Rex Stout - Nero Wolfe 33 - Too Many Clients Page 5

  “I said no. There’s no argument and no time. Damn it, I’m giving you a break. The keys.”

  She opened her bag, fingered in it, took out a leather key fold, and handed it over. I unsnapped it, saw two Rabson keys, which are not like any others, displayed them to Perez, and asked if they were the keys to the door and the elevator. He took a look and said yes. Dropping them in a pocket, I pushed the button to open the elevator door and told Meg Duncan, “I’ll see you later. Half past two.”

  “Why can’t I stay until you find—”

  “Nothing doing. I’ll be too busy for company.”

  She stepped in, the door closed, the click came, and the faint sound. I turned to Perez.

  “You’ve never seen her before.”

  “No. Never.”

  “Phooey. When you brought things up at midnight?”

  “I only saw him. She could have been in the bathroom.”

  “Where’s the bathroom?”

  He pointed. “At that end.”

  I went to his wife. “When she saw you she said, ‘Thank God it’s you.’ ”

  She nodded. “I heard her. She must see me some time when she came in, in the hall or a door was open. We don’t know her. We never saw her.”

  “The things you don’t know. All right now, you two. It will take hours and will have to wait because I have things to do, but one question now.” To him: “When you put the body in the hole why did you climb in and put the tarp over it?”

  He was surprised. “But he was dead! A man dead, you cover him! I knew that thing was in there, I had seen it.”

  That was the moment that I decided that Cesar Perez had not killed Thomas G. Yeager. Possibly his wife had, but not him. If you had been there looking at him as he said that, you would have decided the same. When I had been trying to account for the tarp the simplest explanation had never occurred to me, that long ago people covered dead men to hide them from vultures, and it got to be a habit.

  “That was decent,” I said. “Too bad you didn’t wear gloves. Okay, that’s all for now. I have work to do. You heard me give that woman Nero Wolfe’s address, Six-eighteen West Thirty-fifth Street. Be there at six o’clock this afternoon, both of you. I’m your detective temporarily, but he’s the boss. You certainly need help, and after you tell him about it we’ll see. Where are Yeager’s keys? Don’t say ‘We don’t know.’ You said you took them. Where are they?”

  “I have them safe,” Mrs. Perez said.

  “Where?”

  “In a cake. I made a cake and put them in. There are twelve keys in a thing.”

  “Including the keys to the door and the elevator?”

  “Yes.”

  I considered. I was already on thin ice, and if I took possession of something that had been taken from Yeager’s body there would be no ice at all between me and suppression of evidence. No. “Don’t cut the cake,” I said, “and be darned sure nobody else does. Are you going anywhere today? Either of you?”

  “We don’t have to,” she said.

  “Then don’t. Nero Wolfe’s office at six o’clock, but I’ll see you when I come down, probably in an hour or so.”

  “You take things?”

  “I don’t know. If I do I’ll show them to you, including the cigarette case. If I take anything you think I shouldn’t, you can call in that cop from out front.”

  “We couldn’t,” Perez said.

  “He makes a joke,” she told him. She pushed the button to bring the elevator up. “This is a bad day, Cesar. There will be many bad days, and he makes a joke.” The elevator clicked at the top, she pushed another button, the door opened, and they entered and were gone.

  I moved my eyes around. At the edge of a panel of red silk at the left was a rectangular brass plate, if it wasn’t gold. I went and pulled on it, and it gave. The panel was a door. I pushed it open and stepped through, and was in the kitchen. The walls were red tile, the cupboards and shelves were yellow plastic, and the sink and appliances, including the refrigerator and electric range, were stainless steel. I opened the refrigerator door, saw a collection of various items, and closed it. I slid a cupboard door back and saw nine bottles of Dom Pérignon champagne on their sides in a plastic rack. That would do for the kitchen for now. I emerged and walked the length of the yellow carpet, surrounded by silk and skin, to the other end, where there was another brass plate, or gold, at the edge of a panel. I pushed it open and was in the bathroom. I don’t know what your taste is, but I liked it. It was all mirrors and marble, red marble with yellow streaks and splotches. The tub, big enough for two, was the same marble. Two of the mirrors were doors to cabinets, and they contained enough different cosmetic items to supply a harem.

  I returned to the silk and skin. There were no drawers anywhere, no piece of furniture that might contain pieces of paper on which someone had written something. There was nothing at the telephone stand but the phone, which was yellow, and the directory, which was in a red leather holder. But along one wall, the one across from the bed, there was no furniture for about thirty feet of its length, and the silk along the bottom, for three feet up from the floor, was in little folds like a curtain, not flat as it was everywhere else. I went and gave the silk a tug and it parted and slid along the top, and behind it were drawer fronts, of wood something like mahogany, but redder. I pulled one open. Female slippers, a dozen pairs in two neat rows, various colors and shapes and sizes. The sizes ranged from quite small to fairly large.

  I looked into only five more drawers before I went to the phone. That was enough to make it plain that Meg Duncan wasn’t the only one who had keys to the door and elevator. There was another drawer of slippers, again assorted colors and sizes, and two drawers of nighties, a mighty fine collection. It was after I unfolded eight of them and spread them on the bed for comparison, and found that they also covered a wide range in sizes, that I went to the phone and dialed a number. There was a possibility that it was tapped or there was an extension, but it was very slim, and I preferred the slight risk to going out to a booth.

  Saul Panzer, whose number I dialed, was the free-lance operative we called on when only the best would do. But what I got was the answering-service girl, who said that Mr. Panzer was out and couldn’t be reached and would I leave a message. I said no and dialed another number, Fred Durkin’s, the next best, and got him. He said he had nothing on for the day.

  “You have now,” I told him. “Pack a bag for a week. It will probably be less but could be more. Come as you are, no costumes required, but have a gun. You probably won’t use it, but have it. Come to One-fifty-six West Eighty-second Street, the basement entrance, superintendent, and push the button at the door. It will be a man or a woman, either Cuban or Puerto Rican, I’m not sure which. They speak American. Tell him or her your name and ask for me, and you’ll have the pleasure and honor of being brought to my presence. Don’t hurry. Take three minutes to pack if you want to.”

  “Eighty-second Street,” he said. “Murder. What was his name? Yeager.”

  “You read too much and you’re morbid and you jump to conclusions. Pack your bag and button your lip.” I hung up.

  Folding flimsy nighties properly is no job for a man and it takes time, but I gritted my teeth and stuck to it, because a detective is supposed to leave a place the way he found it. Them back in the drawer, I brought the elevator up, took it down, and went to an open door, the first one on the left in the hall. The Perez family was having a conference in the kitchen. Father and mother were sitting, and Maria was standing. There was more light than there had been in the front of the hall, and with that rare specimen, the more light the better. Looking at her, any man alive would have the thought, What the hell, I could wash the dishes and darn the socks myself. The beige nightie with lace around the top, medium-sized, would have fitted her fine. I made my eyes go to her parents and spoke.

  “A man will come pretty soon, tall and thick in all directions. He’ll give his name, Fred Durkin, and ask for me. S
end him up.”

  I got the expected reaction from Mrs. Perez. I had no right to tell anybody about that place, they were going to pay me, and so forth. Wishing to keep on speaking terms with our clients, I took four minutes to explain why I had to leave Fred there when I went, got her calmed down, permitted my eyes to dart another glance at Maria, took the elevator back up, and resumed on the drawers where I had left off. I won’t take time and space to list an inventory, but will merely say that everything that could be needed for such an establishment was there. I’ll only mention two details: one, that there was only one drawer of male items, and the six suits of pajamas were all the same size; and two, the drawer in which I found Meg Duncan’s cigarette case was obviously a catchall. There were three women’s handkerchiefs, used, an anonymous compact, a lady’s umbrella, a matchbook from Terry’s Pub, and other such miscellany. I had just put it all back in and was closing the drawer when I heard the click from the elevator.

  Presumably it was Fred, but possibly not, so I got the Marley out and went to the wall by the elevator door. I could hear no voices from below; the place was so thoroughly soundproofed that you could hear nothing but a faint suggestion of noise from the street traffic, and that was more felt than heard. Soon the click came again, the door opened, and Fred slipped out. He stood and swiveled his head, right and left, brought it around until he caught a glimpse of me, turned it back again, and spoke.

  “Jesus Kee-rist!”

  “Your new home,” I told him. “I do hope you’ll be happy here. The idea is, you take your pick from the pictures. Something like the Mountain Room at the Churchill with live trout and you choose the one you want for lunch. I strongly recommend the one over there sitting on a rose bush. If she can stand thorns she can stand you.”

  He put his bag down. “You know, Archie, I’ve always wondered why you didn’t marry. How long have you had it?”

  “Oh, ten years, I guess. I have others here and there around town. I’m turning this one over to you for a while. Kitchen, bathroom, TV, maid service. Like it?”

  “Good God. I’m a married man.”

  “Yeah. Too bad. I’d like to stay and explain the pictures to you, but I have to go. The point is, if a visitor comes, someone should be here to receive her. It could be a him, but more likely it would be a her. Most likely there won’t be any, but there might be. She might come at any hour, day or night. The less you know the better; just take my word for it that if she steps out of that elevator you are in a position to refuse to let her get back in, and there’s no other way out of here. Identify yourself or not, as you prefer. Ring me, and I’ll come.”

  He was frowning. “Alone with a woman, restraining her by force isn’t so good.”

  “You won’t have to touch her unless she starts it.”

  “She sticks her head out a window and yells police.”

  “Not a chance. There’s no window, and she wouldn’t want anyone to know she’s here, least of all a cop. The one thing she’ll want is to get out, and fast.”

  He was still frowning. “The hole that Yeager’s body was found in is right out front. Maybe I ought to know a little more.”

  “Not from me. Why drag in Yeager? He’s dead; I read it in the paper. If the phone rings take it and ask who it is and see what happens, but don’t say who you are. That’s the door to the kitchen.” I pointed. “There’s some fancy stuff in the refrigerator when you get hungry. The people down below are Mr. and Mrs. Cesar Perez and their daughter Maria. Did you see Maria?”

  “No.”

  “I’m going to marry her when I find time. I’ll tell Mrs. Perez to bring you up a loaf of bread, and if you have to have anything she’ll get it. She and her husband are out on a limb and they’re counting on me to get a ladder. Okay, enjoy the pictures. You couldn’t ask for a better chance to study anatomy.” I opened the elevator door.

  “What if it’s a man that comes?”

  “It won’t be. If it is, stick to the program; that’s why I told you to have a gun.”

  “What if it’s a cop?”

  “One chance in a million. Not even that. Tell him you’ve forgotten your name and he’ll have to ring me at Nero Wolfe’s office. Then I’ll know what happened.”

  “And I’ll be in the coop.”

  “Right. But not for long. We’ll have you out by Christmas easy. There’s half a pound of fresh caviar in the refrigerator, twenty dollars’ worth. Help yourself.”

  I entered the elevator. Downstairs I explained the situation to Mrs. Perez and asked her to take up a loaf of bread, and left the house. My watch said noon, on the dot, as I headed for Columbus Avenue for a taxi.

  Chapter 5

  At five minutes past one, Wolfe, at his desk, growled at me. “Your objective was to find an acceptable client, not a pair of wretches who probably killed him and another wretch who offers a reward for a cigarette case. I concede your craft, your finesse, and your gumption, and I even felicitate you, but if you have discovered the culprits, as seems probable, where do you send a bill?”

  I had reported in full, omitting only one detail, a factual description of Maria. He was quite capable of assuming, or pretending to assume, that I was prejudiced in favor of Mr. and Mrs. Perez on account of their daughter. I had described the place accurately and completely, and had even included my handling of the nightie problem. I had admitted that I had tried to get Saul Panzer (ten dollars an hour), and had got Fred Durkin instead (seven-fifty an hour) only because Saul was not available.

  “I won’t see them,” he said.

  I knew, or thought I did, where the real snag was, but I had to go easy. I nodded thoughtfully. “Of course they could have killed him,” I said, “but one will get you five that they didn’t. For the reasons I gave. His tone and his expression when he told me why he put the tarp over the body. The fact that she let the daughter come to the door when I rang the bell. If she had killed him she would have come herself. But chiefly, with him alive they were in clover. Of course he was paying them plenty. With him dead they’re not only minus a fat income, they’re in a hell of a fix, and they would have been even if I hadn’t got to them. When the executor of his estate learns that he owned that house and goes to inspect it?”

  I crossed my legs. “Naturally,” I said, “you don’t like it, I understand that. If it was just a nice place he had fixed up where he could safely spend a night now and then with his mistress, that wouldn’t be so bad, but obviously it wasn’t that. There are probably half a dozen women with keys to that door and elevator, and maybe twenty or more. I realize that you wouldn’t like to be involved with that kind of setup, but now that I have—”

  “Nonsense,” he said.

  I raised a brow. “Nonsense?”

  “Yes. A modern satyr is part man, part pig, and part jackass. He hasn’t even the charm of the roguish; he doesn’t lean gracefully against a tree with a flute in his hand. The only quality he has preserved from his Attic ancestors is his lust, and he gratifies it in dark corners or other men’s beds or hotel rooms, not in the shade of an olive tree on a sunny hillside. The preposterous blower of carnality you have described is a sorry makeshift, but at least Mr. Yeager tried. A pig and a jackass, yes, but the flute strain was in him too—as it once was in me, in my youth. No doubt he deserved to die, but I would welcome a sufficient inducement to expose his killer.”

  I suppose I was staring. “You would?”

  “Certainly. But who is likely to offer it? Granting that you have shown commendable alacrity and wit, and that you are right about Mr. and Mrs. Perez, where are we? Where is a prospective client? To whom can we disclose the existence of that preposterous bower and his connection with it? Neither his family nor his business associates, surely. They would be more likely to want it concealed than disclosed, and are we blackmailers? I concede that there is one remote possibility: who is the man who came here yesterday posing as Yeager, and why did he come?”

  I shook my head. “Sorry I can’t oblige. Have you
read my report?”

  “Yes. Manifestly he is a man with a special and educated fondness for words. He said, ‘Else there was no use coming.’ He said, ‘I can speak in assured confidence?’ He said, ‘That will suffice.’ The last two are merely noticeable, but the first is extraordinary. ‘Else’ instead of ‘or’ or ‘otherwise’? Remarkable.”

  “If you say so.”

  “I do. But also, merely talking along, he quoted from John Webster’s The Duchess of Malfi: ‘Other sins only speak; murder shrieks out.’ He quoted from John Harington’s Alcilia: ‘Treason doth never prosper.’ He quoted from Browning’s Paracelsus: ‘Measure your mind’s height by the shade it casts.’ People quote to display their erudition, but why to you? You heard him and were looking at him. Was he trying to impress you?”

  “No. He was talking, that was all.”

  “Just so. And he had sentences at the tip of his tongue from two Elizabethans and Robert Browning. Not one man in ten thousand is familiar with both Webster and Browning. He’s a pedagogue. He’s a teacher of literature.”

  “You’re not.”

  “I recognized only Webster. I looked up the others. I don’t know Harington, and Browning repels me. So he is one in ten thousand, and there are less than a thousand of him in New York. I invite a trial of your ingenuity: if he knew Yeager was dead, either because he had killed him or otherwise, why did he come here with that tarradiddle?”

  “I pass. I’ve already tried it, last night. If he had killed him, the only possibility was that he was cracked, and he wasn’t. If he hadn’t killed him but knew he was dead, the best I could do was that he wanted to call attention to that block on Eighty-second Street and that house, and to buy that I’d have to be cracked myself. An anonymous phone call to the police would have been quicker and simpler. Can you do any better?”

  “No. No one can. He did not know Yeager was dead. Then, thinking Yeager alive, what did he hope to accomplish by that masquerade? He could not assume with confidence that when Yeager failed to appear you would either telephone his house or go there, but he knew that before long, either last evening or this morning, you would communicate with him, you would learn that your caller was an impostor, and you would tell Yeager about it. With what result? Merely that Yeager would know what the impostor had told you. If he identified the impostor from your description, he would know that that man knew of his visits to the Eighty-second Street address, but I reject that. If the impostor wanted Yeager to know who knew about that house, why all the fuss of coming to you? Why not just tell him, by phone or mail or face-to-face, or even in an anonymous note? No. He knew that Yeager would not identify him from your description. He merely wanted Yeager to know that someone knew of his connection with that house, and possibly also that you and I now knew about it. So I doubt if he could or would be helpful, but all the same I would like to speak with him.”