Grindon, Willowdale Zodiac, Hawley’s Orinoco, Mrs. Lin-
vffle’s bull whose name I don’t know, and Hickory Buckingham
Pell. Mr. Sturtevant is ready to leave at a moment’s notice.
You can accompany him, or Mr. Goodwin can, or you can
merely give him a letter.”
Bennett was frowning. “You mean the original sketches?”
“I understand no others are available. Those on certificates
are scattered among the owners.”
Bennett shook his head. “They can’t leave the files, it’s
a strict rule. They’re irreplaceable and we can’t take risks.”
“I understand. I said you can go yourself. When they come
you can sit me here at this table with them and they can be
constantly under your eye. I need only half an hour with
them, possibly less.”
“But they mustn’t leave the files. Anyhow, I can’t get
away.”
“This is the favor requested by Mr. Osgood.”
“I can’t help it. It … it isn’t reasonable.”
Wolfe leaned back and surveyed him. “One test of in-
telligence,” he said patiently, “is the ability to welcome a
singularity when the need arises, without excessive strain.
Strict rules are universal. We all have a rule not to go on the
street before clothing ourselves, but if the house is on fire
we violate it. There is a conflagration here in Crowfield—
metaphorically. People are being murdered. It should be ex-
tinguished, and the incendiary should be caught. The con-
nection between that and the sketches in your files may be
hidden to you, but not to me; for that you will have to accept
my word. It is vital, it is essential, that I see those sketches.
If you won’t produce them as a favor to Mr. Osgood, you will
do so as obligation to the community. I must see them.”
Bennett looked impressed. But he objected. “I didn’t say you
couldn’t see them. You can, anybody can, at our office. Go
there yourself.”
“Preposterous. Look at me.”
“I don’t see anything wrong with you. The airplane will
carry you all right.”
“No.” Wolfe shuddered. “It won’t. That’s another thing
you must accept my word for, that to expect me to get into
an airplane would be utterly fantastic. Confound it, you
object to violating a minor routine rule and then have the
effrontery to suggest—have you ever been up in an airplane?”
“No.”
“Then for heaven’s sake try it once. It will be an experi-
ence for you. You’ll enjoy it. I’m told that Mr. Sturtevant is
competent and trustworthy and has a good machine. Get
those sketches for me.”
That was really what decided the question, 5 minutes later—
the chance of a free airplane ride. Bennett gave in. He made
a notation of the sketches Wolfe wanted, made a couple of
phone calls, and was ready. I went with him to the landing
field; we walked because he wanted to stop at the Guernsey
cattle shed on the way. At the field we found Sturtevant, a
good-looking kid with a clean face and greasy clothes, warm-
ing up the engine of a neat little biplane painted yellow. He
said he was set and Bennett climbed in. I backed out of harm’s
way and watched them taxi across the field, and turn, and
come scooting across the grass and lift. I stood tihere until they
were up some 400 feet and headed east, and then walked
back to the exposition grounds proper, to meet Wolfe at the
Methodist tent as arranged. One rift in a gray sky was that
I was to get another crack at the fricassee, and after my
C. C. P. U. breakfast I had a place for it.
But it wasn’t a leisurely meal, for it appeared that we
had a program—that is, Wolfe had it and I was to carry it out.
After all his gab about violating rules, he kept his intact about
the prohibition of business while eating, and since he was in
a mood there wasn’t much conversation. When the pie had
been disposed of and the coffee arrived, he squirmed to a new
position on the folding chair and began to lay it out. I was
to take the car and proceed to Osgoods, and bathe and
change my clothes. Since the house would be full of funeral
guests, I was to make myself as unobtrusive as possible, and if
Osgood himself failed to catch sight of me at all, so much
the better, as I was still .under suspicion of having steered his
daughter to a rendezvous with the loathsome Pratt brat. I
was to pack our luggage and load it in the car, have the
car filled with gas and oil and whatever else it had an appetite
for, and report at the room where we had met Bennett not
later than 3 o’clock.
“Luggage?” I sipped coffee. “Poised for flight, huh?”
Wolfe sighed. “We’ll be going home. Home.”
“Any stops on the way?”
“Well stop at Mr. Pratt’s place.” He sipped. “By the way,
I’m overlooking something. Two things. Have you a memo-
randum book with you? Or a notebook?”
“I’ve got a pad. You know the kind I carry.”
“May I have it? And your pencil. It would be well to
use the kind of pencil that is carried, though I think it will
never get to microscopes. Thank you.” He frowned at the pad.
“Larger sheets would be better, but this will serve, and it
wouldn’t do to buy one in Crowfield.” He put the pad and
pencil in his pocket “The second thing, I must have a good
and reliable liar.”
“Yes, sir.” I tapped my chest.
“No, not you. Rather, in addition to you.”
“Another liar besides me. Plain or fancy?”
“Plain. But we’re limited. It must be one of the three
persons who were there when I was standing on that rock
in the pasture Monday afternoon.”
“Well.” I pursed my lips and considered. “Your friend
Dave might do for a liar. He reads poetry.”
“No. Out of the question. Not Dave.” Wolfe opened his
eyes at me. “What about Miss Rowan? She seems inclined to
friendship. Emphatically, since she visited you in Jail.”
“How the devil did you know that?”
“Not knowledge. Surmise. Your mother’s voice on the tele-
phone was hers. We’ll discuss that episode after we get home.
You must have suggested that performance to her, therefore
you must have been in communication with her. People in
jail aren’t called to the telephone, so she couldn’t have
phoned you. She must have gone to see you. Surely, if she
is as friendly as that, she would be pliant.”
“I don’t like to use my spiritual appeal for business pur-
poses.”
“Proscriptions carried too far lead to nullity,”
“After I analyze that I’ll get in touch with you. My first im-
pulse is to return it unopened.”
“Will she lie?”
“Good lord, yes. Why not?”
“It’s important. Can we count on it?”
“Yes.”
“Then another detail is for you to telephone, find her,
and make sure she will be at Mr. Pratt’s place from 3 o’clock
on. Tell her you will want to speak to her as soon as we arrive
there.” He caught the eye of a Methodist, and when she came
to his beckoning requested more coffee. Then he told me,
“It’s after 1 o’clock. Mr. Bennett is over halfway to Fern-
borough. You haven’t much time.”
I emptied my cup and left him.
The program went without a hitch, but it kept me on the
go. I phoned Pratt’s first thing, for Lily Rowan, and she
was there, so I checked that off. I warmed up the concrete out
to Osgood’s, and by going in the rear entrance and up the
back stairs avoided contact with the enraged father. I prob-
ably wouldn’t have been noticed anyway, for the place was
nearly as crowded as the exposition. There must have been a
hundred cars, which was why I had to park long before I
got to the end of the drive, and of course I had to carry the
luggage. Upstairs I caught a glimpse of Nancy, and exchanged
words with the housekeeper in the back hall downstairs, but
didn’t see Osgood. The service began at 2 o’clock, and when
I left the only sound in the big old house, coming from the
part I stayed away from, was the rise and fall of the
preacher’s voice pronouncing the last farewell for Clyde Os-
good, who had won a bet and lost one simultaneously.
At 5 minutes to 3, with clean clothes and a clean body,
not to mention the mind, with the car, filled with luggage and
the other requisites, parked conveniently near, and without
any satisfactory notion of the kind of goods Wolfe’s factory
was turning out in the line of evidence, though I had a strong
inkling of who the consignee was to be, I sought Room 9
in the exposition offices. Sturtevant had apparently made
good on his schedule, for the factory was in operation. Wolfe