Goodwin and I are going there, unaccompanied. When we return to our car we shall await you or your agent to inspect our baggage. Have you any comment?'
'I -' Pitcairn hesitated, frowning, then he said, 'No.'
'Good.' Wolfe turned and went to a table for his coat, hat, and cane. 'Come, Archie.' He marched.
As we reached the door Sybil's voice came at our backs. 'If you find the box of morphine don't tell anybody.'
Outdoors I held Wolfe's coat for him and got mine on. The whole day had been dark, but now it was getting darker, though a cold wind was herding the clouds down to the horizon and on over. When we reached the rear of the house I swung left for a detour to the car to get a flashlight, and caught up with Wolfe on the path. No ducking was necessary now, as the twigs had dried. We passed the tennis court and entered the grove of evergreens, where it was already night.
I glanced at my wrist. 'Four o'clock,' I announced cheerily to Wolfe, who was ahead. 'If we were home, and Theodore was still there, or Andy had come, you would be just going up to the plant rooms to poke around.'
He didn't even tell me to shut up. He was way beyond that.
It was dark enough in the cottage to need lights, and I turned them on. Wolfe glanced around, spotted a chair nearly big enough, took off his hat and coat, and sat, while I started a tour. The dicks had left it neat. This medium-sized room wasn't bad, though the rugs and furniture had seen better days. To the right was a bedroom and to the left another one, and in the rear was a bathroom and a kitchen.
I took only a superficial look and then returned to Wolfe and told him, 'Nothing sticks out. Shall I pack?'
'What for?' he asked forlorn.
'Shall I see if they missed something important?'
He only grunted. Not feeling like sitting and looking at him, I began a retake. A desk and a filing cabinet yielded nothing but horticultural details and some uninteresting personal items, and the rest of the room nothing at all. The bedroom at the left was even blanker. The one at the right was the one Andy had used, and I went over it good, but if it contained anything that could be used to flatten Lieutenant Noonan's nose I failed to find it. The same for the bathroom. And ditto for the kitchen, except that at the rear of a shelf, behind some packages of prunes and cereals, I dug up a little cardboard box. There was no morphine in it, and there was no reason to suppose there ever had been, and I reported its contents to Wolfe merely to get conversation started.
'Keys,' I said, jiggling the box, 'and one of them is tagged d-u-p period g-r-n-h-s period, which probably means duplicate to the greenhouse. It would come in handy if we want to sneak in some night and swipe that Phalaenopsis.'
No comment. I put the keys in my pocket and sat down.
Pretty soon I spoke. 'I'd like to make it plain,' I said distinctly, 'that I don't like the way you're acting. Many times, sitting in the office, you have said to me, 'Archie, go get Whosis and Whosat and bring them here.' Usually, I have delivered. But if you now tell me to drive you home, and, upon arriving, tell me to go get the Pitcairns and Imbries and Gus Treble, which is what I suspect you of, save it. I wouldn't even bother to answer, not after the way you've bitched it up just because a pretty girl called you by your first name.'
'She isn't pretty,' he growled.
'Nuts. Certainly she's pretty, though I don't like her any better than you do. I just wanted to make sure that you understand what the situation will be if we go home.'
He studied me. After a while he nodded, with his lips compressed, as if in final acceptance of an ugly fact.
'There's a phone,' he said. 'Get Fritz.'
'Yeah, I saw it, but what if it's connected with the house?'
'Try it.'
I went to the desk and did so, dialing the operator, and, with no audible interference, got her, gave the number, and heard Fritz's voice in my ear. Wolfe got up and came across and took it away from me.
'Fritz? We have been delayed. No, I'm all right. I don't know. The delay is indefinite. No, confound it, he's in jail. I can't tell now but you'll hear from me again well before dinnertime. How are the plants? I see. No, that's all right, that won't hurt them. I see. No no no, not those on the north! Not a one! Certainly I did, but…'
I quit listening, not that I was callous, but because my attention was drawn elsewhere. Turning away, for no special reason, a window was in my line of vision, and through it, outdoors near the pane, I saw a branch of a shrub bob up and down and then wiggle to a stop. I am no woodsman, but it didn't seem reasonable that wind could make a leafless branch perform like that, so I turned to face Wolfe again, listened for another minute, and then sauntered across the room and into the kitchen. I switched off the light there, carefully and silently eased the back door open, slipped outside, and pulled the door to.
It was all black, but after I had stood half a minute I could see a little. I slipped my hand inside my vest to my shoulder holster, but brought it out again empty; it was just an automatic check. I saw now that I was standing on a concrete slab only a shallow step above the ground. Stepping off it to the left, I started, slow motion, for the corner of the house. The damn wind was so noisy that my ears weren't much help. Just as I reached the corner a moving object came from nowhere and bumped me. I grabbed for it, but it, instead of grabbing, swung a fist. The fist was hard when it met the side of my neck, and that got me sore. I sidestepped, whirled, and aimed one for the object's kidney, but there wasn't enough light for precision and I missed by a mile, nearly cracking a knuckle on his hip. He came at me with a looping swing that left him as open as a house with a wall gone, I ducked, and he went on by and then turned to try again. When he turned I saw who it was: Andy's assistant, Gus Treble.
I stepped back, keeping a guard up for defense only.
