Too Many Clients

by Rex Stout

  "May I speak with Mr. Yeager?" "He's not available at the moment. Who is this, please?" I hung up. Not only did I know the voice of Sergeant Purley Stebbins of Homicide West, but also it was I who some years back had informed him that when one answers the phone at the home of the John Does one says not "Mr. Doe's residence" but "Mrs. Doe's residence." So I hung up, departed, signed to Al Goller to stay put, walked to the corner of 68th Street and turned right, and proceeded far enough to see that the dick behind the wheel of the PD car double-parked in front of Number 340 was the one who usually drove Stebbins. Whirling, I went back the way I had come, to the lunchroom and the phone booth, dialed the number of the Gazette, asked for Lon Cohen, and got him. My intention was to ask him if he had heard of any interesting murders recently, but I didn't get to. His voice came. "Archie?" "Right. Have you--" "How the hell did you know Thomas G. Yeager was going to be murdered when you called me three hours ago?" "I didn't. I don't. I merely--" "Balls. But I appreciate it. Thanks for a pageone box. NERO WOLFE SCOOPS THE COPS AGAIN. I'm writing it now: 'Nero Wolfe, private eye extraordinary, was plunging into the Yeager murder case more than two hours before the body was discovered in an excavation on West Eighty-second Too Many Clients 13 Street. At five-five p.m. his lackey, Archie Goodwin, phoned the Gazette office to get--'" "You'll eat it. The whole world knows I'm not a lackey, I'm a flunky, and the idea of Nero Wolfe plunging. Besides, this is the first time I've phoned you for a month. If someone called and imitated my voice it was probably the murderer, and if you had been smart enough to keep him on while you had the call traced you might have--" "Okay. Start over. When can you give me something?"

  "When I have something to give. I always do, don't I? Pretend I didn't know Yeager had been murdered until you told me. Where is the excavation on West Eighty-second Street?" "Between Columbus and Amsterdam." "When was the body found?" "Ten after seven. Fifty minutes ago. Under a tarp at the bottom of a hole dug by Con Edison. Boys climbed in to retrieve a ball that had rolled in." I took a second. 'The body must have rolled in since five o'clock; that's when Con Ed men usually quit if it's not an emergency. Didn't anyone see it roll in and pull the tarp over it?" "How do I know? We got it only half an hour ago." "How sure is the identification?" "Positive. One of the men we sent knew him. He phoned just five minutes ago." "How do you know he was murdered?" "That's not official yet, but there's a hole in the side of his head that he didn't make with his finger. Look, Archie. His file from the morgue was here on my desk when the flash came. Within an hour 14 Rex Stout everybody here will know that I sent for it two hours in advance. I don't mind being mysterious, but it could be a nuisance if this gets big. So I mention that I sent for the file because of a call from you, and someone who likes to do favors mentions it to someone at Homicide, and then?" "Then I cooperate with the cops as usual. I'll be there in twenty minutes." "Fine. It'll be a pleasure to see you." I went out to the sidewalk, got into Al's cab, and told him to roll around the corner to Mike. As he pulled away from the curb he said his instructions were to accept only a passenger who told him he needed a shave, and I told him all right, he needed a shave. There was no space at the curb on 67th Street near Mike, so we stopped alongside, and I got out and stood between the two cabs, at the open front windows. "The party's off," I told them. "Circumstances beyond my control. I mentioned no figure to you because of unknown factors, such as how long it would take, but since you have only had to sit around a while, maybe twenty apiece would be enough. What do you think?" Mike said, "Yeah," and Al said, "Sure. What happened?" I got out my wallet and took out six twenties. "So we'll make it three times that," I said, "because you are not dumb. I haven't told you the name of the client, but I described him, and you know he was coming from around the corner on Sixty-eighth Street, and he was going to West Eighty-second Street. So when you read in the paper tomorrow about a man named Thomas G. Yeager who lived at Three-forty East Sixty-eighth Street, that his body Too Many Clients 15 was found at seven-ten this evening in a hole on West Eighty-second Street, with a hole in his head, you will wonder. When a man wonders about something, he likes to talk about it. So here's sixty bucks apiece. What I want is a chance to satisfy my curiosity without being bothered by cops wanting to know why I arranged this setup. Why the hell did he go on his own instead of sticking to our program? I will add that he didn't say or hint that he expected or feared any violence; he only wanted to find out if he was being tailed, and if so he wanted the tail pulled off and identified if possible. That's what I told you and that's how it was. I haven't the faintest idea who killed him or why. You know all I know. I would just as soon have nobody else know it until I look around a little. You guys have known me-- how long?" "Five years," Mike said. "Eight years," Al said. "How did you find out he got it? If his body was found only an hour ago--" "When I rang his house I recognized the voice that answered, a Homicide sergeant, Purley Stebbins. When I went around the corner I recognized the driver of a PD car parked in front of Number Three-forty. When I phoned a newspaperman I know and asked for news I got it. I am saving nothing; you have it all. Here's your sixty bucks." Al reached to get a corner of one twenty with a finger and a thumb and slipped it out. "This'll do," he said. "This is enough for my time, and keeping my lip buttoned is just personal. I'll enjoy it. Every cop I see I can think, You bastard, what I know and you don't." Mike, grinning, took his three twenties. "I'm different," he said. "Just as apt as not I'd tell 16 Rex Stout everybody in reach, including cops, but now I can't because I'd have to give your forty bucks back. I may not be noble but I'm honest." He put the bills in a pocket and extended a paw. "But we'd better shake on it just to be sure." We shook, and I got back into Al's cab and told him to take me to the Gazette building. If Lon Cohen had a title, I didn't know what it was and I doubt if he did. Just his name was on the door of the little room on the twentieth floor, two doors down from the corner office of the publisher, and in that situation you would think he would be out of the dust stirred up by the daily whirlwind of a newspaper, but he always seemed to be up, not only on what had just happened but on what was just going to happen. We kept no account of how we stood on give and take over the years, but it pretty well evened up. He was very dark�dark skin stretched tight over his neat little face, dark brown deep-set eyes, hair almost black, slicked back and up over his sloping dome. He was next to the best of the poker players I occasionally spent a night with, the best being Saul Panzer, whom you will meet later. When I entered the little room that Monday evening he was on the phone, and I took the chair at the end of his desk and sat and listened. It went on for minutes, and all he said was "No" nine times. When he hung up I said, "Just a yes man." "I have to make a call," he said. "Here, pass the time." He picked up a cardboard folder and handed it to me and returned to the phone. It was the file on Thomas G. Yeager. Not bulky�a dozen or so newspaper clippings, four typewritten memos, tear sheets of an article in a Too Many Clients 17 trade journal, Plastics Today, and three photographs. Two of the photographs were studio jobs with his name typed at the bottom, and one was of a gathering in the Churchill ballroom, with a typed caption pasted on: "Thomas G. Yeager speaking at the banquet of the National Plastics Association, Churchill Hotel, New York City, October 19, 1958." He was at the mike on the stage with his arm raised for a gesture. I read the memos and glanced through the clippings, and was looking over the article when Lon finished at the phone and turned. "All right, give," he demanded. I closed the folder and put it on the desk. "I came," I said, "to make a deal, but first you should know something. I have never seen Thomas G. Yeager or spoken with him or had any communication from him, and neither has Mr. Wolfe. I know absolutely nothing about him except what you told me on the phone and what I just read in that folder." Lon was smiling. "Okay for the record. Now just between you and me." "The same, believe it or not. But I heard something just before I phoned you at five o'clock that made me curious about him. For the time being I would prefer to keep what I heard to myself--for at least twenty-four hours
and maybe longer. I expect to be busy and I don't want to spend tomorrow at the DA's office. So it's not necessary for anyone to know that I rang you this afternoon to ask about Yeager." "It may be desirable. For me. I sent for his file. If I say I dreamed something was going to happen to him people might talk." I grinned at him. "Come off it. You haven't even 18 Rex Stout got a pair. You can say anything you damn please. You can say someone told you something off the record and you're hanging on to it. Besides, I'm offering a deal. If you'll forget about my curiosity about Yeager until further notice, I'll put you on my Christmas card list. This year it will be an abstract painting in twenty colors and the message will be 'We want to share with you this picture of us bathing the dog, greetings of the season from Archie and Mehitabel and the children.'" "You haven't got a Mehitabel or any children." "Sure, that's why it will be abstract." He eyed me. "You could give me something not for quotation. Or something to hold until you're ready to let go." "No. Not now. If and when, I know your number."

  "As usual." He raised his hands, palms up. "I have things to do. Drop in some day." His phone rang, and he turned to it, and I went. On my way to the elevator and going down, I looked it over. I had told Wolfe I would be back before bedtime, but it was only nine o'clock. I was hungry. I could go to a soda counter for a bite and decide how to proceed while I bit, but the trouble was that I knew darned well what I wanted to do, and it might take all night. Besides, although it was understood that when I was out on an errand I would be guided by intelligence and experience, as Wolfe had put it, it was also understood that if things got complicated I would phone. And the phone was no good for this, not only because he hated talking on the phone about anything whatever, but also because it had to be handled just right or he would refuse to play. So I flagged a taxi and Too Many Clients 19 gave the driver the address of the old brownstone on West 35th Street. Arriving, I mounted the seven steps to the stoop and pushed the bell button. My key isn't enough when the chain bolt is on, as it usually is when I'm out. When Fritz opened the door and I entered, he tried not to look a question at me but couldn't keep it out of his eyes�the same question he hadn't asked that afternoon: Did we have a client? I told him it was still possible, and I was empty, and could he spare a hunk of bread and a glass of milk? He said but of course, he would bring it, and I went to the office. Wolfe was at his desk with a book, leaning back in the only chair in the world that he can sit down in without making a face, made to order by his design and under his supervision. The reading light in the wall above and behind his left shoulder was the only one on in the room, and like that, with the light at that angle, he looks even bigger than he is. Like a mountain with the sun rising behind it. As I entered and flipped the wall switch to cut him down to size, he spoke. He said, "Umph." As I crossed to my desk he asked, "Have you eaten?" "No." I sat. "Fritz is bringing something." "Bringing?" Surprise with a touch of annoyance. Ordinarily, when an errand has made me miss a meal and I come home hungry, I go to the kitchen to eat. The exceptions are when I have something to report that shouldn't wait, and when he is settled down for the evening with a book he is in no mood to listen to a report, no matter what. I nodded. "I have something on my chest." His lips tightened. The book, a big thick one, 20 Rex Stout was spread open, held with both hands. He closed it on a finger to keep his place, heaved a sigh, and demanded, "What?" I decided it was useless to try circling around. With him you have to fit the tactics to the atmosphere. "That slip I put on your desk," I said. "The bank balance after drawing those checks. The June tax payment will be due in thirty-seven days. Of course we could file an amended declaration if someone doesn't turn up with a major problem and a retainer to match." He was scowling at me. "Must you harp on the obvious?" "I'm not harping. I haven't mentioned it for three days. I refer to it now because I would like to have permission to take a stab at digging up a client instead of sitting here on my fanny waiting for one to turn up. I'm getting calluses on my rump." "And your modus? A sandwich board?" "No, sir. I have a possible target, just barely possible. About that man who came to hire me to spot a tail, Thomas G. Yeager. I got two cabs and had them waiting at seven o'clock, one for him to take and one for me to follow in. He didn't show up. I got tired waiting and rang his house, and Purley Stebbins answered the phone. I went around a corner and there was a car with Purley's driver in it, in front of Yeager's house. I rang Lon Cohen and he wanted to know why I had phoned him to ask about Thomas G. Yeager two hours before Yeager's body was found in a hole on West Eighty-second Street. With a hole in his head. So our client was gone, but it occurred to me that his going might possibly get us another one. He was a big shot in his field, with a big title and a nice house in a nice Too Many Clients 21 neighborhood, and it could be that no one but me knew of his suspicion that he was being tailed or was going to be. Also the address that he thought he was going to be tailed to was One-fifty-six West Eighty-second Street, and it was in that block on that street that his body had been found. So I spent some of your money. Besides paying the two hackies for their time, I gave them an extra forty bucks to forget where they had been--that is, I gave it to Mike Collins. Al Goller preferred to do his forgetting for personal reasons." Wolfe grunted. "Your initiative. They may already have the murderer." "Then you're out forty dollars in addition to the fifty-three dollars and sixty cents spent on behalf of a client from whom we won't collect because he's dead. But it's not as simple as that. Actually our client is not dead. Or, putting it another way, we didn't have a client. On my way home I stopped in at the Gazette to ask Lon Cohen to forget that I had phoned to ask him about Thomas G. Yeager, and there was a folder on his desk with some items about Yeager, including three pictures of him, which I looked at. The man who came this afternoon to hire me to spot his tail was not Yeager. No resemblance. So I suppose it's more accurate to say we didn't have a client." FR1;Chapter 3 Naturally I expected to get a strong reaction, and I did. Wolfe straightened up to reach to the desk for his bookmark, a thin strip of gold which he used only for books he considered worthy of a place on the shelves in the office. As he inserted it in the book Fritz appeared with a tray and brought it to my desk. Seeing that Wolfe was putting his book down, he winked at me approvingly, and I swiveled to get at the tray. There was a bowl of chestnut soup, a cucumber-and-shrimp sandwich on toast, a roast-beef sandwich on a hard roll, home-baked, a pile of watercress, an apple baked in white wine, and a glass of milk. A question of etiquette. When we are at table in the dining room for lunch or dinner, any mention of business is taboo. The rule has never been formally extended to fill-ins, but Wolfe feels strongly that when a man is feeding nothing should interfere with his concentration on his palate. Having disposed of the book, he leaned back and shut his eyes. After a few spoonfuls of soup I said, "I'm too hungry to taste anyway. Go right ahead." His eyes opened. "Beyond all doubt?" 24 Rex Stout "Yes, sir." I took in a spoonful and swallowed. "His name was typed on the pictures. Also there was a picture of him in a magazine. A face like a squirrel with a pointed nose and not much chin. The man this afternoon had a long bony face and broad forehead." "And, calling himself Yeager, he said that he expected to be followed to a specified address on West Eighty-second Street, and Yeager's body was found near that address. How long had he been dead?" "I don't know. Give them time. Besides what I've told you, all Lon knew was that the body was in a hole in the street dug by Con Edison men, it was covered with a tarp, and it was found by boys whose ball rolled in." "If I approve of your proposal to explore the possibility of getting a client and earning a fee, how do you intend to proceed?" I swallowed soup. "First I finish these sandwiches and the apple and milk. Then I go to Eighty-second Street. Since the body was found in a hole in the street, it's quite possible that there is nothing to connect it with that neighborhood or that particular address. He could have been killed anywhere and taken there and dumped. The blocks in the Eighties between Columbus and Amsterdam are no place for a big shot in a big corporation. The Puerto Ricans and Cubans average three or four to a
room. I want to find out what business Yeager had there, if any." "You would go now? Tonight?" "Sure. As soon as I empty this tray." "Pfui. How often have I told you that impetuosity is a virtue only when delay is dangerous?" t^ Too Many Clients 25 "Oh, six thousand." "But you are still headlong. In the morning we shall get many details that are lacking now. There may be no problem left, except the identity of the man who came here in masquerade, and that may no longer be of interest. Now, of course, it is. How long was he with you?" "Twenty-five minutes." "We may need a record of what he said. Instead of dashing up to Eighty-second Street you will spend the evening at the typewriter. The conversation verbatim, and include a complete description." He picked up the book and shifted to his reading position. That took care of the rest of the evening. I still would have liked to take a look at 156 West 82nd Street before the cops got interested in it, if they hadn't already, but Wolfe did have a point, and it was his money I had given Mike Collins. Typing my talk with the bogus Yeager was no strain, merely work. I have reported orally many conversations much longer than that one, with more people involved. It was a little short of midnight when I finished. After collating the sheets, original and carbon, and putting them in a drawer, removing the orchids from the vase on Wolfe's desk and taking them to the garbage pail in the kitchen--he wants them gone when he brings fresh ones in the morning--locking the safe, seeing that the front door was bolted, and turning out the lights, I mounted two flights to my room. Wolfe was already in his, on the second floor. Usually I get down to the kitchen for breakfast around eight-thirty, but that Tuesday morning I made it earlier, a little after eight. I wanted to go 26 Rex Stout straight to the little table where Fritz had put my copy of the Times on the reading rack, but impetuosity is a virtue only when delay is dangerous, so I made myself exchange greetings with Fritz, get my glass of orange juice, stir it, and take a couple of sips. Then I went and got the paper. Would the headline be yeager murder solved? It wasn't. It was executive shot and killed. I sat down and took another sip. With my orange juice, buckwheat cakes and sausage, blackberry jam, and two cups of coffee, I read it in both the Times and the Gazette. I'll skip such details as the names of the boys who found the body. They got their names in the papers, and that ought to last them, and anyway I doubt if they read books. He had been shot once, above the right ear, at close range, and had died instantly. He had been dead sixteen to twenty-four hours when the body was examined at 7:30 p.m., so he had been killed between 7:30 p.m. Sunday and 3:30 a.m. Monday. The autopsy might make it more definite. There had been no workmen in the excavation on 82nd Street all day Monday because needed repair times were not at hand, so the body could have been put in the hole Sunday night. The tarpaulin had been left in the hole by the workmen. No one had been found who had seen Yeager alive in the neighborhood or who had heard a shot fired in the vicinity, so he had probably been killed elsewhere and the body transferred there. Yeager's daughter, Anne, was at college, Bennington. His son, Thomas G. Junior, was in Cleveland, employed at the plant of Continental Plastic Products. Yeager and his wife had left New York Friday evening to spend the weekend visiting Too Many Clients 27 friends in the country; he had returned to town Sunday afternoon, but his wife hadn't returned until Monday morning. There had been no one at the Yeager house on 68th Street Sunday afternoon. Nothing was known of Yeager's movements after he boarded a train for New York at Stamford at 5:02 p.m. Sunday. No one was being held by the police, and the District Attorney would say only that the investigation was in progress. In the picture of him in the Times he was grinning like a politician. There were two in the Gazette--one a reproduction of one I had seen in Lon's office, and one of him stretched out at the edge of the hole he had been found in. I clipped the one in the Times and the live one from the Gazette and put them in my pocket notebook. At 8:51 I put down my empty coffee cup, thanked Fritz for the meal and told him I might or might not be home for lunch, went to the hall, mounted the flight to Wolfe's room, and entered. His breakfast tray, with nothing left on it but empty dishes, was on the table by a window, and beside it was his copy of the Times. He was standing before the mirror on the dresser, knotting his four-in-hand. Since he always goes from his room to the roof for his morning two hours in the plant rooms I don't know why he sports a tie--maybe being polite to the orchids. He grunted good morning, got the tie adjusted, and turned. "I'm off," I said. "Instructions?" "Your initiative," he said. "No, sir. That was yesterday. Are you sending me or aren't you? Apparently it's wide open, unless they're saving something. He had been dead at 28 Rex Stout least fourteen hours when that bozo came yesterday. What he said is in my desk drawer. How much do I have along for possible needs?" "Enough." "Any limit?" "Certainly. The limit dictated by your discretion and sagacity." "Right. Expect me when you see me." Descending to the office, I opened the safe, got five hundred dollars in used fives, tens, and twenties from the cash reserve, closed the safe, and twirled the knob. Removing my jacket, I unlocked the bottom drawer of my desk, got my armpit holster and put it on, loaded the Marley .32, and slipped it in the holster. Ever since an unpleasant experience some years ago I never go on an errand connected with a murder with only my pocketknife. I put on my jacket and went to the hall. Coat and hat? I hate to bother with them. There was no sun outside; the 7:30 radio had said possible showers. What the hell, live dangerously. I left, walked to Tenth Avenue and flagged a taxi, and told the driver 82nd and Broadway. Of course I had no script; it would have to be ad lib, except the obvious first step, to find out if the city scientists had finished their research. Many of them knew me by sight, and they knew I wouldn't be nosing around the scene of a murder just to pass the time. So, walking east from Broadway and crossing Amsterdam Avenue, I stopped at the corner for a survey from a distance, from the uptown side of 82nd Street. I have good eyes at any distance, and I could make out the "156" on a house about thirty paces from the corner. Parked cars were bumper to bumper along the curb on both Too Many Clients 29 sides except where barriers guarded the hole in the pavement, but there was no police ear, marked or unmarked. Begging the pardon of the tenants of the block, it was a slum. Fifty or sixty years ago, when the stone was new and clean and the brass was shiny, the long row of five-story houses might have been a credit to the city, but no more. They looked ratty and they were ratty, and it was a bet that they would crumble any minute if they hadn't been jammed together. There weren't many people on the sidewalk, and no kids, since it was school hours, but there was quite a gathering around the barriers surrounding the hole, which was some fifteen yards beyond Number 156. There was a cop there riding herd on them, but he was merely a flatfoot. There was no sign of Homicide or DA man. I crossed the street and walked along to the barriers. Over the shoulder of a woman in a purple dress I could see two workmen down in the hole, so the scientists had finished with it. While I stood looking down at them my sagacity came up with five conclusions: 1. Yeager had had some connection with someone or something at Number 156. Whoever the guy was who had come and hired me, and whatever his game was, and whether he had killed Yeager or not, he certainly hadn't just pulled that address out of a hat. 2. If Yeager had been killed elsewhere and the body had been brought to this spot deliberately, to impress someone at 156, why hadn't it been dumped on the sidewalk smack in front of 156? Why roll it into the hole and climb down and put a tarp over it? No. 30 Rex Stout 3. If Yeager had been killed elsewhere and the body had been brought to this spot not deliberately, but accidentally, merely because there was a hole here, you would have to swallow a coincidence that even a whale couldn't get down. No. 4. Yeager had not been shot as he was entering or leaving 156. At any time of night the sound of a shot in that street would have brought a dozen, a hundred, heads sticking out of windows. So the shooter runs or steps on the gas pedal. He does not drag the body to the hole and roll it in and climb down and put a tarp over it. No. 5. Therefore Yeager had been killed inside Number 156, some time, any time, after 7:30 p.m. Sunday, and later that night, when there was no audience, the body
had been carried to the hole, only fifteen yards, and dropped in. That didn't account for the tarp, but no theory would. At least the tarp didn't hurt it. It could have been to postpone discovery of the body until the workmen came. In detective work it's a great convenience to have a sagacity that can come up with conclusions like that; it saves wear and tear on the brain. I backed away from the barrier and walked the fifteen yards to Number 156. Some of the houses had a sign, vacancy, displayed at the entrance, but 156 didn't. But it did have a sign, hand-printed on a piece of cardboard fastened to the pillar at the foot of the steps going up to the stoop. It said superentendant, with an arrow pointing to the right. So I went right and down three steps, then left and through an open doorway into a little vestibule, and there in front of my eyes was evidence that there was something Too Many Clients 31 special about that house. The door had a Rabson lock. You have a Rabson installed on a door only if you insist on being absolutely certain that anyone who enters must have either the right key or a sledgehammer, and you are able and willing to shell out $61.50. I pushed the bell button. In a moment the door opened, and there facing me was one of the three most beautiful females I have ever seen. I must have gaped or gasped, from the way she smiled, the smile of a queen at a commoner. She spoke. "You want something?" Her voice was low and soft, without breath. The only thing to say was "Certainly, I want you," but I managed to hold it in. She was eighteen, tall and straight, with skin the color of the wild thyme honey that Wolfe gets from Greece, and she was extremely proud of something, not her looks. When a woman is proud of her looks it's just a smirk. I don't think I stammered, but if I didn't I should have. "I'd like to see the superintendent." "Are you a policeman?" If she liked policemen the only thing to say was "Yes." But probably she didn't. "No," I said, "I'm a newspaperman." "That's nice." She turned and called, "Father, a newspaperman!" and her voice raised was even more wonderful than her voice low. She turned back to me, graceful as a big cat, and stood there straight and proud, not quite smiling, her warm dark eyes as curious as if she had never seen a man before. I knew damn well I ought to say something, but what? The only thing to say was "Will you marry me?" but that wouldn't do because the idea of her washing dishes or darning socks was preposterous. 32 Rex Stout Then I became aware of something, that I had moved my foot inside the sill so the door couldn't close, and that spoiled it. I was just a private detective trying to dig up a client. Footsteps sounded, and as they approached she moved aside. It was a man, a chunky broadshouldered guy two inches shorter than her, with a pug nose and bushy eyebrows. I stepped inside and greeted him. "My name's Goodwin. From the Gazette. I want to rent a room, a front room." He said to his daughter, "Go, Maria," and she turned and went, down the dark hall. He turned to me. "No rooms." "A hundred dollars a week," I said. "I'm going to do an article on the scene of a murder after the murder. I want to take pictures of the people who come to look at it. A window on your second floor would be just the right angle." "I said no rooms." His voice was deep and rough. "You can shift someone around. Two hundred dollars." "No." "Three hundred." "No." ^ "Five hundred." "You're crazy. No." "I'm not crazy. You are. Snooting five hundred bucks. What's your name?" "It's my name." "Oh for God's sake. I can get it next door or from the cop out front. What's wrong with it?" He half closed one eye. "Nothing is wrong with it. My name is Cesar Perez. I am a citizen of the United States of America." Too Many Clients 33 "So am I. Will you rent me a room for one week for five hundred dollars in advance in cash?" "But what I said." He gestured with both hands and both shoulders. "No room. That man out there dead, this is a bad thing. To take pictures of the people from this house, no. Even if there was a room." I decided to be impetuous. Delay could actually be dangerous, since Homicide or the DA might uncover a connection between Yeager and this house any moment. Getting my case from my pocket and taking an item from it, I handed it to him. "Can you see in this light?" I asked. He didn't try. "What is it?" "My license. I'm not a newspaperman, I'm a private detective, and I'm investigating the murder of Thomas G. Yeager." He half closed an eye again. He poked the license at me, and I took it. His chest swelled with an intake of air. "You're not a policeman?" "No." "Then get out of here. Get out of this house. I have told three different policemen I don't know anything about that man in the hole, and one of them insulted me. You get out." "All right," I said, "it's your house." I returned the license to the case and the case to my pocket. "But I'll tell you what will happen if you bounce me. Within half an hour a dozen policemen will take the house over, with a search warrant. They'll go over every inch of it. They'll round up everybody here, beginning with you and your daughter, and they'll nab everyone who enters. The reason they'll do that is that I'll tell them I can prove that Thomas G. 34 Rex Stout I Yeager came to this house Sunday evening and he was killed here." "That's a lie. Like that policeman. That's insult." "Okay. First I call to the cop out front to come in and stand by so you can't warn anyone." I turned. I had hit it. With the cops of course he had been set, but I had been unexpected and had caught him off balance. And he wasn't a moron. He knew that even if I couldn't prove it I must have enough to sick the law on him and the house. As I turned he reached and got my sleeve. I turned back, and he stood there, his jaw working. I asked, not hostile, just wanting to know, "Did you kill him?" "You're a policeman," he said. "I am not. My name is Archie Goodwin and I work for a private detective named Nero Wolfe. We expect to get paid for investigating this case, that's how we make a living. So I'll be honest; we would rather find out for ourselves why Yeager came here instead of having the police do it, but if you won't cooperate I'll have to call that cop in. Did you kill him?" He wheeled and started down the hall. I moved, got his shoulder, and yanked him around. "Did you kill him?" "I've got a knife," he said. "In this house I've got a right to have it." "Sure. I've got this." I pulled the Marley from the holster. "And a permit for it. Did you kill him?" "No. I want to see my wife. She thinks better than I do. My wife and daughter. I want--" A door ten feet down the hall swung open, and a woman's voice said, "We're here, Cesar," and there they were. The one coming was a tall grim-faced ^- ""^^^'P^^^^^^^^ffiHffilHI^I^H^^I^^^'^^^^^^^^^^^^B If K I ---- ^!-------- % I' Too Many Clients 35 woman with an air of command. Maria stayed at the door. Perez started reeling off Spanish at his wife, but she broke in. "Stop it! He'll think it's secrets. With an American talk American." She focused sharp black eyes on me. "We heard you. I knew this would come, only I thought it would be the police. My husband is an honest man. He did not kill Mr. Yeager. We call him Mr. House because it's his house. How do you know?" I returned the Marley to the holster. "Since I do know, Mrs. Perez, does it matter how?" "No, I am a fool to ask. All right, ask questions." "I'd rather have your husband answer them. It may take a while. If there's a room with chairs?" "I'll answer them. We sit down with friends. You after my husband with a gun." "I was only showing off. Okay, if your legs can stand it mine can. What time did Mr. Yeager come here Sunday?" "I thought you knew." "I do. I'm finding out how you answer questions. If you answer too many of them wrong I'll try your husband, or the police will." She considered it a moment. "He came around seven o'clock." "Did he come to see you or your husband or your daughter?" She glared. "No." "Whom did he come to see?" "I don't know. We don't know." "Try again. That's silly. I'm not going to spend all day prying it out of you bit by bit." She eyed me. "Have you ever been up there?" 36 Rex Stout "I'm asking the questions, Mrs. Perez. Whom did he come to see?" "We don't know." She turned. "Go, Maria." "But Mother, it's not�" "Go!" Maria went, back inside, and shut the door. It was just as well, since it's a strain to keep your eyes where they ought to be when they want to be somewhere else. Mother returned to me. "He came around seven o'clock and knocked on the door. That one." She pointed to the door Maria had shut behind her. "He spoke to my husband and paid him some money. Then he went down the hall to the elevator. We don't know if someone was up there or if someone came later. We were looking at the television, so we wouldn't hear if someone came in and went to the el
evator. Anyhow we weren't supposed to know. The door in front has a good lock. So it's not silly that we don't know who he came to see." "Where's the elevator?" "In the back. It has a lock too." "You asked if I have ever been up there. Have you?" "Of course. Every day. We keep it clean." "Then you have a key. We'll go up now." I moved. She glanced at her husband, hesitated, glanced at me, went and opened the door Maria had closed and said something in Spanish, and started down the hall. Perez followed, and I brought up the rear. At the far end of the hall, clear back, she took a key from a pocket of her skirt and inserted it in the lock of a metal door, another Rabson lock. The door, either aluminum or stainless steel, slid open. That ;g^.,^w_gggpq Too Many Clients 37 door certainly didn't fit that hall, and neither did the inside of the elevator--more stainless steel, with red enameled panels on three sides. It was small, not even as large as Wolfe's at home. It ascended, silent and smooth, I judged, right to the top floor, the door slid open, and we stepped out. For the second time in an hour I must have either gaped or gasped when Perez turned on the lights. I have seen quite a few rooms where people had gone all out, but that topped them all. It may have been partly the contrast with the neighborhood, the outside of the house, and the down below, but it would have been remarkable no matter where. The first impression was of silk and skin. The silk, mostly red but some pale yellow, was on the walls and ceiling and couches. The skin was on the girls and women in the pictures, paintings, that took a good third of the wall space. In all directions was naked skin. The pale yellow carpet, wall to wall, was silk too, or looked it. The room was enormous, twenty-five feet wide and the full length of the house, with no windows at either end. Headed to the right wall, near the center, was a bed eight feet square with a pale yellow silk coverlet. Since yellow was Wolfe's pet color it was too bad he hadn't come along. I sniffed the air. It was fresh enough, but it smelled. Air-conditioned, with built-in perfume. There weren't many surfaces that would hold fingerprints--the tops of two tables, a TV console, a stand with a telephone. I turned to Mrs. Perez. "Have you cleaned here since Sunday night?" "Yes, yesterday morning." That settled that. "Where's the door to the stairs?" "No stairs." "They're boarded up below," Perez said. 38 Rex Stout "The elevator's the only way to come up?" p- "Yes." "How long has it been like this?" "Four years. Since he bought the house. We had been here two years." "How often did he come here?" "We don't know." "Certainly you do, if you came up every day to ,<�. clean. How often?" "Maybe once a week, maybe more." ,: I turned on Perez. "Why did you kill him?" S^ "No." He half closed an eye. "Me? No." |N^ "Who did?" t"^ "We dont know," his wife said. '; ^ I ignored her. "Look," I told him. "I don't want to turn you over unless I have to. Mr. Wolfe and I would prefer to keep you to ourselves. But if you don't open up we'll have no choice, and there may not be much time. They've got a lot of fingerprints from the tarpaulin that covered his body. I know he was killed in this house. If just one of those prints matches yours, good-by. You're in. Since he was killed in this house, you know something. What?" He said to his wife, "Felita?" She was looking at me, her sharp black eyes into me. "You're a private detective," she said. "You told my husband that's how you make a living. So we pay you. We have some money, not much. One hundred dollars." "What do you pay me for?" "To be our detective." "And detect what?" "We'll tell you. We have the money downstairs." "I'll earn it first. All right, I'm your detective, but I can quit any time, for instance if I decide that Too Many Clients 39 you or your husband killed Yeager. What do you want me to detect?" "We want you to help us. What you said about the fingerprints. I told him he must put on gloves, but he didn't. We don't know how you know so much, but we know how it will be if you tell the police about this house. We did not kill Mr. House. Mr. Yeager. We don't know who killed him. My husband took his dead body and put it in that hole because we had to. When he came Sunday evening he told my husband to go to Mondor's at midnight and bring some things he had ordered, some caviar and roast pheasant and other things, and when my husband came up with them his dead body was here." She pointed. "There on the floor. What could we do? It was secret that he came to this house. What would happen if we called a policeman? We knew what would happen. So now we pay you to help us. Perhaps more than one hundred dollars. You will know�" She whirled around. There had been a noise from the elevator, a click, and then a faint sound of friction, barely audible. Perez said, "It's going down. Someone down there." "Yeah," I agreed. "Who?" "We don't know," Mrs. Perez said. "Then we'll see. Stay where you are, both of you." I got the Marley out. "It's a policeman," Perez said. "No," she said. "No key. He couldn't have Mr. House's keys because we took them." "Shut up," I told them. "If I'm your detective, do what I say. No talking and no moving." We stood facing the elevator. I moved to the wall and put my back to it, arm's length from the 40 Rex Stout elevator door. Since it had been up when the visitor came and he had had to push the button to bring it down, he must know someone was up here and might come out with his finger on a trigger, which was where I had mine. The faint sound came again, then a click, the door opened, and out came a woman. Her back was to me as she faced Mrs. Perez. "Thank God," she said, "it's you. I thought it would be." "We don't know you," Mrs. Perez said. I did. I had taken a step and got her profile. It was Meg Duncan, whom I had seen last week from a fifth-row seat on the aisle, in her star part in The Back Door to Heaven. Chapter 4 If you ever have your pick of being jumped by a man your size or a woman who only comes to your chin, I advise you to make it the man. If he's unarmed the chances are that the very worst he'll do is floor you, but God knows what the woman will do. And you may floor him first, but you can't plug a woman. Meg Duncan came at me exactly the way a cavewoman went at her man, or some other man, ten thousand years ago, her claws reaching for me and her mouth open ready to bite. There were only two alternatives, to get too far or too close, and too close is better. I rammed into her past the claws, against her, and wrapped her, and in one second the breath was all out of her. Her mouth stayed open, but for air, not to bite. I slid around and had her arms from behind. In that position the worst you can get is a kick on a shin. She was gasping. My grip may have been really hurting her right arm because I had the gun in that hand and the butt was pressing into her. When I removed that hand to drop the Marley in my pocket she didn't move, and I turned loose and backed up a step. "I know who you are," I said. "I caught your 42 Rex Stout show last week and you were wonderful. I'm not a cop, I'm a private detective. I work for Nero Wolfe. When you get your breath you'll tell me why you're here." She turned, slowly. It took her five seconds to make the half-turn to face me. "You hurt me," she said. "No apology. A squeeze and a little bruise on an arm are nothing to what you had in mind." She rubbed the arm, her head tilted back to look up at me, still breathing through her mouth. I was being surprised that I had recognized her. On the stage she was extremely easy on the eyes. Now she was just a thirty-year-old female with a good enough face, in a plain gray suit and a plain little hat, but of course she was under strain. She spoke. "Are you Nero Wolfe's Archie Goodwin?" "No. I'm my Archie Goodwin. I'm Nero Wolfe's confidential assistant." "I know about you." She was getting enough air through her nose. "I know you're a gentleman." She extended a hand to touch my sleeve. "I came here to get something that belongs to me. I'll get it and go. All right?" "What is it?" "A--a something with my initials on it. A cigarette case." "How did it get here?" She tried to smile, as a lady to a gentleman, but it was a feeble effort. A famous actress should have done better, even under strain. "Does that matter, Mr. Goodwin? It's mine. I can describe it. It's dull gold, with an emerald in a corner on one side and my initials on the other." pa^v I w "a^- Too Many Clients 43 I smiled as a gentleman to a lady. "When did you leave it here?" "I didn't say I left it here." "Was it Sunday evening?" "No. I wasn't here Sunday evening." "Did you kill Yeager?" She slapped me. That is, she slapped at me. She was certainly impetuous. Also she was quick, but so was I. I caught her wrist and gave it a little twist, not enough to hurt much, and let go. There was a gleam in her eyes,
and she looked more like Meg Duncan. "You're a man, aren't you?" she said. "I can be. Right now I'm just a working detective. Did you kill Yeager?" "No. Of course not." Her hand came up again, but only to touch my sleeve. "Let me get my cigarette case and go." I shook my head. "You'll have to manage without it for a while. Do you know who killed Yeager?" "Of course not." Her fingers curved around my arm, not a grip, just a touch. "I know I can't bribe you, Mr. Goodwin, I know enough about you to know that, but detectives do things for people, don't they? I can pay you to do something for me, can't I? If you won't let me get my cigarette case you can get it for me, and keep it for me. You can give it to me later, you can decide when, I don't care as long as you keep it." Her fingers pressed a little. "I would pay whatever you say. A thousand dollars?" Things were looking up, but it was getting a little complicated. At 4:30 yesterday afternoon we had had no client and no prospect of any. Then one had come but had turned out to be a phony. Then Mrs. Perez had dangled a hundred bucks and perhaps more. Now this customer was offering a 44 Rex Stout grand. I was digging up clients all right, but too many clients can be worse than too few. I regarded her. "It might work," I said. "It's like this. Actually I can't take a job; I'm employed by Nero Wolfe. He takes the jobs. I'm going to look this place over, and if I find your cigarette case, as I will if it's here, I'll take it. Give me your keys, to the door down below and the elevator." Her fingers left my arm. "Give them to you?" "Right. You won't need them any more." I glanced at my wrist. "It's ten-thirty-five. You have no matinee today. Come to Nero Wolfe's office at half past two. Six-eighteen West Thirty-fifth Street. Your cigarette case will be there, and you can settle it with Mr. Wolfe." "But why can't you�" "No. That's how it is, and I have things to do." I put a hand out. "The keys." "Why can't I�" "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." Too Many Clients 45 "Phooey. When you brought things up at midnight?"