“I would like to say,” I told Wolfe, “that you are wrong about Ann Amory being a sentimental imbecile for not telling the police as soon as she learned that Roy had killed Mrs. Leeds. I knew her and you didn’t. I doubt if she really knew Roy had done it, I mean actually saw it. My guess is she saw something that gave her a strong suspicion. She told Mrs. Chack about it, but Mrs. Chack talked her out of it.”
Wolfe muttered, “Imbecile.”
“No,” I said with conviction. “She was a damn good kid. I tell you I knew her. Mrs. Chack nearly talked her out of it, but not quite, and it kept worrying her. After all, she was engaged to marry the guy. I’m betting she put it up to him straight, that would have been like her, and of course he denied it, but that didn’t convince her either, and then he was afraid she might spill it to someone any minute, and he probably acted queer-he would-and that made her suspicion stronger. Of course she knew he had had plenty of motive. The only thing he cared about in the world was that loft and the damn pigeons, and Mrs. Leeds was going to take them away from him and kick him out. But she wasn’t absolutely sure he had done it. Nice situation. She couldn’t just let it ride, but she didn’t want to denounce him to the police. So she tried to get expert advice by asking Lily Rowan to send her to a lawyer. She was trying to do it right. She wouldn’t even tell me about it. But when I bounced in down there he got scared good and proper. And she would have told you. That is, she would if you had been approachable.”
“Imbecile,” Wolfe muttered.
There was no question about his being back to normal. Me too. He gave me a pain in the neck. But being in uniform and on duty, I had to suppress my personal emotions. I reached for the phone and dialed the number again, and this time got him. As soon as he heard my name he began to sputter, but I ignored it.
“Colonel Ryder,” I said stiffly, “an appointment has been arranged for you with Mr. Nero Wolfe at eleven o’clock tomorrow morning, if you will kindly be at his office at that hour. If you will arrive at ten-thirty, I shall be glad to furnish you with an explanation of the unfortunate publicity I received today, which I feel sure will be satisfactory. At that time I shall also explain why it will be necessary for me to have a week-end leave beginning Saturday noon. My word of honor as an officer is involved.”
As I hung up Wolfe raised his head for another sniff of the aroma from the kitchen. My own mind was concentrated on something else. I was permitted some latitude in my expense account, but to make an entry,
Booby Trap
Chapter 1
On our way out of the house-his house, which was also his office, on West 35th Street over near the North River- Nero Wolfe, who was ahead of me, stopped so abruptly that I nearly bumped into him. He wheeled and confronted me, glancing at my briefcase.
“Have you got that thing?”
I looked innocent. “What thing?”
“You know very well. That confounded grenade. I want that infernal machine out of this house. Have you got it?”
I held my ground. “Colonel Ryder,” I said in a crisp military tone, “who is my superior officer, said I could keep it for a souvenir in view of my valor and devotion to duty in recovering-”
“You can’t keep it in my house. I tolerate pistols as a tool of the business, but not that contraption. If by accident the pin got removed it would blow off the top of the building, not to mention the noise it would make. I thought you understood this is out of discussion. Get it, please.”
Formerly I might have argued that my room on the third floor was my castle, tenanted by me as part of my pay for suffering his society as his assistant and guardian, but that was out now, since Congress was taking care of me by appropriating around ten billion bucks a month. So I merely shrugged to show I was humoring him, and, knowing how it annoyed him to be kept waiting standing up, moseyed over to the stair and took my time mounting the two flights to my room. It was there where I kept it on top of the chest of drawers-about seven inches long and three in diameter, painted a pale pink, looking nothing like as deadly as it was supposed to be. Reaching for it, I glanced at the safety pin to make sure it was snug, put it in the briefcase, went back downstairs at my leisure, ignored a remark he saw fit to make, and accompanied him out to the curb where the sedan was parked.
One thing Wolfe demanded from the Army, and got, was enough gas for his car. Not that he was trying to bypass the war. He really was making sacrifices for victory. As one, most of his accustomed income from the detective business. Two, his daily sessions with his orchids in the plant rooms on the roof, whenever Army work interfered. Three, his fixed rule to avoid the hazards of unessential movements, especially outdoors. Four, food. I kept an eye on that, looking for a chance to insert remarks, and drew a blank. He and Fritz accomplished wonders within the limitations of coupon fodder, and right there in the middle of New York, with black markets tipping the wink like floozies out for a breath of air on a summer evening, Wolfe’s kitchen was as pure as cottage cheese.
After burning up not more than half a gallon of the precious gas, even counting traffic stops and starts, I let him out in front of 17 Duncan Street, found a place to park, and walked back and joined him in the lobby. Leaving the elevator at the tenth floor, Wolfe had a chance to suppress some more irritation. In my uniform all I had to do was return the salute of the corporal on guard, but although Wolfe had been there at least a couple dozen times and it was no trick to recognize him, he was in cits, and the New York headquarters of Military Intelligence was finicky about civilian visitors. After he got the high sign we went through a door, down a long corridor with closed doors on both sides, one of which was to my office, turned a corner, and entered the anteroom of the Second in Command.
An Army sergeant was sitting at a desk giving the keyboard of a typewriter the one- two.
