The Silent Speaker (19 page)

Wolfe was drinking beer, as I observed when I stepped inside the office door merely to tell him:

'I'll be upstairs. I always like to wash my hands after I've been with certain kinds of policemen, meaning Inspector Ash, and I've-'

'Come in here. That letter and check. We'd better get that done.'

I gawked. 'What, to the NIA?'

'Yes.'

'My God, you don't mean you're actually going to send it?'

'Certainly. Didn't I tell that woman I would'Wasn't it with that understanding that she told me things?'

I sat down at my desk and regarded him piercingly. 'This,' I said sternly, 'is not being eccentric. This is plain loony. What about Operation Payroll'And where did you suddenly get a scruple'And anyway, she didn't tell you the one thing you wanted to know.' I abruptly got respectful. 'I regret to report, sir, that the checkbook is lost.'

He grunted. 'Draw the check and type the letter. At once.' He pointed to a stack of envelopes on his desk. 'Then you can go through these reports from Mr. Bascom's office. They just came by messenger.'

'But with no client-shall I phone Bascom to call it off?'

'Certainly not.'

I went to the safe for the checkbook. As I filled out the stub I remarked, 'Statistics show that forty-two and three-tenths per cent of all geniuses go crazy sooner or later.'

He had no comment. He merely drank beer and sat. Now that I was to be permitted to know what Bascom's men were doing, he wouldn't even cooperate enough to slit open the envelopes. Whatever it was it must be good, since he evidently intended to go on paying for it with his own dough. I pounded the typewriter keys in a daze. When I put the check and letter before him to be signed I said plaintively:

'Excuse me for mentioning it, but a century from Mrs. Boone would have helped. That seems to be more our speed. She said she could afford it.'

He used the blotter. 'You'd better take this to the post office. I suspect the evening collection from that box doesn't get made sometimes.'

So I had some more chauffeuring to do. It was only a ten-minute walk to the post office on Ninth Avenue and back, but I was in no mood for walking. I only like to walk when I can see some future ahead of me. Returning, I put the car in the garage, since the evening would obviously be a complete blank.

Wolfe was still in the office, outwardly perfectly normal. He glanced at me, then at the clock, and back at me.

'Sit down a moment, Archie. You'll have plenty of time to wash before dinner. Dr. Vollmer is coming to see us later, and you need some instructions.'

At least his mind was still functioning enough to send for a doctor.

DOC VOLLMER WAS DUE to arrive at ten o'clock. At five minutes to ten the stage was set, up in Wolfe's bedroom. I was in Wolfe's own chair by the reading lamp, with a magazine. Wolfe was in bed. Wolfe in bed was always a remarkable sight, accustomed to it as I was. First the low footboard, of streaky anselmo-yellowish with sweeping dark brown streaks-then the black silk coverlet, next the wide expanse of yellow pajama top, and last the flesh of the face. In my opinion Wolfe was quite aware that black and yellow are a flashy combination, and he used it deliberately just to prove that no matter how showy the scene was he could dominate it. I have often thought that I would like to see him try it with pink and green. The rest of the room-rugs and furniture and curtains-was okay, big and comfortable and all right to be in.

Doc Vollmer, admitted downstairs by Fritz and knowing his way around the house, came up the one flight alone and walked into the room, the door standing open. He was carrying his toolbox. He had a round face and round ears, and two or three years had passed since he had given up any attempt to stand with his belly in and his chest out. I told him hello and shook hands, and then he went to the bedside with a friendly greeting and his hand extended.

Wolfe twisted his neck to peer at the offered hand, grunted skeptically, and muttered, 'No, thank you. What's the ceiling on it'I don't want any.'

Standing at the footboard, I began hastily, 'I should have explained-' but Wolfe broke in, thundering at Vollmer, 'Do you want to pay two dollars a pound for butter'Fifty cents for shoestrings'A dollar for a bottle of beer'Twenty dollars for one orchid, one ordinary half-wilted Laeliocattleya'Well, confound it, answer me!' Then he quit thundering and started muttering.

Vollmer lowered himself to the edge of a chair, put his toolbox on the floor, blinked several times at Wolfe, and then at me.

I said, 'I don't know whether it's the willies or what.'

Wolfe said. 'You accuse me of getting you here under false pretenses. You accuse me of wanting to borrow money from you. Just because I ask you to lend me five dollars until the beginning of the next war, you accuse me!' He shook a warning finger in the direction of Vollmer's round astonished face. 'Let me tell you, sir, you will be next! I admit that I am finished; I am finally driven to this extremity. They have done for me; they have broken me; they are still after me.' His voice rose to thunder again. 'And you, you incomparable fool, you think to escape! Archie tells me you are masquerading as a doctor. Bah! They'll take your clothes off! They'll examine every inch of your skin, as they did mine! They'll find the mark!' He let his head fall back on the pillow, closed his eyes, and resumed muttering.

Vollmer looked at me with a gleam in his eyes and inquired, 'Who wrote his script for him?'

Managing somehow to control the muscles around my mouth, I shook my head despairingly. 'He's been like this for several hours, ever since I brought him back home.'

'Oh, he's been out of the house?'

'Yes. From three-fifteen till six o'clock. Under arrest.'

Vollmer turned to Wolfe. 'Well,' he said decisively. 'The first thing is to get some nurses. Where's the phone'Either that or take him to a hospital.'

'That's the ticket,' I agreed. 'It's urgent. We must act.'

Wolfe's eyes came open. 'Nurses?' he asked contemptuously. 'Pfui. Aren't you a physician'Don't you know a nervous breakdown when you see one?'

'Yes,' Vollmer said emphatically.

'What's the matter with it?'

'It doesn't seem to be-uh, typical.'

'Faulty observation,' Wolfe snapped. 'Or a defect in your training. Specifically, it's a persecution complex.'

'Who's doing the persecuting?'

Wolfe shut his eyes. 'I feel it coming on again. Tell him, Archie.'

I met Vollmer's gaze. 'Look, Doc, the situation is serious. As you know, he was investigating the Boone-Gunther murders for the NIA. The high command didn't like the way Inspector Cramer was handling it and booted him, and replaced him with a baboon by the name of Ash.'

'I know. It was in the evening paper.'

'Yeah. In tomorrow's evening paper you'll learn that Nero Wolfe has returned the NIA retainer and quit.'

'For God's sake, why?'

'I'm telling you. Ash's personal attitude toward Wolfe is such that he would rather slice his wrists than slash his throat because it would prolong the agony. Today he got a material witness warrant and Wolfe had to go to Centre Street, me taking him. Hombert had the warrant killed, for various reasons, but the main one was that Wolfe was working for the NIA, and if the NIA gets offended any worse than it is now it will probably fire the Mayor and everyone else and declare New York a monarchy. But. Wolfe no sooner gets home than he breaks off relations with the NIA. They'll get his letter, with check enclosed, in the morning mail. Whereupon hell will pop wide open. What the NIA will do we don't know and maybe we don't care-I should say maybe Wolfe doesn't care. But we know damn well what the cops will do. First, with Wolfe no longer sleeping with the NIA, that motive for tenderness will be gone. Second, they know that Wolfe has never yet had a murderer for a client, and they know what a job it is to pry him loose from money, especially thirty thousand bucks and up, and they will therefore deduce that one of the NIA boys is guilty, and that Wolfe knows it and knows who it is.'

'Who is it?'

I shook my head. 'I don't know, and since Wolfe's a raving lunatic you can't ask him. With that setup, it's a cinch to read the future. The wagon will be at the door ready for him, with the papers all in order, any time after ten o'clock, possibly earlier. It's a shame to disappoint them, but all I can do is meet them with another kind of paper, signed by a reputable physician, certifying that in Wolfe's present condition it would be dangerous either to move him from his bed or to permit anyone to converse with him.'

I waved a hand. 'That's how it stands. Five years ago, the time Wolfe did you a little favor when that crook-what was his name'Griffin-tried to frame you on a malpractice suit, and you told Wolfe if he ever wanted anything all he had to do was ask for it, I warned you you might regret it some day. Brother, this is the day.'

Vollmer was rubbing his chin. He didn't really look reluctant, merely thoughtful. He looked at Wolfe, saying nothing, and then returned to me and spoke:

'Naturally I have an uncontrollable itch to ask a lot of questions. This is absolutely fascinating. I suppose the questions wouldn't be answered?'

'I'm afraid not. Not by me anyhow, because I don't know the answers. You might try the patient.'

'How long will the certificate have to function?'

'I have no idea. Damn it, I tell you I'm ignorant.'

'If he's bad enough to prohibit visitors I'll have to insist on calling on him at least twice a day. And to make it good there ought to be nurses.'

'No,' I said firmly. 'I grant there ought to be, but he would run a fever. Nurses are out. As for you, call as often as you want to. I may get lonely. And make that certificate as strong as they come. Say it would kill him if anybody whose name begins with A even looked at him.'

'It will be so worded as to serve its purpose. I'll bring it over in ten minutes or so.' Vollmer stood up with his toolbox in his hand. 'I did say that time, though, that Wolfe would get anything he asked for.' He looked at Wolfe. 'It would be gratifying just to hear you ask me for something. How about it?'

Wolfe groaned. 'They come in hordes,' he said distinctly, but in a phony voice. 'In chariots with spiked wheels, waving the insolent banners of inflation! Five dollars for a pound of corned beef! Ten dollars for a squab! Sixty cents-'

'I'd better be going,' Vollmer said, and moved.

I DIDN'T GET LONELY during the two and a half days- Thursday, Friday, and part of Saturday-that the certificate worked. Newspapermen, cops, FBI's, NIA's-they all appreciated that I was holding the fort under trying circumstances and did their best to keep my mind occupied so I wouldn't fret. If ordinarily I earn twice as much as I get, which is a conservative estimate, during those sixty-some hours it was ten times as much at a minimum.

Throughout the siege Wolfe stayed put in his room, with the door locked and one of the keys in my pocket and one in Fritz's. Keeping away from the office, dining room, and kitchen for that length of time was of course a hardship, but the real sacrifice, the one that hurt, was giving up his two-a-day trips to the plant rooms. I had to bully him into it, explaining that if a surprise detachment shoved a search warrant at me I might or might not be able to get him back into bed in time, and besides, Theodore slept out, and while he was no traitor he might inadvertently spill it that his afflicted employer did not seem to be goofy among the orchids. For the same reason I refused to let Theodore come down to the bedroom for consultations. I told Wolfe Thursday or Friday, I forget which:

'You're putting on an act. Okay. Applause. Since it requires you to be out of circulation that leaves it strictly up to me and I make the rules. I am already handicapped enough by not knowing one single goddam thing about what you're up to. We had a-'

'Nonsense,' he growled. 'You know all about it. I have twenty men looking for that cylinder. Nothing can be done without that cylinder. It must be found and it will be. I simply prefer to wait here in my room instead of in jail.'

'Nuts.' I was upset because I had just spent a hot half hour with another NIA delegation down in the office. 'Why did you have to break with the NIA before you went to bed to wait'Granting that one of them did it and you know all about it, which everybody is now sure of but you'll have to show me, that was no reason to return their money in order to keep from having a murderer for a client, because you said yourself that no man was your client, the NIA was. Why in the name of God did you return their dough'And if this cylinder gag is not merely a stall, if it's really it and all the it there is, as you say, what if it never is found'What are you going to do, stay in bed the rest of your life, with Doc Vollmer renewing the certificate on a monthly basis?'

'It will be found,' he said meekly. 'It was not destroyed, it exists, and therefore it will be found.'

I stared at him suspiciously, shrugged, and beat it. When he gets meek it is absolutely no use. I went back to the office and sat and scowled at the Stenophone machine standing over in a corner. My chief reason for admitting that Wolfe really meant what he said about the cylinder was that we were paying a dollar a day rent for that machine.

Not the only reason, however. Bill Gore and twenty Bascom men were actually looking for the cylinder, no question about it. I had been instructed to read the reports before taking them up to Wolfe, and they were quite a chapter in the history of hunting. Bill Gore and another guy were working on all of Phoebe Gunther's friends and even acquaintances in Washington, and two others were doing likewise in New York. Three were flying all over the country, to places where she knew people, on the theory that she might have mailed the cylinder to one of them, though that seemed like a bum theory if, as Wolfe had said, she had wanted to have it easily accessible on short notice. His figure of a grand a day hadn't been so far out after all. One had learned that she had gone to a beauty parlor that Friday afternoon in New York, and he had turned it inside out. Three had started working on parcel rooms everywhere, but had discovered that parcel rooms were being worked by the police and the FBI, armed with authority, so they had switched to another field. They were trying to find out or guess all the routes she had taken on foot and were spending their days on the sidewalks, keeping their eyes peeled for something, anything-a window box with dirt in it, for instance-where she might have made a cache. The rest of them were trying this and that. Friday evening, to take my mind off my troubles, I tried to figure out some possible spot that they were missing. I kept at it an hour, with no result. They were certainly covering the territory.

There were unquestionably twenty-one expensive men on the cylinder chase, but what stuck in my craw was Saul Panzer. No matter what you had on the program Saul rated star billing, and he was not among the twenty-one at all. As far as I was allowed to know he was not displaying the slightest interest in any cylinder. Every couple of hours he phoned in, I didn't know from where, and I obeyed instructions to connect him with Wolfe's bedside extension and keep off the line. Also he made two personal appearances-one at breakfast time Thursday morning and one late Friday afternoon-and each time he spent a quarter of an hour alone with Wolfe and then departed. By that time I was so damn cylinder-conscious that I was inclined to suspect Saul of being engaged in equipping a factory in a Brooklyn basement so we could roll our own.

As the siege continued, my clashes with Wolfe increased both in frequency and in range. One, Thursday afternoon, concerned Inspector Cramer. Wolfe buzzed me on the house phone and told me he wished to have a telephone conversation with Cramer, so would I please dig him up. I flatly refused. My point was that no matter how bitter Cramer might be, or how intensely he might desire to spray Ash with concentrated DDT, he was still a cop, and was therefore not to be trusted with any evidence, as for instance Wolfe's voice sounding natural and making sense, that would tend to cast doubt on Doc Vollmer's certificate. Wolfe finally settled for my getting the dope on Cramer's whereabouts and availability, and that proved to be easy. Lon Cohen told me he had taken a two weeks' leave of absence, for sulking, and when I dialed the number of Cramer's home he answered the phone himself. He kept the conversation brief and to the point, and when I hung up I got Wolfe on the house phone and told him:

'Cramer's on leave of absence and is staying home licking his wounds, possibly bedridden. He wouldn't say. Anyhow, he can be reached there any time, but he is not affable. I have a notion to send Doc Vollmer to see him.'

'Good. Come up here. I'm having trouble with this window again.'

'Damn it, you stay in bed and keep away from the windows!'

One feature of the play was that I was not supposed to deny entry to any legitimate caller. That was to convey the impression that our household was not churlish, far from it, but merely stricken with misfortune. Although newspapermen and various other assorted prospectors kept me hopping, the worst nuisances were the NIA and the cops. Around ten Thursday morning Frank Thomas Erskine phoned. He wanted Wolfe but of course didn't get him. I did my best to make the situation clear, but I might as well have tried to explain to a man dying of thirst that the water was being saved to do the laundry with. Less than an hour later here they came, all six of them-the two Erskines, Winterhoff, Breslow, O'Neill, and Hattie Harding. I was courteous, took them to the office, gave them seats, and told them that a talk with Wolfe was positively not on the agenda.

They seemed to be under the impression, judging from their attitudes and tones, that I was not a fellow being but a cockroach. At times it was a little difficult to keep up with them, because they were all full of ideas and words to express them and no one acted as chairman to grant the floor and prevent overlapping. Their main gripes were, first, that it was an act of treachery and betrayal for Wolfe to return their money; second, that if he did it because he was sick he should have said so in his letter; third, that he should immediately and publicly announce his sickness in order to stop the widespread and growing rumor that he broke with the NIA because he got hold of conclusive evidence that the NIA had committed murder; fourth, that if he did have evidence of an NIA man's guilt they wanted to know who and what it was within five minutes; fifth, that they didn't believe he was sick; sixth, who was the doctor; seventh, if he was sick how soon would he be well; eighth, did I realize that in the two days and three nights that had passed since the second murder, Phoebe Gunther's, the damage to the NIA had become incalculable and irretrievable; ninth, fifty or sixty lawyers were of the opinion that Wolfe's abandoning the case without notice would vastly increase the damage and was therefore actionable; tenth, eleventh and twelfth, and so on.

Through the years I have seen a lot of sore, frantic, and distressed people in that office, but this aggregation of specimens was second to none. As far as I could see the common calamity had united them again and the danger of an indiscriminate framing bee had been averted. At one point their unanimous longing to confront Wolfe reached such proportions that Breslow, O'Neill, and young Erskine actually made for the stairs and started up, but when I yelled after them, above the uproar, that the door was locked and if they busted it in Wolfe would probably shoot them dead, they faltered, about-faced, and came back for some more of me.

I made one mistake. Like a simp I told them I would keep a continual eye on Wolfe on the chance of his having a lucid interval, and if one arrived and the doctor permitted I would notify Erskine and he could saddle up and gallop down for an interview. I should have foreseen that not only would they keep the phone humming day and night to ask how about some lucidity, but also they would take turns appearing in person, in singles, pairs, and trios, to sit in the office and wait for some. Which they did. Friday some of them were there half the time, and Saturday morning they started in again. As far as their damn money was concerned, I did at least thirty thousand dollars' worth of entertaining.

After their first visit, Thursday morning, I went up and reported in full to Wolfe, adding that I had not seen fit to inform them that he was keeping the cylinder hounds on the jog at his own expense. Wolfe only muttered:

'It doesn't matter. They'll learn it when the time comes.'

'Yeah. The scientific name for the disease you've got is acute malignant optimism.'

As for the cops, I was instructed by Wolfe to try to prevent an avalanche by volunteering information without delay, and therefore had phoned the Commissioner's office at eight-thirty Thursday morning, before any mail could have been opened up at the NIA office. Hombert hadn't arrived yet, nor had his secretary, but I described the situation to some gook and asked him to pass it on. An hour later Hombert himself called, and the conversation was almost verbatim what it would have been if I had written it down before it took place. He said he was sorry Wolfe had collapsed under the strain, and that the police official who would shortly be calling to see him would be instructed to conduct himself diplomatically and considerately. When I explained that it was doctor's orders that no one at all should see him, not even an insurance salesman, Hombert got brusque and wanted Vollmer's full name and address, which I obligingly furnished. He wanted to know if I had told the press that Wolfe was off the case, and I said no, and he said his office would attend to that to make sure they got it straight. Then he said that Wolfe's action, dropping his client, put it beyond argument that he knew the identity of the murderer, and was probably in possession of evidence against him, and since I was Wolfe's confidential assistant it was to be presumed that I shared the knowledge and the possession, and I was of course aware of the personal risk incurred by failing to communicate such information to the police immediately. I satisfied him on that point, I don't think. Anyhow I was telling the truth, and since I'm not very good at telling the truth I couldn't very well expect him to believe me.

In less than half an hour Lieutenant Rowcliffe and a detective sergeant showed up and I conducted them into the office. Rowcliffe read Doc Vollmer's certificate thoroughly, three times, and I offered to type a copy for him to take along for further study. He was keeping himself under restraint, since it was obvious that thunder and lightning would be wasted. He tried to insist that it wouldn't hurt a bit for him to tiptoe into Wolfe's room just for a compassionate look at a prostrated fellow citizen, and indeed a professional colleague, but I explained that much as the idea appealed to me I didn't dare because Doc Vollmer would never forgive me. He said he understood my position perfectly, and how about my getting wise to myself and spilling some beans'I was, I told him, fresh out of beans. He came about as close to believing me as Hombert had, but there was nothing he could do about it short of taking me downtown and using a piece of hose on me, and Rowcliffe knew me almost as well as he disliked me, so that didn't strike him as feasible.

When they departed Rowcliffe climbed in the police car and rolled away, and the sergeant began strolling up and down the sidewalk in front of the house. That was sensible. There was no point in hiring a window across the street or some similar subtlety, since they knew that we knew there would be a constant eye on our door. From there on we had a sentry out front right up to the end.

I never did understand why they didn't try quicker and harder to break it up, but I suspect it was on account of friction between Inspector Ash and the high command. Later, after it was all over, I tried to find out from Purley Stebbins what had gone on, but Purley never was willing to contribute more than a couple of grunts, probably because the Ash regime was something he wanted to erase from memory. Doc Vollmer got more of it than I did. He kept me informed when he came to pay visits to his patient. The first one, Thursday morning, I escorted him up to the bedroom, but when Wolfe started to enjoy himself by pointing a shaking finger at the wall and declaring that big black worms covered with dollar signs were crawling down from the ceiling, we both got out of there. Thereafter Vollmer never went near the patient, merely staying in the office chinning with me long enough to make it a call for the benefit of the sidewalk sentry. The police were pestering him, but he was getting a kick out of it. Thursday morning Rowcliffe had called on him right after leaving me, and that afternoon a police doctor had come to his office to get information about Wolfe on a professional level. Friday morning Ash himself had showed up, and twenty minutes with Ash had made Vollmer more enthusiastic than ever about the favor he was doing Wolfe. Later Friday afternoon another police doctor had come and had put Vollmer over some high hurdles. When Vollmer dropped in that evening he was, for the first time, not completely cocky about it.