Cramer cussed a while. “You won’t come?”
“No.”
“Can I come there?”
“I should think not, under the circumstances. As I said, you cannot enter without a search warrant.”
“To hell with a search warrant. I’ve got to see you. I mean, come and talk with you.”
“Just to talk? You are making no reservations?”
“No. This is straight. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
“Very well.” I saw the creases in Wolfe’s cheeks unfolding. “I’ll try to restrain Mr. Goodwin.”
We hung up. Wolfe pushed the button for Fritz. I shut my notebook and tossed it to the back of the desk, and picked up the glass and took a sip of milk. Then, glancing at the clock and seeing it was midnight, I decided I had better reinforce my endurance and went to the cabinet and poured myself a modicum of bourbon. It felt favorable going down, so I took another modicum. Fritz had brought Wolfe some beer, and it was already flowing to its destiny.
I said, “Tell me where Mike Walsh is and I’ll go and wring his neck. He must have gone to the first drug store and phoned headquarters. We should have had Fred tail him.”
Wolfe shook his head. “You always dive into the nearest pool, Archie. Some day you’ll hit a rock and break your neck.”
“Yeah? What now? Wasn’t it Walsh that phoned him?”
“I have no idea. I’m not ready to dive. Possibly Mr. Cramer will furnish us a sounding. Tell Saul to go to bed and come to my room for instructions at eight o’clock.”
I went to the front room and gave Saul the program, and bade him good night, and went back to my desk again. There was a little white card lying there, fallen out of my notebook, where I had slipped it some hours before and forgotten about it. I picked it up and looked at it. Francis Horrocks.
I said, “I wonder how chummy Clara Fox got with that acquaintance she made. The young diplomat that sent her the roses. It was him that got her in to see his boss. Where do you suppose he fits in?”
“Fits in to what?”
So that was the way he felt. I waved a hand comprehensively. “Oh, life. You know, the mystery of the universe. The scheme of things.”
“I’m sure I don’t know. Ask him.”
“Egad, I shall. I just thought I’d ask you first. Don’t be so damn snooty. The fact is, I feel rotten. That Harlan Scovil that got killed was a good guy. You’d have liked him; he said no one could ever get to know a woman well enough to leave her around loose. Though I suppose you’ve changed your mind, now that there’s a woman sleeping in your bed-”
“Nonsense. My bed-”
“You own all the beds in this house except mine, don’t you? Certainly it’s your bed. Is her door locked?”
“It is. I instructed her to open it only to Fritz’s voice or yours.”
“Okay. I’m apt to wander in there any time. Is there anything you want to tell me before Cramer gets here? Such as who shot Harlan Scovil and where that thirty grand is and what will happen when they pick Mike Walsh up and he tells them all about our convention this evening? Do you realize that Walsh was here when Saul took Hilda Lindquist away? Do you realize that Walsh may be in Cramer’s office right now? Do you realize-”
“That will do, Archie. Definitely.” Wolfe sat up and poured beer. “I realize up to my capacity. As I told Mr. Walsh, I am not an alarmist, but I certainly realize that Miss Fox is in more imminent danger than any previous client I can call to mind; if not danger of losing her life, then of having it irretrievably ruined. That is why I am accepting the hazard of concealing her here. As for the murder of Harlan Scovil, a finger of my mind points straight in one direction, but that is scarcely enough for my own satisfaction and totally insufficient for the safety of Miss Fox or the demands of legal retribution. We may leam something from Mr. Cramer, though I doubt it. There are certain steps to be taken without delay. Can Orrie Cather and Johnny Keems be here at eight in the morning?”
“I’ll get them. I may have to pull Johnny off-”
“Do so. Have them here by eight if possible, and send them to my room.” He sighed. “A riot for a levee, but there’s no help for it. You will have to keep to the house. Before we retire certain arrangements regarding Miss Fox will need discussion. And by the way, the letter I dictated on behalf of our other client. Miss Lindquist, should be written and posted with a special-delivery stamp before the early-morning collection. Send Fritz out with it.”
“Then I’d better type it now, before Cramer gets here.”
“As you please.”
I turned and got the typewriter up and opened my notebook, and rattled it off. I grinned as I wrote the “Dear sir,” but the grin was bunk, because if Wolfe hadn’t told me to be democratic I would have been up a stump and probably would have had to try something like “Dearest Marquis.” From the article I had read the day before I knew where he was. Hotel Portland. Wolfe signed it, and I got Fritz and let him out the front door and waited there till he came back. The short dick was still out there.
I was back in the office but not yet on my sitter again, when the doorbell rang. I wasn’t taking any chances, since Fred had gone home and Saul was upstairs asleep. I pulled the curtain away from the glass panel to get a view of the stoop, including corners, and when I saw Cramer was there alone I opened up. He stepped in and I shut the door and bolted it and then extended a paw for his hat and coat. And it wasn’t so silly that I kept a good eye on him either, since I knew he had been enforcing the law for thirty years.
He mumbled, “Hello, son. Wolfe in the office?”
“Yeah. Walk in.”
IX
WOLFE and the inspector exchanged greetings. Cramer sat down and got out a cigar and bit off the end, and held a match to it. Wolfe got a hand up and pinched his nostrils between a thumb and a forefinger to warn the membranes of the assault that was coming. I was in my chair with my notebook on my knee, not bothering to camouflage.
Cramer said, “You know, you’re a slick son-of-a-gun. Do you know what I was trying to decide on my way over here?”
Wolfe shook his head. “I couldn’t guess.”
“I bet you couldn’t. I decided it was a toss-up. Whether you’ve got that Fox woman here and you’re playing for time or waiting for daylight to spring something, or whether you’ve sent her away for her health and you’re kidding us to make us think she’s here so we won’t start nosing for her trail. For instance, I don’t suppose it could have been this Goodwin here that phoned my office at half past eleven?”
“I shouldn’t think so. Did you, Archie?”
“No, sir. On my honor I didn’t.”
“Okay.” Cramer got smoke in his windpipe and coughed it out. “I know there’s no use trying to play poker with you, Wolfe. I quit that years ago. I’ve come to lay some cards on the table and ask you to do the same. In fact, the Commissioner says we’re not asking, we’re demanding. We’re taking no chances-”
“The Police Commissioner? Mr. Hombert?” Wolfe’s brows were up.
“Right. He was in my office when I phoned you. I told you, this is more important than you think it is. You’ve stepped into something.”
“You don’t say so.” Wolfe sighed. “I was sure to, sooner or later.”
“Oh, I’m not trying to impress you. I’ve quit that too. I’m just telling you. As I told the Commissioner, you’re tricky and you’re hard to get ahead of, but I’ve never known you to slip in the mud. By and large, and of course making allowances, you’ve always been a good citizen.”
“Thank you. Let us go on from there.”
“Right.” Cramer took a puff and knocked off ashes. “I said I’d show you some cards. First, there’s the background, I’d better mention that. You know how it is nowadays, everybody’s got it in for somebody else, and half of them have gone cuckoo. When a German ship lands here a bunch of Jews go and tear the flag off it and raise general hell. If a Wop professor that’s been kicked out of Italy tries to give a lecture a gang of Fascists haul him down and beat him up. When you try your best to feed people that haven’t got a job they turn Communist on you and start a riot. It’s even got so that when a couple of bank presidents have lunch at the White House, the servants have to search the floor for banana peels that they may have put there for the President to slip on. Everyone has gone nuts.”