him. Why not? That's my philosophy, Mr. Goodwin?why not? It saves trouble.'
He was prying my chin up, doing the throat. That clean, I rolled my head to the right to turn the other cheek.
'Of course,' he said, 'the police have to get it straight, but they can't expect us to remember everything. When he came in first he talked with Fickler, maybe five minutes. Then Fickler took him to Tina's booth, and he talked with Tina. 76
that Fielder sent Philip in, and then Carl and then lie and then Tom and then me and then Janet. I think pretty good to remember that.' i I mumbled agreement. He was at the corner of my mouth. 'But I can't remember everything, and they can't make e. I don't know how long it was after Janet came back out fore Fielder went to Tina's booth and found him dead. pfhey ask me was it nearer ten minutes or nearer fifteen, but %% say I had a customer at the time, we all did but Philip, and !>I don't know. They ask me how many of us went behind the Wrartition after Janet came out, to the steamer or the vat or to :>get the lamp or something, but I say again I had a customer I at the time, and I don't know, except I know I didn't go because I was trimming Mr. Howell at the time. I was working the top when Fickler yelled and came running out. They can ask Mr. Howell.'
'They probably have,' I said, but to no one, because Ed had gone for a hot towel.
He returned and used the towel and got the lilac water. Patting it on, he resumed, 'They ask me exactly when Carl and Tina went, they ask me that twenty times, but I can't say and I won't say. Carl did it all right, but they can't prove it by me. They've gotta have evidence, but I don't. Cold towel today?'
'No, I'll keep the smell.'
He patted me dry, levered me upright, and brought a comb and brush. 'Can I remember what I don't know?' he demanded.
'I know I can't.'
'And I'm no great detective like you.' Ed was a little rough with a brush. 'And now I go for lunch but I've got to have a cop along. We can't even go to the can alone. They searched all of us down to the skin, and they even brought a woman to search Janet. They took our fingerprints. I admit they've gotta have evidence.' He flipped the bib off. 'How was the razor, all right?'
I told him it was fine as usual, stepped down, fished for a quarter, and exchanged it for my check. Purley Stebbins,
77
nearby, was watching both of us. There had been times when I had seen fit to kid Purley at the scene of a murder, but not now. A cop had been killed.
He spoke, not belligerently. 'The inspector don't like your being here.'
'Neither do I,' I declared. 'Thank God this didn't happen to be Mr. Wolfe's day for a haircut, you would never have believed it. I'm just a minor coincidence. Nice to see you.'
I went and paid my check to Fickler, got my things on, and departed.
aaa
s I emerged into Lexington Avenue there were several things on my mind. The most immediate was this: if Cramer's suspicion had been aroused enough to spend a man on me, and if I were seen going directly home from the shop, there might be too much curiosity as to why I had chosen to spend six bits for a shave at that time of day. So instead of taking a taxi, which would have had to crawl crosstown anyhow, I walked, and when I got to Altman's I used their aisles and exits to make sure I had no tail. That left my mind free for other things the rest of the way home.
One leading question was whether Carl and Tina would still be where I had left them, in the front room. That was what took me up the seven steps of the stoop two at a time, and on in quick. The answer to the question was no. The front room was empty.
I strode down the hall to the office but stopped there because I heard Wolfe's voice. It was coming through the open door to the dining room, across the hall, and it was saying, 'No, Mr. Vardas, I cannot agree that mountain climbing is merely one manifestation of man's spiritual aspirations. I think instead it is an hysterical paroxysm of his infantile vanity. One of the prime ambitions of a jackass is to bray louder than any other jackass, and man is not . . .'
I crossed the hall and the dining-room sill. Wolfe was at 78
his end of the table, and Fritz, standing at his elbow, had just removed the lid from a steaming platter. At his left was Tina, and Carl was at his right, my place when there was no company. Wolfe saw me but finished his paragraph on mountain climbing before attending to me.
'In time, Archie. You like veal and mushrooms.'
Talk about infantile. His not being willing to sit to his lunch with unfed people in the house was all well enough, but why not send trays in to them? That was easy--he was sore at me, and I had called them foreigners.
I stepped to the end of the table and said, 'I know you have a paroxysm if I try to bring up business during meals, but eighteen thousand cops would give a month's pay to get their hands on Carl and Tina, your guests.'
'Indeed.' Wolfe was serving the veal and accessories. 'Why?'
'Have you talked with them?'
'No. I merely invited them to lunch.'
'Then don't until I've reported. I ran into Cramer and Stebbins at the barber shop.'
'Confound it.' The serving spoon stopped en route.
'Yeah. It's quite interesting. But first lunch, of course. I'll go put the chain bolt on. Please dish me some veal?'
Carl and Tina were speechless.
