He knows how to fit things together.” She had got completely relaxed, but now she darted a glance at me.
“What is it, just a house?” “Sure, with a room in it he uses for an office.” She shook her head. “You’ve got me wrong, Mr. Truett. I wouldn’t go into a house I’d never been in with a man I didn’t know well enough to call him by his first name.” The girl interpreted everything in terms of companionship. “You’ve got me wrong,” I assured her. “If and when I ask you to enjoy life with me it won’t be on the pretense that we’ve got work to do. I doubt if I’ll feel like it until you get this Wally Moore out of your system. That might even be why I want to go and discuss it with Mr. Wolfe.” She wasn’t stubborn. Fifteen minutes later we were down on the sidewalk, climbing into a taxi. In that quarter-hour I had signed the check, drawn the curtain again for a decent interval, and phoned Wolfe to tell him what was coming.
In the taxi she was nervous. Thinking it would be a good idea to keep her relaxed, and anyway I had drunk my half of the wine and brandy, I courteously got hold of her hand, but she pulled it away. It irritated me a little, because I felt sure that what made her balky was not the idea of discussing murder with Nero Wolfe but the prospect of entering a strange house with me. It seemed a little late in the day for a Puritan streak to show. As a result, however, my faculties resumed their normal operations, and therefore I became aware, at Forty-seventh Street and Tenth Avenue, that we had an outrider. Another taxi had stuck to our rear all the way across town, and turned south on Tenth Avenue behind us. The driver was apparently not the subtle type. Since Rosa had seen fit to build a fence between us, I said nothing about it to her.
When we turned right on Thirty-fifth Street our suffix came along. By the time we rolled to the curb in front of Wolfe’s house there wasn’t even a hyphen between us. I paid the driver from my seat, and my giving Rosa a hand out to the sidewalk, and the emergence from the other cab of a big husky male in a topcoat and a conservative felt hat, were simultaneous.
As he started toward us I addressed him, “I didn’t quite catch the name.” He snubbed me and spoke to her, coming right up to her and ignoring me entirely.
“Where are you going with this man?” Masterful as he was, it by no means withered her. “You’re getting to be a bigger fool every day, Harry,” she declared, extremely annoyed. “I’ve told you a thousand times that it’s none of your business where I go or who with!” “And I’ve told you it is and it still is.” He was towering over her. “You were going in that house with him. By God, you come with me!” He gripped her shoulder.
She squirmed, but not a panicky squirm; he was probably squeezing her flesh into her bones. With his build he could have tucked her under one arm. Grimacing from it, she appealed to me.
“Mr. Truett, this is that husband I was telling you about. He’s so big!” Implying I was helpless. So I spoke to “Listen, brother, here’s a suggestion.
We’ll only be in there three or four hours that ought to do it. You wait here on the stoop and when she comes out you can take her home.” I suppose it was badly phrased, but husbands who try to go on steering when the car is upside down in a ditch always aggravate me. He reacted immediately by letting go of her shoulder, which was a necessary preliminary to his next move, an accurate and powerful punch aimed for the middle of my face.
Ducking out of its path, my thought was that this would be simple, since he didn’t know enough about it to go for something more vulnerable and easier to get at than a face, but I was wrong. He knew plenty about it, and evidently, also thinking it would be simple, hadn’t bothered about tactics. When I merely jerked my head sideways to let the punch go by and planted a left hook with my weight behind it just below the crotch of his ribs, thereby informing him that I knew the alphabet, he became a different man.
Within a minute he had landed on my body three times and underneath my jaw once, and I had become aware that, with his extra fifteen or twenty pounds, he had the advantage in every way but one: he was mad and I wasn’t. Believing as I do in advantages, so long as you don’t do anything you aren’t willing to have done back at you, I carefully chose moments to use a little precious breath on remarks.
When he missed with a right swing and had to dance back a step to recover I told him, “Three hours with her…seems like three minutes…huh?” When I sneaked in a swift short punch and had the other one coming up and he had to clinch, I muttered, “In a month or so I’ll be through with her anyway.” At one point, just after he had jolted me good with a solid one over the heart, I thought he was doing some conversing himself. I distinctly heard a voice say, “You might as well pay me now. He shouldn’t try to talk. You can’t talk and fight both.” Then I realized at the edge of my mind that it wasn’t him. The taxi drivers were leaning against the fender of the cab I had paid for, enjoying a free show. I resented that, and, knowing I was in no position to resent anything, shoved it out of the way. The husband apparently had oversize lungs. With no gong to announce intermissions I was beginning to wish I had learned to breathe through my ears, but he didn’t even his mouth open. He just kept coming. I told him, “Even if you put me to sleep…I’ll wake up again…and so will she…not three hours…three days and nights…and it’ll be worth it…” With his right he started a haymaker for my head, practically putting his left in his pocket. He had done that once before, and I had been a tenth of a second too slow. My best punch is a right to the body, the kidney spot, turning my whole weight behind it exactly as if I meant to spin clear on around. When the timing and distance are just right it’s as good as I’ve got. That one clicked.
He didn’t go down, but it softened the springs in his legs, and for an instant his arms were paralyzed. I was on him, in close, sawing with both elbows, my face not six inches from his, and when I saw he was really on the way and perfectly safe for two full seconds, I backed out a little and let him have two more kidney punches. The second one was a little high because he had started down.
I stood over him with my fists still tight and became aware that I was trembling from head to foot and there was nothing I could do about it. I heard the voice of one of the taxi drivers: “Boy, Oh boy. Pretty as a picture! I felt them last two myself.” I looked around. That block was never much populated, and at that time of day was deserted. We hadn’t done any yelping or bellowing. Not a soul was in sight except the two drivers.
“Where’s the lady?” I asked.
“She beat it like a streak when he slammed you up against my car.” He aimed a thumb west. “That way. And I don’t want no argument with you. What the hell, Mac, you’re good enough for the Garden!” I was still trying to catch up on my breathing. The husband rose to an elbow and was evidently on his way up. I spoke to him.
“You goddam married wife-chaser, the second you’re on your feet you get more of the same, or even on one foot. Do you know who lives in this house? Nero Wolfe.
I was taking her to see him on business. Now she’s gone, and damned if I’m going in with nothing, so I’ll take you. Besides, you ought to get brushed off and drink a cup of tea.” He was sitting up, looking the way I felt. “Is that straight?” he demanded. “You were bringing her here to see Nero Wolfe?” “Yes.” Then I’m sorry. I apologize.” He scrambled to his feet. “When it comes to her I don’t stop to think. I could use a drink and I don’t mean tea, and I’d like to take a look in a mirror.” “Then up that stoop. I know where there’s a mirror. Your hat’s there in the gutter.” One of the drivers handed it to him. I followed him up the seven steps and let us in with my key. We hung our things in the hall, and I steered him on to the office. Wolfe was there behind his desk. He took the husband in with a swift glance, then transferred it to me and demanded: “What the devil are you up to now? Is this the young woman who dined with you?” “No, sir,” I said. I was feeling battered but self-satisfied, and I had my breath back. “This is her husband, Mr. Harold Anthony from the financial district, a college man. He tailed her from her office, and tailed her and me clear here, and he thought I was bringing her as a plaything for you. Evidently he knows your reputation. He aimed for my face and missed, on the sidewalk out in front. He has taken lessons and it took me ten minutes or more to nail him, which I did with three kidney punches. He was down flat. Is that correct, Mr.