your true objective--a disappointment, but no disaster. As it was, you struck. I am not a moralizer, but I permit myself the comment that in my experience your performance is without parallel for ruthlessness and savagery. It appears that Miss Arden was not merely no enemy of yours; she was your friend. She must have been, to join with you in your impish prank; but you needed her corpse for a tool to gratify your mortal hatred for Miss Holt. That was--'
'Her hatred for Miss Holt,' Cramer said. 'You assume that too?'
'No indeed. That is established. Miss Bram. Speaking of Gilbert Irving, you said that when he looks at Miss Holt or hears her voice he has to lean against something to keep from trembling. You didn't specify the emotion that so affects him. Is it repugnance?'
'No. It's love. He wants her.'
'Was his wife aware of it?'
'Yes. Lots of people were. You only had to see him look at her.'
'That is not true,' Irving said. 'I am merely Miss Holt's friend, that's all, and I hope she is mine.'
Judy's eyes darted at him and returned to Wolfe. 'He's only being a husband because he thinks he has to. He's being a gentleman. A gentleman doesn't betray his wife. I was wrong about you. I shouldn't have called you a fat fool. I didn't know--'
Cramer cut in, to Wolfe. 'All right, if that isn't established it can be. But it's about all that's established. There's damn little you can prove. Do you expect me to charge a woman with murder on your guess?'
You don't often hear a sergeant disagree with an inspector in public, but Purley Stebbins--no, I used the wrong word. Not hear, see. Purley didn't say a word. All he did was leave his post at Kearns' elbow and circle around Irving to stand beside Mrs. Irving, between her and Judy Bram. Probably it didn't occur to him that he was disagreeing with his superior; he merely didn't like the possibility of Mrs. Irving's getting a knife from her handbag and sticking it in Judy's ribs.
'There's nothing at all I can prove,' Wolfe said. 'I have merely exposed the naked truth; it is for you, not me, to drape it and arm it with the evidence the law requires. For that you are well
122 3 fl* Wolfe's Door
equipped; surely you need no suggestions from me; but, item, did Mrs. Irving get her car from the garage yesterday evening? What for? If to drive to a restaurant and then to a theater, in itself unlikely, where did she park it? Item, the knife. If she conceived her prank only after her husband phoned to cancel their engagement, which is highly probable, she hadn't time to contrive an elaborate and prudent plan for getting a weapon. She either bought one at a convenient shop, or she took one from her own kitchen; and if the latter her cook or maid will have missed it and can identify it. Her biggest mistake, of course, was leaving the knife in the body, even with the handle wiped clean; but she was in a hurry to leave, she was afraid blood would spurt on her, and she was confident that she would never be suspected of killing her good friend Phoebe Arden. Other items--'
Mrs. Irving was up, and as she arose her husband did too, and grabbed her arm from behind. He wasn't seizing a murderer; he was being a gentleman and stopping his wife from betraying herself. She jerked loose, but then Purley Stebbins had her other arm in his big paw.
'Take it easy,' Purley said. 'Just take it easy.'
Mira's head dropped and her hands came up to cover her face, and she started to shake. Judy Bram put a hand on her shoulder and said, 'Go right ahead, Mi, don't mind us. You've got it coming.' Waldo Kearns was sitting still, perfectly still. I got up and went to the kitchen, to the extension, and dialed the Gazette number. I thought I ought to be as good at keeping a promise as Mira had been.
XI
Yesterday I drove Mira and Judy to Idlewild, where Mira was to board a plane for Reno. Judy and I had tossed a coin to decide whether the trip would be made in the Heron sedan which Wolfe owns and I drive, or in Judy's cab, and I had won. On the way back I remarked that I supposed Kearns had agreed to accept
Method Three for Murder 123
service for a Reno divorce because now it wouldn't leave him free to marry Phoebe Arden.
'No,' Judy said. 'Because his wife was a witness in a murder trial and that wouldn't do.'
A little later I remarked that I supposed she had stopped dreaming about a lion standing on a rock about to spring at her.
'No,' she said. 'Only now I'm not sure who it is. It could even be you.'
A little later I remarked that if the state of New York carried out its program for Mrs. Irving, who was in the death house at Sing Sing, I supposed Mira would get back from Reno just in time for a wedding.
'No,' Judy said. 'They'll wait at least a year. Gil Irving will always be being a gentleman.'
Three supposes and all wrong. And still men keep on marrying women.
THE RODEO MURDER
Cal Barrow was standing at the tail end of the horse with his arm extended and his fingers wrapped around the strands of the rope that was looped over the horn of the cowboy saddle. His gray-blue eyes--as much of them as the half-closed lids left in view--were straight at me. His voice was low and easy, and noise from the group out front was coming through the open door, but I have good ears.
'Nothing to start a stampede,' he said. 'I just wanted to ask you how I go about taking some hide off a toad in this town.' To give it as it actually sounded I would have to make it, 'Ah jist wanted to ask yuh how Ah go about takin' some hide off a toad,' but that's too complicated, and from here on I'll leave the sound effects to you if you want to bother.
I was sliding my fingertips up and down on the polished stirrup strap so that observers, if any, would assume that we were discussing the saddle. 'I suppose,' I said, 'it's a two-legged toad.' Then, as a brown-haired cowgirl named Nan Karlin, in a pink silk shirt open at the throat and regulation Levis, came through the arch and headed for the door to the terrace, lifting the heels of her fancy boots to navigate the Kashan rug that had set Lily Rowan back fourteen thousand bucks, I raised my voice a little so she wouldn't have to strain her ears if she was curious.
