be sure of your forgetting until certain difficulties have
ended.”
“That’s pretty vague. Get your clothes on and we’ll
see.” I picked up the phone and dialed, and he started
toward me. I showed the gun, but he kept coming,
saying something, and I dropped the phone and moved
to meet him, and damned if he didn’t swerve around me
and dart for the phone. I had intended to tap him with
the gun, not caring for bruised knuckles, but his swerve
got him on the wrong side, so I took him from behind,
with my left arm hooked under his chin and my hip at
his rump, and levered him up and over. He landed on his
hands and knees nine feet away. I said, “Cut out the
horseplay and put your pants on,” and went to the
phone and dialed. After nine buzzes Wolfe’s voice came.
“Yes?”
“Me. Could we use fifty grand?”
A grunt. “In the box?”
“No. I haven’t got it yet. I’m in Hazen’s bedroom.
There are four people with me, two men and two
women, lined up against the wall. The four that came to
dinner last night. They were in this room looking for
something and hadn’t found it. Perdis just off—”
“One of them has Hazen’s key.”
“No. I had them strip and went through their clothes.
They say the maid let them in. She’s not here; of course
they greased her. Perdis just offered me fifty grand to
go away and forget I was here. I’ll split it with you. He
would probably double it.”
106 Rex Stout
“Pfui. Are you intact?”
“Sure. I’m calling just to tell you to expect us, say in
half an hour, maybe less.”
Silence. He would have to work, not tomorrow, but
now—and two women. Then: “I suppose I must,” and
he hung up.
Perdis had joined the others at the wall. As I cradled
the phone he spoke. “We will double it. One hundred
thousand dollars.”
“Skip it.” I moved to the foot of the bed. “What would
I tell my wife if I had one? You heard me tell Nero
Wolfe to expect us in half an hour, but you have a choice.
You can leave and go your ways and try to forget you
were here, and I’ll phone Inspector Cramer and report
this incident, omitting nothing. Or you can come and
talk it over with Nero Wolfe, and he may or may not
care to bother Cramer about it. You may have two
minutes to consider it.” I looked at my wrist.
“Listen, Mr. Goodwin,” Anne Talbot said. She had
her clothes on, and with or without them she was highly
ornamental. “We were looking for something that be-
longs to us. We’re not thieves. We’re respectable—”
I cut her off. “Sorry, but don’t waste it on me. I just
run errands. It’s either Nero Wolfe or the police. If you
pick Nero Wolfe there will be a slight delay because I
have a little chore to do in this room. You will take your
things and go downstairs and on out, and get two taxis.
You will get into one of the taxis and wait there in front
of the house, and have the other one there for me. I’ll be
down soon, probably in a couple of minutes. There’s one
complication: if you split and one or two of you prefer to
go somewhere else, I’ll phone the police immediately. I
would rather not, but I’d have to.”
Two of them, Perdis and Mrs. Oliver, started to
speak, but I shut them off and moved away from the
bed. Anne Talbot went to the bed and got her coat, and
Khoury went and held it for her, and then got his own.
Anne Talbot said to Perdis and Mrs. Oliver, “Is there
any alternative?” Perdis went and got Mrs. Oliver’s
The Homicide Trinity 107
coat and took it to her, and she went to the bed for her
bag.
Perdis was the last one out. When he had started
down the stairs I shut the door, put a chair against it,
went to the chest of drawers, a big heavy piece at the
left wall, and took out the bottom drawer. There was a
folded blanket in it. I squatted at the opening. The
board that the drawer slid on, solid, not a plywood
panel, was flush and snugly fitted, no play to it. I tried
to get its edge with my thumbnails; nothing doing. I got
out my pocketknife, stuck the point of the blade in the
crack at the center, just barely in, pried gently, and up
it came. The front edge of the board was beveled. Very
neat. I put my hand in, felt metal, got a finger under,
and here came the box. It was steel, anything but
flimsy, twelve inches by six and about two inches deep,
and weighed a good four pounds, with a lock not to be
opened with a nail file. I shook it and heard no move-
ment, which didn’t prove anything. With the board
down, I replaced the drawer, moved the chair away
from the door and opened it, and went to the head of the
stairs. No sound of voices from below. If I had gone
down and joined them in the hall carrying a steel box
which I must have found in Hazen’s room they would
have made quite a party of it. I descended a flight, stood
to listen half a minute, and went on down. They had
turned on the light in the lower hall. My hat and coat
were there on the floor. I put the Marley in the holster,
put on the hat and coat, slipped the box under the coat,
with my hand in my pocket holding it, turned out the
light, and opened the door.
They had followed instructions to a T. Two taxis
were there, and they were in the one in the rear, all four
of them. After glancing in I told the driver to follow my
taxi, went and got in and gave the driver the address,
and we rolled.
Chapter 6
When you mount the seven steps to the stoop
and enter the hall of the old brownstone on
West 35th Street, the first door on your left is
to what we call the front room, with the office door
farther along on that side. The walls and doors of the
front room and office are soundproofed. After convoy-
ing the company to the front room and telling them they
wouldn’t have to wait long, I returned to the hall, put
my hat and coat on the rack, proceeded to the office, and
put the box on Wolfe’s desk pad.
“Good timing,” I said. “In another hour or two they
would probably have found it.”
He reached to pass his fingertips along its edge. “You
haven’t opened it.”
“No. It’s a good lock. They’re in the front room, all
four. I gave them their pick, you or the cops, and they
preferred you. There’s nothing to add to what I told you
on the phone. Before I open it I want to register a guess.
Not that it’s what Hazen had on them, that’s a cinch. My
guess is specifically what he had on Mrs. Oliver. She
murdered her husband. Wait till you see her.”
He made a face. “This will be distasteful. Bring
keys.”
I went to the cabinet at the far wall, opened a drawer,
and made selections. Although I couldn’t qualify on the
witness stand as a lock expert, I know a Hotchkiss from
a Euler, and I can open your suitcase with a paper clip if
you’ll be patient. Moving the box to my desk, I sat and
started in. I had selected four types, little boxes of
assortments. In three minutes I eliminated the first
type, and in another three the second one. The third
The Homicide Trinity 109
seemed more promising, and I was getting hot when
Wolfe growled, “Get a hammer and screwdriver.”
As he spoke it clicked and I had it. I raised the lid. The
box was empty. I upended it for Wolfe to see. “Yeah,” I
said. “It sure is distasteful.”
He took in air, about a bushel, and let it out again.
“It’s just as well. It would probably have presented us
with a problem. More than one. I presume he decided it
was a mistake to tell his wife of it and removed the
contents. Elsewhere in the house?”
“I doubt it.”
“So do I.” He leaned back, closed his eyes, and pushed
his lips out. In a moment he pulled them in, and then out
and in, out and in. He was working. A minute passed,
two minutes, three. … He opened his eyes and
straightened up. “Lock the box and leave it on your
desk. Put the keys away. Have a gun in your hand when