by Rex Stout
There was no doubt at all that the kidnaping was being investigated. Since Jimmy had died before telling anyone how or where he had been snatched, or where and by whom he had been kept, or where he had been released, there was no lead at all. The caretaker of the country house near Katonah had been taken apart by a dozen experts, but he had stuck to it that Vail had left in his Thunderbird shortly after eight Sunday evening to drive back to town, and had returned in the Thunderbird about half past seven Wednesday morning, tired, mad, dirty, and hungry. He had told the caretaker nothing whatever. The theory was that the kidnapers had taken the Thunderbird and kept it wherever they had kept him, and, when they turned him loose, had let him have it to drive home in, which was a perfectly good theory, since they certainly wouldn’t want to use it. It was being examined by a task force of scientists, for fingerprints, of course, and for where and how far it had been, and who and what had been in it. It was described both in the paper and on the radio, and shown on television, with the request that anyone who had seen it between Sunday evening and Wednesday morning should communicate immediately with the police, the Westchester DA, or the FBI.
Also described, but not shown on television, was the suitcase the money had been in: tan leather, 28 by 16 by 9, old and stained, scuffed a little, three brass clasps, one in the middle and one near each end. Mrs. Vail had taken it to the bank, where the money had been put in it, and the description had been supplied by the bank’s vice-president. It was the property of Jimmy Vail—or had been.
The best prospect of some kind of a lead was finding someone who had been at Fowler’s Inn or The Fatted Calf Tuesday evening and had seen one of the kidnapers. The man Mrs. Vail had given the suitcase to had had his face covered. It was assumed that a confederate had been present at both places to make sure that Mrs. Vail didn’t show anyone the notes she got from the phone books. People at both places remembered seeing Mrs. Vail, and the cashier at Fowler’s Inn had seen her go to the phone book and open it, but no one had been found who had seen anybody take a visible interest in her.
Funeral services for Jimmy Vail would be held at the Dunstan Chapel Saturday morning at eleven.
Thanks to Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin, though no one but Lon Cohen was thanking us, the murder of Dinah Utley was getting a big play both in print and on the air. Not only had her body been found at or near the spot where Mrs. Vail had delivered the suitcase, but also someone had leaked it, either in White Plains or in Manhattan, that she had been an accomplice in the kidnaping. So Cramer had bought the deduction Wolfe had made from the notes and had passed it on to Westchester, and when Ben Dykes came at eleven-thirty there would be some fancy explaining to do.
As I said, I was in the office listening to the nine-o’clock news when Saul and Fred and Orrie came down from Wolfe’s room. The kidnaping and murder items had been covered, so I switched it off and greeted them. If you wanted an operative for a tough job and were offered your pick of those three, never having seen or heard of them before, you would probably take Fred Durkin or Orrie Cather, and you would be wrong. Fred was big and broad, and looked solid and honest and was, but from the neck up he was a little too solid for situations that needed quick reactions. Orrie was tall and handsome and smart, and in any situation his reaction was speedy enough, but it might be the right reaction and it might not. Saul was small and wiry, with a long narrow face and a big nose. He always looked as if he would need a shave in another hour, he wore a cap instead of a hat, and his pants had always been pressed a week ago. But there wasn’t an agency in New York that wouldn’t have taken him on at the top figure if he hadn’t preferred to free lance, and at ten dollars an hour he was a bargain for any job you could name.
“Six hundred three ways,” Orrie said. “And I want a picture of Noel Tedder.”
“I’ll take one of Ralph Purcell,” Fred said.
“So you’re taking one apiece?” I went to the safe and squatted to twirl the knob. “The very best way to waste time and money. Foolproof. As for pictures, I only have newspaper shots.”
“I’ll get them from Lon,” Saul said. “Mr. Wolfe says your credit’s good with him.”
“It sure is.” I swung the safe door open and got the cash box. “Credit, hell. A truckload of pictures wouldn’t make a dent in what he owes us. So you’ve got Andrew Frost?”
He said he had, and added that Wolfe had said that I would be in the office to receive reports. I had known that was coming. In a tough case it’s nice to know that we have three good men on the job, even for chores as chancy as solo tailing, but the catch is that I have to sit there on the back of my lap to answer the phone and go to help if needed. I gave each of them two cees in used fives, tens, and twenties, made entries in the cash book, and supplied a few routine details, and they went. They had arrived at eight and it was then nine-thirty, so we were already out $37.50.
I was behind on the germination and blooming records, which I typed on cards from notes Wolfe brought down from the plant rooms, so after opening the mail I got the drawer from the cabinet and began entering items like “27 flks agar slp no fung sol B autoclaved 18 lbs 4/18/61.” I was fully expecting a phone call from either Noel or Margot, or possibly their mother, but none had come by eleven, when Wolfe came down. There would be no calls now, since they would all be at the funeral services.
The session with Ben Dykes, who came at 11:40, ten minutes late, which I had thought would be fairly ticklish, wasn’t bad at all. He didn’t even hint at any peril to us, as far as he was concerned, though he mentioned that Hobart was considering whether we should be summoned and charged. What he wanted was information. He had seen our signed statement, and he knew what he had told Cramer and I had told Mandel, but he wanted more. So he laid off. Though he didn’t say so, for him the point was that a kidnaper had collected half a million dollars right there in his county, and there was a chance that it was still in his county, stashed somewhere, and finding it would give him a lot of pleasure, not to mention profit If at the same time he got a line on the murderer of Dinah Utley, okay, but that wasn’t the main point. So he stayed for more than an hour, trying to find a crumb, some little thing that Mrs. Vail or Dinah Utley or Jimmy had said that might give him a trace of a scrap of a hint When, going to the hall with him to let him out, I said Westchester was his and he and his men must know their way around, he said yeah, but the problem was to keep from being jostled or tramped on by the swarms of state cops and FBI supermen.
At one o’clock the radio had nothing new, and neither had we. Saul and Fred and Orrie had phoned in. They had all gone to the funeral, which was a big help. That’s one of the fine features of tailing; wherever the subject leads you, you will follow. I once spent four hours tagging a guy up and down Fifth and Madison Avenues, using all the tricks and dodges I knew, and learned later that he had been trying to find a pair of gray suspenders with a yellow stripe.
It was one of those days. Shad roe again for lunch, this time larded with pork and baked in cream with an assortment of herbs. Every spring I get so fed up with shad roe that I wish to heaven fish would figure out some other way. Whales have. Around three o’clock, when we were back in the office, there was a development, if you don’t care what you call it. The phone rang and it was Orrie Gather. He said his and Fred’s subjects were together, so they were. He was in a booth at 54th and Lexington. Noel Tedder and Ralph Purcell had just entered a drugstore across the street. That was all. Ten seconds after I hung up it rang again. Noel Tedder. You couldn’t beat that for a thrill to make your spine tingle: Fred and Orrie across the street, eagle-eyed, and the subject talking to me on the phone. He said he had persuaded Purcell to come and talk with Wolfe and he would be here in twenty minutes. I turned and asked Wolfe, and he looked at the clock and said of course not, and I turned back to the phone.
“Sorry, Mr. Tedder, Mr. Wolfe will be—”
“I knew it! My sister!”
“Not your sister. He turned her down, and the arrangement with you
stands. But he’ll be busy from four to six. Can Mr. Purcell come at six?”
“I’ll see. Hold the wire.” In half a minute: “Yes, he’ll be there at six o’clock.”
“Good.” I hung up and swiveled. “Six o’clock. Wouldn’t it be amusing if he gives us a hot lead and Fred and I hop on it—of course Fred will tail him here and be out front—and we’re two hours late getting there and someone already has it? Just a lousy two hours.”
Wolfe grunted. “You know quite well that if I permit exceptions to my schedule I soon will have no schedule. You would see to that.”
I could have made at least a dozen comments, but what was the use? I turned to the typewriter and the cards. When he left for the plant rooms at 3:59 I turned on the radio. Nothing new. Again at five o’clock. Nothing new. When the Gazette came it had pictures of fourteen people who had been at Fowler’s Inn or The Fatted Calf Tuesday evening, which showed what a newspaper that’s on its toes can do to keep the public informed. I was back at the typewriter when the doorbell rang at 5:55. I went to the hall, saw Ralph Purcell through the one-way glass, and stepped to the door and opened it, and he said apologetically, “I guess I’m a little early,” and offered a hand. I took it. What the hell, it wouldn’t be the first murderer I had shaken hands with.
As I took his hat the elevator jolted to a stop at the bottom, the door opened, and Wolfe emerged, three minutes ahead of time because he likes to be in his chair when company comes.
Purcell went to him. “I’m Ralph Purcell, Mr. Wolfe.” He had a hand out. “I’m a great admirer of yours. I’m Mrs. Jimmy Vail’s brother.”
Of course Wolfe had to take the hand, and when he does take a hand, which is seldom, he really takes it. As we went to the office Purcell was wiggling his fingers. Wolfe told him to take the red leather chair, went to his, got his bulk arranged, and spoke.
“I assume Mr. Tedder has explained the situation to you?”
Purcell was looking at me. When I gave Wolfe a report I am supposed to include everything, and I usually do, and I had had all the time there was Thursday afternoon at Doc Vollmer’s, but I had left out an item about Purcell. I had described him, of course—round face like his sister’s, a little pudgy, going bald—but I had neglected to mention that when someone started to say something he looked at someone else. I now learned that he didn’t go so far as to look at A when he was speaking to B. His eyes went to Wolfe.
“Yes,” he said, “Noel explained it, but I’m not sure—it seems a little—”
“Perhaps I can elucidate it. What did he say?”
“He said you were going to find the money for him—the money my sister paid the kidnaper. He asked me if I remembered that my sister had told him he could have the money if he found it, and of course I did. Then it seemed to be a little confused, but maybe it was just confused in my mind. Something about you wanted to ask me some questions because you thought one of us might know something about it on account of Dinah, Dinah Utley, and I thought he said something about one of us putting something in Jimmy’s drink, but when I asked about it he said you would explain that part of it.”
So Noel had been fairly tactful after all, at least with Uncle Ralph.
Wolfe nodded. “It’s a little complicated. The best—Why do you look at Mr. Goodwin when I speak?”
As Purcell’s eyes left me a flush came to his cheeks. “It’s a habit,” he said, “a very bad habit.”
“It is indeed.”
“I know. You notice my eyes stick out?”
“Not flagrantly.
“Thank you, but they do. When I was a boy people said I stared. One person especially. She—” He stopped abruptly. In a moment he went on. “That was long ago, but that’s why I do it. I only do it when someone starts speaking. After I talk a little I’m all right. I’m all right now.”
“Then I’ll proceed.” Wolfe propped his elbows on the chair arms and joined his fingertips to make a tent. “You know that Miss Utley had a hand in the kidnaping.”
“No, sir, I don’t. I mean I don’t know it, and I guess I don’t believe it. I heard what my sister said to Mr. Goodwin and what he said to her, and that’s all I know. The reason I don’t believe it, kidnaping is so dangerous, if you get caught you don’t stand any chance, and Dinah wasn’t like that. She wasn’t one to take big chances. I know that from how she played cards. Gin. She would hang onto a card she couldn’t possibly use if she thought it might fill me. Of course everyone does that if you know it will, but she did it if she only thought it might. You see?”
Wolfe didn’t, since he never plays cards, gin or anything else, but he nodded. “But you do take chances?”
“Oh, yes, I’m a born gambler. Three times my sister has staked me to some kind of wild idea I had—no, four—and none of them panned out. I’ll bet on anything. When I have anything to bet with.”
“Life needs some seasoning,” Wolfe conceded. “As for Miss Utley, you are wrong. She was involved in the kidnaping. If I told you how that has been established to my satisfaction you would probably still be skeptical. But having come to indulge Mr. Tedder, now that you’re here you might as well indulge me. If Miss Utley was involved, at least one of the kidnapers is someone she knew, and therefore I want information about her friends and acquaintances. I suppose you know them, some of them?”
“Well.” Purcell shifted his weight in the chair. “Now, that’s funny. Dinah’s friends. Of course she had friends, she must have, but I don’t really know any. She often went out evenings, movies and shows and so on, but I don’t know who she went with. That’s funny. I thought I knew her pretty well. Of course for acquaintances, she met a lot of people—”
The phone rang. I took it and got a familiar voice. “Archie? Fred. In a booth at the corner. Do I snatch a bite and come back or do I call it a day? I’m supposed to stay on him till he goes home. How long will he be there?”
“Hold it.” I turned to Wolfe. “Fred. His subject has entered a building, a tumble-down dump that could be a den of vice. He wants instructions. Should he crash it?”
Wolfe shot me a mean glance. “Tell him to quit for the day and resume in the morning.” To Purcell: “You were saying?”
But Uncle Ralph waited until I had relayed the order, hung up, and swiveled. Good manners, even if he didn’t belong. “About Dinah’s acquaintances,” he said, “she met a lot of people there at the house, dinner guests and now and then a party, but that wouldn’t be what you want. You want a different type, someone she might use for something dangerous like kidnaping.”
“Or someone who might use her.”
Purcell shook his head. “No, sir. I don’t think Dinah would take a chance at kidnaping, but if she did she would be in charge. She would be the boss.” He lifted a hand for a gesture. “I said I’m an admirer of yours, Mr. Wolfe, and I really mean it. A great admirer. I know you’re never wrong about anything, and if you’re sure Dinah was involved you must have a good reason. I thought I knew her pretty well, and naturally I’m curious, but of course if you’re not telling anyone …”
“I have told someone.” Wolfe regarded him. “I have told the police, and it will probably soon be public knowledge, so I may as well satisfy your curiosity. Miss Utley typed the notes—the one that your sister received in the mail and the two she found in the telephone books. Indubitably.”
No perceptible reaction. You might have thought Purcell hadn’t heard. The only muscles that moved were the ones that blinked his eyelids as he kept focused on Wolfe Then he said, “Thank you for telling me. That shows I’m not as big a ninny as some people think I am. I suspected something like that when they asked me if I knew who had taken the typewriter from my sister’s study.”
“The police asked you?”
“Yes. I didn’t tell them, because I— Well, I didn’t, but I’ll tell you. I saw Dinah take it. Tuesday evening. Her car was parked in front, her own car, and I saw her take the typewriter out of the house, so she must have put it in the car.”
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“What time Tuesday evening?”
“I didn’t notice, but it was before nine o’clock. It was about an hour after my sister had left in her car with the suitcase in it.”
“How did you know the suitcase was in it?”
“I carried it out for her and put it in the trunk. I saw her with it upstairs and offered to take it. She didn’t tell me where she was going, and I didn’t ask her. I thought something was wrong, but I didn’t know what. I thought she was probably going wherever Jimmy was. He had been gone since Sunday, and I didn’t think he was at Katonah, and my sister hadn’t told us where he was.” Purcell shook his head. “So Dinah typed the notes, and so she took the typewriter. I’ve got to thank you for telling me. So you’re right about her, and I thought I knew her. You know, I was playing gin with her a week ago Thursday—no, Friday—and of course she had it all planned then. That’s hard to believe, but I guess I’ve got to believe it, and I can see why you want to know about her friends. If I could tell you I would. Is it all right to tell my sister about her typing the notes?”
“Your sister has probably already been told by the police.” Wolfe palmed the chair arms. “You haven’t been much help, Mr. Purcell, but you have been candid, and I appreciate it. Mr. Tedder should thank you, and no doubt he will. I needn’t keep you any longer.”
“But you were going to explain about someone putting something in Jimmy’s drink.”
“So I was. Wednesday evening in the library. You were there.”
“Yes.”
“You served brandy to Mr. Frost.”
“Yes, I believe I did. How did— Oh, Noel told you.”
“No, his sister told me. I had the idea of trying to get from her who could, and who could not, have drugged Mr. Vail’s drink, but abandoned it. Such an inquiry is nearly always futile; memories are too faulty and interests too tangled. The point is simple: Mr. Vail must have been drugged when he was pulled off the couch and across to the statue, therefore someone put something in his drink. That’s the explanation.”
