigan, but he might as well. Phelps arid Kustin say that even if the confession is true it's invalid because it isn't signed, and any publication of it would be libelous. They think we ought to bury it. But they also think we should accept it as true. Why not? Corrigan's dead, and that would make the three murders finished business and they could start gathering up the pieces. Their feeling about you is approximately the same as Briggs', but they're realistic about it. None of them will look O'Malley in the eye, though he gives them plenty of chances to. He sticks it in them and twists it. He sent some flowers to the wife of the juror he bribed, with a letter of apology for thinking she informed on him, and before he sent the letter he read it aloud to them with Lieutenant Row-cliff present and asked their opinion of it.'
There was only an inch of beer left in Cramer's glass. He got it and drained it and then settled back, not through yet. He rubbed the side of his nose with a fingertip. 'I guess that covers it. It looks like a wrap-up. The DA will be ready to give the press a statement as soon as they decide whether to release the confession. Thank God they decide that and not me. But on the main question, do we cross off the murders or don't we, I'll have to go along and maybe I'm ready to, only there's you to think of. That's why I'm here. Once or twice I have kicked a hat that you had hid a brick in, and I don't want a sore toe. You connected Joan Wellman with Dykes by spotting that name, Baird Archer. You tied in Rachel Abrams by having Goodwin there two minutes late. You pulled the stunt that got Corrigan a bullet in his head. So I repeat a question I asked you day before yesterday: are you ready to send your client a bill?'
'No,' Wolfe said flatly.
'I thought not,' Cramer growled. 'What are you waiting for?'
'I'm through waiting.' Wolfe struck the arm of his chair
with his palm, a gesture so violent that with him it was the next thing to hysterics. 'I have to he. This can't go on forever. I'll have to do it with what I've got or not at all.'
'What have you got?'
'Nothing that you haven't. Absolutely nothing. It may not be enough, but I see no chance of getting more. If I-'
The phone rang, and I swiveled and got it. It was Saul Panzer. He wanted Wolfe. Wolfe took it and gave me the sign to get off, and I did so. The part of the conversation that Cramer and I listened to was not exciting. Mostly it was grunts, at intervals. Apparently Saul had plenty to say. At the end Wolfe told him, 'Satisfactory. Report here at six o'clock,' and hung up.*
He turned to Cramer. 'I'll have to amend that statement. I now have something that you do not have, but it was easily available to you if you had gone after it. I'm better off than I was, but not much. I never will be, and I'm going to act. You're welcome to participate if you care to.'
'In what?'
'A risky but resolute effort to expose a murderer. Tha the best I can offer.'
'You can offer some information. What did you just ^e^ and who is it?'
Wolfe shook his head. 'You would insist on further inquiry and let the moment slip, and further inquiry would be fruitless. He has been too smart for you and almost too smart for me. I'm going to close with him and I may get him. You may participate or not, as you please.'
'Participate how?'
'By getting them here, all of them. This evening at nine o'clock. Including the ten women that Mr. Goodwin entertained at dinner two weeks ago. I need them all, or I may. And of course come yourself.'
'If I get them here I take a hand.'
Wolfe sighed. 'Mr. Cramer. Three weeks ago we agreed to cooperate. I have done so faithfully. I have given you everything I got, without reciprocation. Where do we stand? You, utterly routed, are ready to joint with the District Attorney in unconditional surrender. You have been bamboozled. I have not. I know him, his motive, and his strategy. I intend to rush him. You say you should take a hand?'
Cramer was not overwhelmed. 'I say if I get them here I am officially responsible and I'm in charge.'
'Very well, then you decline. Mr. Goodwin will get them here. If you come you will not get in. I hope to be ready to communicate with you before midnight.'
Cramer sat and scowled. His lips tightened. He opened his mouth, said nothing, and pressed his lips tight again. I was pretty well acquainted with him, and I knew by his eyes that he was going to take it. But he coXildn't just knuckle under, he had to keep his independence and show his spirit and prove that he was by no means cowed. So he said, 'I'll bring Sergeant Stebbms along.'
22
TfTE NEEDED seventeen chairs if they all came, and a W phone call from Stebbins around four o'clock informed me that they would. With four from the front room, one from the hall, two from my room, and two from Fritz's room, Fritz and I got them collected and arranged in the office. We had an argument. Fritz insisted there should be a table of liquid refreshments, that Wolfe regarded that as a minimum of hospitality for invited guests, and I fought it. Not so much on account of the basic situation, since more than one murderer had been served a highball or other mixture in that room. The trouble was the females, particularly Helen Troy and Blanche Duke. I did not want the former, at some ticklish spot where everything might hang on a word and a tone, to jump up and call out, 'Oyez, oyeth!' And if the latter, whose inhibitions were totally unreliable, got a shaker full of her formula mixed and worked on it, she might do or say anything. So I was firm.
Fritz couldn't appeal to Wolfe because he wasn't accessible. He was there at his desk, but not for us. Five minutes after Cramer left he had leaned back, closed his eyes, and started pushing his lips in and out, which meant he was working, and hard. He kept at it until lunch, took only half of his customary hour for the meal, returned to the office, and started in again. He left for the plant rooms at four o'clock as usual, but when I went up there on an errand he was standing in a corner of the intermediate room frowning at a
