'It isn't worth the trouble. I believe Mr. Goodwin has told you to command us if at any time you need information from here.'
'He didn't say 'command,' but he said you'd reciprocate and I appreciate it. I like that 'command.' If you need more on this let me know.'
Wolfe said he would, hung up, pushed the phone away as if he resented it, which he does, pushed his chair back, left it, walked over to the globe, twirled it, and focused on a spot near the center of the United States of America. In a minute he demanded, not turning, 'Where the devil is Evansville?'
'If you've got Indiana, at the bottom, on the Ohio River.'
Another ten seconds, and he turned. 'How do you get there?'
'Probably the quickest would be a plane to Louisville.'
'I'd have to be back Monday morning for a little job,' Saul said.
'No, Archie will go. You're needed here. Archie, find-'
He stopped because I had turned to the phone and started dialing.
14
At ten minutes past two Friday morning I sat on a wooden chair at the end of a glass-topped desk in a room with two windows, being sized up by a cop. I wasn't exactly in the pink, after the day in New York, the plane ride to Louisville, and the three-hour drive in a rented car to Evansville, but since I now knew which diphthong it was, and I would sleep better after I got the answers to a few questions, and police headquarters is open all night, I had stopped at the hotel only long enough to sign in. I admit that as I sat I had to tell myself to keep my shoulders up.
The cop's name was Sievers, Lieutenant Sievers, an old pro with very little hair but plenty of jaw. He gave my New York State detective license a thorough look, handed it back, and frowned at me. 'Archie Goodwin,' he said. 'Haven't I seen that name somewhere?'
'I hope not on a hot dodger. You may have seen the name of the man I work for, Nero Wolfe.'
'Oh.' He nodded. 'That one. Yeah. How do you stand him?'
'I've asked myself that question a thousand times, and damned if I can answer it.'
'Don't expect me to. What's your problem here?'
'Just a little information we need, about a man named Richard Ault, or I should say his family. He's dead. He committed suicide in Racine, Wisconsin, on August fourteenth, nineteen fifty-nine.'
'Yeah, I know.'
'This was his home town, wasn't it?'
'It was. He was born here.'
'Did you know him?'
'I knew him by sight. I don't know if I ever spoke to him. He wasn't the kind we have to speak to much. Why are you interested in him now?'
'We're not, in him. A point has come up in a case we're on that his family might know about. I'll see them tomorrow-I mean today-but I thought it wouldn't hurt to find out what they're like first. How do they stand locally?'
'They don't stand. You won't see them tomorrow. There's no one to see.'
'No one at all?'
'No. If you want details, Richard Ault's father, Benjamin Ault, Junior, has a furniture factory, a big one. He inherited it from
'So do I when they may be needed. What about brothers or sisters?'
He shook his head. 'Richard was an only.'
'There's still Mrs. Ault. Where is she?'
'I don't know, and I don't know who does. There's a lawyer who might named Littauer, H. Ernest Littauer. He handled it when she sold the factory.'
I had my notebook out and was scribbling. When in Evansville do as the Romans do. 'I need all the dope I can get,' I said. 'Am I keeping you from anything important?'
'Hell no. Not until the phone rings to report a hit and run.'
'I hope it won't. When did Mrs. Ault sell the factory?'
'About three years ago. When Benjamin Junior died, her husband, she changed the name of the business to M. and R. Ault, Inc. M for Marjorie and R for Richard. Then a couple of years after Richard's death she sold it and left town. As far as I know she has never been back, and I don't know where she is. You do shorthand,
