A Family Affair

'Where is it?'

Wolfe flipped a hand. 'I suppose it has been destroyed.'

'Balls. You wouldn't. Wolfe, I want that book. And the slip of paper.'

'Mr. Cramer.'

Wolfe cocked his head. 'You haven't reflected. If you reprimand the men who searched that room for misfeasance, whether or not you show them the slip of paper and the book, where will you be? You'll be committed. You will have to report this entire conversation to the District Attorney, of course telling him that you think it was a collection not of suppositions but of facts. You may decide to report it to him anyway, but I doubt it. As I said, your mental processes have limits, but you are not dumb. You would probably be prodded into a long and difficult investigation that couldn't possibly have an adequate result-for instance, you might discover how Mr. Bassett learned Orrie Gather's name and address, but then what? No matter what you discover, even what solid evidence you get, the dominant fact, that Orrie Gather is dead, will remain.'

'And you killed him. Your men killed him on your order.'

Wolfe nodded. 'I won't challenge your right to put it like that. Of course I would put it differently. I might say that the ultimate responsibility for his death rests with the performance of the genes at the instant of his conception, but that could be construed as a rejection of free will, and I do not reject it. If it pleases you to say that I killed him, I won't contend. You have worked hard on it for ten days and should have some satisfaction.'

'Satisfaction my ass.'

He stood up. 'Yes, ten days. I'll reflect on it all right.'

He went and got his coat and put it on and came back, to the comer of Wolfe's desk, and said, 'I'm going home and try to get some sleep. You probably have never had to try to get some sleep. You probably never will.'

He turned, saw the globe, and went and whirled it so hard that it hadn't quite stopped when he was through to the hall. When the sound came of the front door closing, Wolfe said, 'Will you bring brandy, Archie? And two glasses. If Fritz is up, bring him and three glasses. We'll try to get some sleep.'

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21/08/2007

LRS to LRF parser v.0.9; Mikhail Sharonov, 2006; msh- tools.com/ebook/