expect to win the bet only with your assistance.'
McMillan stared, with his heavy brows down. 'Now,' he said finally, 'I don't think you want to start talking like that. Not to me. I don't believe so.'
'Oh yes I do,' Wolfe assured him. 'It's my one form of prowess. I do talk. But I mean no offense, I'm speaking only of Clyde's expectations. I must account for his expecting to win that bet before I can approach the murder at all. I have con- sidered, thoroughly, all the possible schemes, as well as the impossible, he might have had in mind, and there is one which appears neat, not too atrocious, and practicable though perhaps difficult. I have said he couldn't have expected simply to remove the bull from the pasture, because he couldn't have hid him from the resulting search. But why couldn't he re- move Caesar and put another bull in his place?'
The stockman snorted. 'A good grade Holstein maybe.'
'No. Humor me, sir. Take my question as serious and answer it. Why couldn't he?'
'Because he couldn't.'
'But why not? There were, I don't know how many, Guernsey bulls at the exposition, only seventeen miles away, and cattle trucks there to haul them in. There were some much closer, here at his father's place, within leading distance. Might not one of them, though vastly inferior to the champion Caesar in the finer qualities which I don't know about, re- semble him sufficiently in size and coloring to pass as a substitute? A substitute for only one day, since the butcher was to come on Wednesday? Who would have known the difference?'
McMillan snorted again. 'I would.'
'Granted. You could have mistaken no other bull for your Caesar. But everyone else might easily have been fooled. At the very least there was an excellent sporting chance of it. It is obvious at what point such a scheme might have entered Clyde's mind. Yesterday afternoon he was sitting on the pasture fence, looking at Hickory Caesar Grindon through his binoculars. It occurred to him that there was a bull of similar general appearance, size and markings, either in his father's herd or among the collection at the exposition, which he had just come from; and that accidental reflection blossomed into an idea. Chased away from the pasture, he went to the house and made the wager with Mr. Pratt. Followed from the terrace to his car by you, he called you aside and made a proposal.'
Wolfe sighed. 'At least he might have. Let's say his pro- posal was that he should, with your consent, remove Caesar and put another bull in his place. He would take Caesar to the Osgood barns. You would, during Tuesday, help to guard the substitute so that no one who would be at all likely to notice the deception would be permitted to approach too closely. With the substitute once butchered, on Wednes- day, the danger would of course be over. On Thursday Mr. Pratt and his guests, with trumpets of publicity, would eat the barbecued bull. On Sunday, with the week expired, Clyde would present Mr. Pratt with irrefutable evidence that it was not Caesar who had been sacrificed and that he had therefore won the bet. Mr. Pratt would of course ex- plode with rage, but in the end he would have to compose himself and admit his helplessness and pay the $10,000, for if the facts were made public the roar of laughter would obliter- ate him. Customers in a pratteria would say, 'Do you suppose this is really beef? It may be woodchuck.' Mr. Pratt would have to pay and keep his mouth shut. He couldn't even take Caesar back, for what would he do with him? Clyde Osgood would get the $10,000, and doubtless a part of his pro- posal would be that you would get Caesar. I don't know how that would work out, since officially Caesar would be dead but there might be a way around that difficulty, and as a minimum benefit you could breed his exceptional qualities into your herd.'
Wolfe intertwined his fingers at his abdominal peak. 'That, of course, is merely the outline of the proposal. Clyde had probably developed it in detail, including the time and manner of shuffling the bulls. The most auspicious time for that would have been after 1 o'clock, when you would be the one on guard, but you might have refused to involve your- self to that extent; and therefore one possibility is that the shuffling was set for earlier and had actually taken place. Caesar may be alive at this moment. The bull who died of anthrax may have been only a substitute. I offer that only as a conjecture; obviously it is tenable only on the supposition that you agreed to Clyde's proposal and entered into his scheme… and you know more about that than I do. But leaving that entirely aside, what do you think of the scheme itself? Do you detect any flaws?'
McMillan was eying him with a grim smile. He said calmly, 'You're slick, aren't you?'
'Moderately.' White's eyes closed and came half open again. 'But don't make the mistake of supposing that I'm trying to waylay you. I may be passably slick, but my favorite weapon is candor. Here is my position, sir. I can account satis- factorily for Clyde's expectation of winning that bet only by assuming that he concocted such plan as I have outlined. If he did so, you either acceded or refused. In either case, I would like to know what he said. Don't think I am in- sulting you by reckoning that you might have withheld facts from Mr. Waddell. I would myself be reluctant to trust him with a fact of any delicacy. I appeal to you, did Clyde make you a proposal, and did you accept or decline?'
McMillan still wore the grim smile. 'You're slick all right. Maybe the next thing is, did I murder him? Maybe I murdered him because he insulted me?'
'Tm never facetious about murder. Besides, I haven't got to the murder yet. I need first to justify Clyde's optimism about his bet, and establish what he came here to do or whom to see. Did he make you a proposal?'
'No.' McMillan abruptly stood up.
Wolfe lifted his brows. 'Going?'
I don't see much point in staying. I came as a favor to Fred Osgood.'
'And as a favor to him, you have no information at all that might help? Nothing that might explain-'
'No. I can't explain a damn thing.' The stockman took three heavy steps and turned. 'Neither can you,' he declared, 'by trying to smear any of the mess on me.'
He strode to the door and opened it, and it closed after him.
Wolfe sighed, shut his eyes, and sat. I stood and looked at him a minute, detecting none of the subtle signs of glee or triumph on his map, and then treated myself to a healthy sigh and got busy with the trays. Not being sure whether a maid was supposed to be available at 10 o'clock at night, and not liking to dump the trays in the hall, I got them perched on my arms and sought the back stairs. That was a blunder, because the stairs were a little narrow and I nearly got stuck on a turn. But I navigated to the kitchen without disaster, unloaded, and proceeded via the pantry and dining room to the main hall. There was a light in the library, and through the open door I saw Howard Bronson reading a newspaper. No one else was visible, and I completed the circuit back. to Wolfe's room by way of the main stair.
