Wolfe shook his head. 'Oh no, sir, I assure you.' He sighed. 'To continue: I don't know how and when Mr. Perry concealed the money in Miss Fox's automobile, but one of my men has uncovered a possibility which the police can easily follow. At any rate, it is certain that he did. That is unimportant. Another thing that moved him to action was the fact that Clara Fox had told him that, having heard him speak favorably of the abilities of Nero Wolfe, she had decided to engage me in the Rubber Band enterprise. Apparently Mr. Perry did give my competence a high rating, for he took the trouble to come here himself to get me to act for the Seaboard Products Corporation, which would of course have prevented me from taking Miss Fox as a client.
'But he had an unpleasant surprise here. He was sitting in that chair, the one he is in now, when a man walked into the room and said, 'My name's Harlan Scovil.' And the man stared at Mr. Perry. We cannot know whether he definitely recognized him as Rubber Coleman or whether Mr. Perry merely suspected that he did. In any event, it was enough to convince Mr. Perry that something more drastic than a framed-up larceny charge was called for without delay; for obviously it would not do for any living person to have even the remotest suspicion that there was any connection between Anthony D. Perry, corporation president, bank director, multi-millionaire, and eminent citizen, and the Rubber Band. Lord Clivers tells me that forty years ago Rubber Coleman was headstrong, sharp of purpose, and quick on the trigger. Apparently he has retained those characteristics. He went to his office and at once phoned Mr. Goodwin to come there. At five-twenty he went to the directors' room. A moment later he excused himself to his associates, left by the door to the public hall, descended to the ground floor and telephoned Harlan Scovil, saying what we can only guess at but certainly arranging a rendezvous, went to the street and selected a parked automobile and took it, drove to where Scovil was approaching the rendezvous and shot him dead, abandoned the car on Ninth Avenue, and returned to the Seaboard Building and the directors' room. It was an action admirably quick-witted, direct and conclusive, with probably not one chance in a million of it's being discovered but for the fact that Miss Fox had happened to pick me to collect a fantastic debt for her.'
Wolfe paused to open and pour beer. Skinner said, 'I hope you've got something, Wolfe. I hope to heaven you've got something, because if you haven't…'
Wolfe drank, and put his glass down. 'I know. I can see the open jaws of the waiting beasts.' He thumbed at Perry. 'This one here in front. But let him wait a litde longer. Let us go on to last evening. That is quite simple. We are not concerned with the details of how Mr. Walsh got to see Mr. Perry at his office yesterday afternoon; it is enough to know that he did, since he phoned Lord Clivers that he had found Rubber Coleman. Well, there was only one thing for Mr. Perry to do, and he did it. Shortly after half past six o'clock he entered that building enclosure by one of the ways we know of- possibly he is a member of the Orient Club, another point for inquiry- crept up on old Mr. Walsh and shot him in the back of the head, probably muffling the sound of the shot by wrapping the gun in his overcoat or something else, moved the body to the vicinity of the telephone if it was not already there, left by the way he had come, and drove rapidly-'
'Wait a minute!' Cramer broke in, gruff. 'How do you fit that? We know the exact time of that shot, two minutes to seven, when Walsh called you on the phone. And you heard the shot. We already know-'
'Please, Mr. Cramer.' Wolfe was patient. 'I'm not telling you what you already know; this, for you, is news. I was saying, Mr. Perry drove rapidly downtown and arrived at this office at exactly seven o'clock.'
Hombert jerked up and snorted. Cramer stared at Wolfe, slowly shaking his head. Skinner, frowning, demanded, 'Are you crazy, Wolfe? Yesterday you told us you heard the shot that killed Walsh, at six-fifty-eight. Now you say that Perry fired it, and then got to your office at seven o'clock.' He snarled, 'Well?'
'Precisely.' Wolfe wiggled a finger at him. 'Do you remember that last night I told you that I was confronted by a difficulty which had to be solved before anything could be done? That was it. You have just stated it. Archie, please tell Saul to go ahead.'
I got up and went and opened the door to the front room. Saul Panzer was sitting there. I called to him, 'Hey, Mr. Wolfe says to go ahead.' Saul made for the hall and I heard him going out the front door.
Wolfe was saying, 'It was ingenious and daring for Mr. Perry to arrange for Mr. Goodwin and me to furnish his alibi. But of course, strictly speaking, it was not an alibi he had in mind; it was a chronology of events which would exclude from my mind any possibility of his connection with Mr. Walsh's death. Such a connection was not supposed to occur to anyone, and above all not to me; for it is fairly certain that up to the time of his arrival here today Mr. Perry felt satisfactorily assured that no one had the faintest suspicion of his interest in this affair. There had been two chances against him: Harlan Scovil might have spoken to Mr. Goodwin between the time that Mr. Perry left here Monday afternoon and the time he phoned to summon Mr. Goodwin to his office; or Mr. Walsh might have communicated with me between five and six yesterday. But he thought not, for there was no indication of it from us; and he had proceeded to kill both of them as soon as he could reasonably manage it. So he arranged-'
Skinner growled, 'Get on. He may not have had an alibi in mind, but he seems to have one. What about it?'
'As I say, sir, that was my difficulty. It will be resolved for you shortly. I thought it better- ah! Get it, Archie.'
It was the phone. I swiveled and took it, and found myself exchanging greetings with Mr. Panzer. I told Wolfe, 'Saul.'
He nodded, and got brisk. 'Give Mr. Skinner your chair. If you would please take that receiver, Mr. Skinner? I want you to hear something. And you, Mr. Cramer, take mine- here- the cord isn't long enough, I'm afraid you'll have to stand. Kindly keep the receiver fairly snug on your ear. Now, Mr. Skinner, speak into the transmitter, 'Ready.' That one word will be enough.'
Skinner, at my phone, croaked, 'Ready.' The next development was funny. He gave a jump, and turned to glare at Wolfe, while Cramer, at Wolfe's phone, jerked a little too, and yelled into the transmitter, 'Hey! Hey, you!'
Wolfe said, 'Hang up, gentlemen, and be seated. Mr. Skinner, please! That demonstration was really necessary. What you heard was Saul Panzer in a telephone booth at the druggist's on the next comer. There, of course, the instrument is attached to the wall. What he did was this.'
Wolfe reached into his pocket and took out a big rubber band. He removed the receiver from his French phone, looped the band over the transmitter end, stretched it out, and let it Sip. He replaced the receiver.
'That's all,' he announced. 'That was the shot Mr. Goodwin and I heard over the telephone. The band must be three-quarters of an inch wide, and thick, as I learned from experiments this morning- On this instrument, of course, it is nothing; but on the transmitter of a pay-station phone, with the impact and jar and vibration simultaneous, the effect is startling. Didn't you find it so, Mr. Skinner?'
