“Nope, not yet. Give us time, can’t you? Don’t you worry, old boy. Right now I need some things in a hurry. I need a good ink pad, preferably a new one, and fifty or sixty sheets of smooth white paper, preferably glazed, and a magnifying glass.”
“Jumping Jesus.” He stared at me. “Who you working for, J. Edgar Hoover?”
“No. It’s all right, we’re having a party. Maybe Liggett will be there. Step on it, huh?”
He told me to wait there and disappeared around the corner. In five minutes he was back, with all three items. As I took them he told me:
“I’ll have to put the pad and paper on the bill. The glass is a personal loan, don’t forget and skip with it.”
I told him okay, thanked him, and beat it. On the way back I took the path which would carry me past Upshur, and I made a stop there and sought suite 60. I got a bottle of talcum powder from my bathroom and stuck it in my pocket, and my pen and a notebook, then found the copy of the
I got no light on that point from Wolfe. He had apparently been busy, for though I hadn’t been gone more than fifteen minutes I found him established in the biggest chair in the small parlor, alongside the same table behind which Tolman had been barricaded against the onslaught of Constanza Berin. Across the table from him, looking skeptical but resigned, was Sergei Vallenko.
Wolfe finished a sentence to Vallenko and then turned to me. “You have everything, Archie? Good. The pad and paper here on the table, please. I’ve explained to Mr. Servan that if I undertake this inquiry I shall have to ask a few questions of everyone and take fingerprint samples. He has sent Mr. Vallenko to us first. All ten prints, please.”
That was a hot one. Nero Wolfe collecting fingerprints, especially after the cops had smeared all over the dining-room and it had been reopened to the public! I knew darned well it was phoney, but hadn’t guessed his charade yet, so once again I had to follow his tail light without knowing the road. I got Vallenko’s specimens, on two sheets, and labelled them, and Wolfe dismissed him with thanks.
I demanded, when we were alone, “What has this identification bureau-”
“Not now, Archie. Sprinkle powder on Mr. Vallenko’s prints.”
I stared at him. “In the name of God, why? You don’t put powder-”
“It will look more professional and mysterious. Do it. Give me the page from the magazine.-Good. Satisfactory. We’ll use only the upper half; cut it off and keep it in your pocket. Put the magnifying glass on the table-ah, Mme. Mondor? Asseyez-vous, s’il vous plait.”
She had her knitting along. He asked her some questions of which I never bothered him for a translation, and then turned her over to my department and I put her on record. I never felt sillier in my life than dusting that talcum powder on those fresh clear specimens. Our third customer was Lisette Putti, and she was followed by Keith, Blanc, Rossi, Mondor… Wolfe asked a few questions of all of them, but knowing his voice and manner as well as I did, it sounded to me as if his part of it was as phoney as mine. And it certainly didn’t sound as if he was prying any crack open.
Then Lawrence Coyne’s Chinese wife came in. She was dressed for dinner in red silk, with a sprig of mountain laurel in her black hair, and with her slim figure and little face and narrow eyes she looked like an ad for a Round the World cruise. At once I got a hint that it was her we were laying for, for Wolfe told me sharply to take my notebook, which he hadn’t done for any of the others, but all he did was ask her the same line of questions and explain about the prints before I took them. However, there appeared to be more to come. As I gave her my handkerchief, already ruined, to wipe the tips of her fingers on, Wolfe settled back.
He murmured, “By the way, Mrs. Coyne, Mr. Tolman tells me that while you were outdoors last evening you saw no one but one of the attendants on one of the paths. You asked him about a bird you heard and he told you it was a whippoorwill. You had never heard a whippoorwill before?”
She had displayed no animation, and didn’t now. “No, there aren’t any in California.”
“So I understand. I believe you went outdoors before the tasting of the sauces began, and returned to the parlor shortly after Mr. Vukcic entered the dining room. Isn’t that right?”
“I went out before they began. I don’t know who was in the dining room when I came back.”
“I do. Mr. Vukcic.” Wolfe’s voice was so soft and unconcerned that I knew she was in for something. “Also, you told Mr. Tolman that you were outdoors all the time you were gone. Is that correct?”
She nodded. “Yes.”
“When you left the parlor, after dinner, didn’t you go to your room before you went outdoors?”
“No, it wasn’t cold and I didn’t need a wrap…”
“All right. I’m just asking. While you were outdoors, though, perhaps you entered the left wing corridor by way of the little terrace and went to your room that way?”
“No.” She sounded dull and calm. “I was outdoors all the time.”
“You didn’t go to your room at all?”
“No.”
“Nor anywhere else?”
“Just outdoors. My husband will tell you, I like to go outdoors at night.”
Wolfe grimaced. “And when you re-entered, you came straight through the main hall to the large parlor?”
