“I might, at that.” I was sympathetic but not mealy. “Don’t be too sure you’re a bad buy. What are the liabilities?”
She twisted her neck to look across the meadow toward the house. Wolfe and Unger were in their chairs under the apple tree, evidently keeping their voices down, since no sound came, and my ears are good.
She turned back to me. “Is it a bluff? Is he just trying to scare something out of us?”
“No, not just. If he scares something out, fine. If not, he’ll get it the hard way. If there’s anything to get he’ll get it. If you’re sitting on a lid you don’t want opened, my advice is to move, the sooner the better, or you may get hurt.”
“I’m already hurt!”
“Then hurt worse.”
“I guess I can be.” She reached for one of the blue flowers and pulled it off with no stem. “You asked what these are. They’re wild asters, just the color of my eyes.” She crushed it with her fingers and dropped it. “I already know what I’m going to do. I decided walking over here with you. What time is it?”
I looked at my wrist. “Quarter past three.”
“Let’s see, four hours-five. Where can I see Nero Wolfe around nine o’clock in town?”
From long habit I started to say at his office, but remembered it was out of bounds. “His address and number are in the phone book,” I told her, “but he may not be there this evening. Phone and ask for Fritz. Tell him you are the Queen of Hearts, and he’ll tell you where Mr. Wolfe is. If you don’t say you’re the Queen of Hearts he won’t tell you anything because Mr. Wolfe hates to be disturbed when he’s out. But why not save time and trouble? Evidently you’ve decided to tell him something, and there he is. Come on and tell him now.”
She shook her head. “I can’t. I don’t dare.”
“On account of Unger?”
“Yes.”
“If he can ask to speak privately with Mr. Wolfe, why can’t you?”
“I tell you I don’t dare!”
“We’ll go and come back as soon as Unger leaves.”
“He’s not going to leave. He’s going to ride to town with me.”
“Then record it on tape and use me for tape. You can trust my memory. I guarantee to repeat it to Mr. Wolfe word for word. Then when you phone this evening he will have had time-”
“Helen!
She started to scramble up, and I got upright and gave her a hand. As we headed across the meadow she spoke, barely above a whisper. “If you tell him I’ll deny it. Are you going to tell him?”
“Wolfe, yes. Unger, no.”
“If you do I’ll deny it.”
“Then I won’t.”
As we approached they left their chairs. Their expressions indicated that they had not signed a mutual nonaggression pact, but there were no scars of battle. Wolfe said, “We’re through here, Archie,” and was going. Nobody else said anything, which made it rather stiff. Following Wolfe around the house to the open space, I saw that it would take a lot of maneuvering to turn around without scraping the Jaguar, so I had to back out through the bushes to the dirt road, where I swung the rear around to head the way we had come.
When we had gone half a mile I called back to my rear-seat passenger, “I have a little item for you!”
“Stop somewhere,” he ordered, louder than necessary. “I can’t talk like this.”
A little farther on there was roadside room under a tree, and I pulled over and parked.
I twisted around in the seat to face him. “We got a nibble,” I said, and reported on Helen Weltz. He started frowning, and when I finished he was frowning more.
“Confound it,” he growled, “she was in a panic, and it’ll wear off.”
“It may,” I conceded. “And so? I’ll go back and do it over if you’ll write me a script.”
“Pfui. I don’t say I could better it. You are a connoisseur of comely young women. Is she a murderess in a funk trying to wriggle out? Or what is she?”
I shook my head. “I pass. She’s trying to wriggle all right, but for out of what I would need six guesses. What did Unger want privately? Is he trying to wriggle too?”
“Yes. He offered me money-five thousand dollars, and then ten thousand.”
“For what?”
“Not clearly defined. A retaining fee for investigative services. He was crude about it for a man with brains.”
“I’ll be damned.” I grinned at him. “I’ve often thought you ought to get around more. Only five hours ago you marched out of that courtroom in the interest of justice, and already you’ve scared up an offer of ten grand. Of course it may have nothing to do with the murder. What did you tell him?”
“That I resented and scorned his attempt to suborn me.”
