tie light, and read in the same print:
he no signal of any kind. Follow instructions ely. Turn right on llth Ave. and go slowly 156th St. Turn right on 56th and go to 9th Ave. i right on 9th Ave. Right again on 45th. Left llth Ave. Left on 38th. Right on 7th Ave. arht on 27th St. Park on 27th between 9th and Aves. Go to No. 814 and tap five times on door. Give the man who opens the door this [>te and the other one. He will tell you where to
|didn't like it much, but I had to admit it was a arrangement for seeing to it that I went to the nee unattached or there wouldn't be any con It had now decided to rain. Starting the en; could see dimly through the misty window that |?axi driver was still monkeying with his carbutoit of course I had to resist the impulse to crank low down to wave so long. Keeping the in as in my left hand, I rolled to the corner, for the light to change, and turned right on Avenue. Since I had not been forbidden to eyes open I did so, and as I stopped at Fifty jfpr the red light I saw a black or dark blue 1 away from the curb behind me and creep in
206 Bex Stoat
my direction. I took it for granted that that was my chaperon, but even so I followed directions and kept to a crawl Until I reached Fifty-sixth and turned right.
In spite of all the twistings and turnings and the lights we had to stop at, I didn't get the license number of the black sedan for certain until the halt at Thirty eighth Street and Seventh Avenue. Not that that raised my pulse any, license plates not being welded on, but what the hell, I was a detective, wasn't I? It was at that same corner, seeing a flatfoot on the sidewalk, that I had half a notion to jump out, summon him, and tackle the driver of the sedan. If it was the strangler, I had the two printed notes in my possession, and I could at least have made it stick enough for an escorted trip to the Fourteenth Precinct Station for ^ chat. I voted it down, and was soon glad of it.
The guy in the sedan was not the strangler, as I soon learned. On Twenty-seventh Street there was space smack in front of Number 814 and I saw no reason why I shouldn't use it. The sedan went to the curb right behind me. After locking my car I stood on the sidewalk a moment, but my chaperon just sat tight, so I kept to the instructions, mounted the steps to the stoop of the run-down old brownstohe, entered the vestibule, and knocked five times on the door. Through the glass panel the dimly h't hall looked empty. As I peered in, thinking I would either have to knock a lot louder or ignore instructions and ring the bell, I heard footsteps behind and turned. It was my chaperon.
'Well, we got here,' I said cheerfully.
'You damn near lost me at one light,' he said accusingly. 'Give me them notes.'
I handed them to him--all the evidence I had. As he unfolded them for a look I took him in. He was around my age and height, skinny but with muscles,
Curtains for Three 207
outstanding ears and a purple mole on his right If it was him I had a date with I sure had been 'They look like it,' he said, and stuffed the in a pocket. From another pocket he produced a
unlocked the door, and pushed it open. 'Follow
>
|l did so, to the stairs and up. As we ascended two s, with him in front, it would have been a cinch for i reach and take a gun off his hip if there had been I there, but there wasn't. He may have preferred a Jder holster like me. The stair steps were bare i wood, the walls had needed plaster since at least Harbor, and the smell was a mixture I wouldn't , to analyze. On the second landing he went down I to a door at the rear, opened it, and signaled Dugh with a jerk of his head, re was another man there, but still it wasn't my lyway I hoped not. It would be an overstate i say the room was furnished, but I admit there fa table, a bed, and three chairs, one of them uphol The man, who was lying on the bed, pushed ' up as we entered, and as he swung around to i feet barely reached the floor. He had shoulders | a torso like a heavyweight wrestler, and legs like aderweight jockey. His puffed eyes blinked in the . from the unshaded bulb as if he had been asleep. at him?' he demanded and yawned, ny said it was. The wrestler- jockey, W-J for , got up and went to the table, picked up a ball of cord, approached me and spoke. 'Take off your coat and sit there.' He pointed to one of the lit chairs.
lold it,' Skinny commanded him. 'I haven't ex yet.' He faced me. 'The idea is simple. This ; that's coming to see you don't want any trouble.
208 Rex Stout
He just wants to talk. So we tie you in that chair and leave you, and he comes and you have a talk, and after he leaves we come back and cut you loose and out you go. Is that plain enough?'
I grinned at him. 'It sure is, brother. It's too damn plain. What if I won't sit down? What if I wiggle when you start to tie me?'
'Then he don't come and you don't have a talk.'
'What if I walk out now?'
'Go ahead. We get paid anyhow. If you want to see this guy, there's only one way: we tie you in the chair.'
'We get more if we tie him,' W-J objected. 'Let me persuade him.'
'Lay off,' Skinny commanded him.
'I don't want any trouble either,' I stated. 'How about this? I sit in the chair and you fix the cord to look right but so I'm free to move in case of fire. There's a hundred bucks in the wallet in my breast pocket. Before you leave you help yourselves.'
'A lousy C?' W-J sneered. 'For Chrissake shut up and sit down.'
'He has his choice,' Skinny said reprovingly.
I did indeed. It was a swell illustration of how much good it does to try to consider contingencies in advance. In all our discussions that day none of us had put the question, what to do if a pair of smooks offered me my pick of being tied in a chair or going home to bed. As far as I could see, standing there looking them over, that was all there was to it, and it was too early to go home to bed.
