I didn’t have to. At 11:25 the doorbell rang. Wolfe had come down from the plant rooms and gone to his desk, put a spray of Oncidium marshallianum in the vase, torn yesterday from his desk calendar, and gone through the mail, and was dictating a long letter to an orchid collector in Guatemala. He hates to be interrupted when he’s doing something really important, but Fritz was upstairs, so I went, and there he was on the stoop. I told Wolfe, “Jimmy Vail in person,” and went and opened the door, and he said, “Maybe you know me? I know you.” He stepped in. “You’re a hell of a good dancer.”
I told him he was too, which was true, took his coat and hat and put them on the rack, and took him to the office, and he crossed to Wolfe’s desk, stood, and said, “I know you don’t shake hands. I once offered to fight a man because he called you a panjandrum; of course I knew he was yellow. I’m Jimmy Vail. May I sit down? Preferably in the red leather chair. There it is.” He went and sat, rested his elbows on the chair arms, crossed his legs, and said, “If I belch you’ll have to pardon me. I had nothing but cold canned beans for two days and three nights, and I overdid it on the bacon and eggs. My wife has told me about hiring you. Never has so much been spent on so little. Naturally I don’t like being called my wife’s property-who would?-but I realize you had to. I only saw it when my wife showed it to me, and I don’t know whether they saw it or not. Is that important?”
You wouldn’t have thought, looking at him and listening to him, that he had just spent sixty hours in the clutches of kidnapers, living on cold beans, and maybe not long to live even on beans, but of course he had cleaned up and had a meal, and the talk I had heard had never included any suggestion that he was a softy. His face was dead white, but it always was, and smooth and neat as it always was, and his dark eyes were bright and clear.
“It would be helpful to know,” Wolfe said, “but it isn’t vital. You came to tell me that? That you don’t know?”
“Not actually.” Vail lifted a hand to the neighbourhood of his right temple and flipped his middle finger off the tip of his thumb. He had made that gesture famous during his career at the Glory Hole. “I just mentioned it because it may be important to us, my wife and me. If one of them saw that thing in the paper they know my wife has told you about it, and that may not be too good. That’s why I came and came quick. They told me to keep my trap shut for forty-eight hours, until Friday morning, and to see that my wife did too, or we would regret it. I think they meant it. I got a strong impression that they mean what they say. So my wife and I are going to keep it to ourselves until Friday morning, but what about you? You could put another notice in the paper to Mr Knapp, saying that since the property has been returned the case is closed as far as you’re concerned. That you’re no longer interested. What do you think?”
Wolfe had cocked his head and was eying him. “You’re making an unwarranted assumption. Mr Vail-that I too will keep silent until Friday morning. I told your wife that the obligation not to withhold knowledge of a major crime must sometimes bow to other considerations, for instance saving a life, but you are no longer in jeopardy. Now that I’ve seen you alive and at freedom, I cannot further postpone reporting to authority. A licensed private detective is under constraints that do not apply to the ordinary citizen. I don’t want to subject you or your wife-”
The phone rang, and I swiveled to get it. “Nero Wolfe’s office, Archie Good-”
“This is Althea Vail. Is my husband there?”
“Yes, he-”
“I want to speak to him.”
She sounded urgent. I proceeded as I did not merely out of curiosity. There was obviously going to be a collision between Wolfe and Jimmy Vail about saving it until Friday, and if that was what she was urgent about I wanted to hear it firsthand. So I told her to hold the wire, told him his wife wanted to speak to him, and beat it, to the kitchen and the extension there. As I got the receiver to my ear Mrs Vail was talking.
“… terrible has happened. A man just phoned from White Plains, Captain Saunders of the State Police, he said, and he said they found a dead body, a woman, and it’s Dinah Utley, they think it is, and they want me to come to White Plains to identify it or send someone. My God, Jimmy, could it be Dinah? How could it be Dinah?”
JIMMY: I don’t know. Maybe Archie Goodwin will know; he’s listening in on an extension. Did he say how she was killed?
ALTHEA: No. He-
JIMMY: Or where the body was found?
ALTHEA: No. He-
JIMMY: Or why they think it’s Dinah Utley?
ALTHEA: Yes, things in her bag and in the car. Her car was there. I don’t think-I don’t want to-can’t I send Emil?
JIMMY: Why not? How about it, Goodwin? Emil is the chauffeur. He can certainly tell them whether it’s Dinah Utley or not. Must my wife go? Or must I go?
It was no use pretending I wasn’t there. “No,” I said, “not just for identification. Of course if it’s Dinah Utley they’ll want to ask both of you some questions, if there’s any doubt about how she died, but for that they can come to you. For identification only, even I would do. If you want to ask Mr Wolfe to send me.”
ALTHEA: Yes! Do that, Jimmy!
JIMMY: Well… maybe… where did he say to come in White Plains?
ME: I know where to go.
ALTHEA: It must be Dinah! She didn’t come home last night and now-this is terrible-
JIMMY: Take it easy, Al. I’ll be there soon. Just take it easy and…
I cradled the phone and went back to the office. Vail was hanging up as I entered. I said to him, “Naturally I want to hear what a client of Mr Wolfe’s has to say on his phone. And naturally you knew I would.” I turned to Wolfe. “A state cop called Mrs Vail from White Plains. They have found a woman’s body, he didn’t say where, and from articles in her bag and her car they think it’s Dinah Utley. Also there must have been something that connected her with Mrs Vail, maybe just the address. He asked Mrs Vail to come to White Plains and identify her, and she doesn’t want to go, and neither does Mr Vail. I suggested that he might want to ask you to send me.”
Wolfe was scowling at Vail. He switched it to me. “Did she die by violence?”
“Mrs Vail doesn’t know. I’ve reported in full.”
“Look,” Vail said, “this is a hell of a thing.” He was standing at the corner of my desk. “Good God. This is a real shocker. I suppose I ought to go myself.”
“If it’s Miss Utley,” Wolfe said, “and if she died by violence, they’ll ask you where you were last night. That would be routine.”
“I’m not telling anyone where I was last night, not until Friday morning. Not even you.”
“Then you’ll be suspect. You and your wife should confer without delay. And if Mr Goodwin goes to identify the body and it is Miss Utley, he will be asked about his association with her, when and where he has seen her. You know she was here yesterday?”
“Yes. My wife told me. But my God, he won’t tell them about that, why she came here!”
Wolfe leaned back and shut his eyes. Vail started to say something, saw he wouldn’t be heard, and stopped. He went to the red leather chair and sat, then got up again, walked halfway to the door, turned, and came back to Wolfe’s desk and stood looking down at him.
Wolfe’s eyes opened, and he straightened up. “Archie, get Mrs Vail.”
“I’m here,” Vail said. “You can talk to me.”
“You’re not my client, Mr Vail. Your wife is.”
I was dialing. The number was in my head, where I had filed it when I looked it up Tuesday night. A female voice said, “Mrs Vail’s residence,” and I said Nero Wolfe wanted to speak with Mrs Vail. After a wait our client’s voice came, “This is Althea Vail. Mr Wolfe?” and I nodded to Wolfe and he took his phone. I stayed on, but I had to fight for it. Jimmy Vail came to take it away from me, reaching for it and getting his fingers on it, but I kept it against my ear and didn’t hear what he said because I was listening to Wolfe.