Prisoner's Base

by Rex Stout

  "I will not," I told her, "file the brand and number of the taxi, or if I do I won't report it or refer to it. However, I am making no promise that I will permanently forget your name. Some day I may think of something I'll want to ask you. If I don't see you before June thirtieth, happy birthday."

  We parted on those terms-not exactly gushy, but not implacable. After watching her taxi roll off uptown, I walked back to the house, expecting an extended session with Wolfe, and not with any uncontrollable glee. It was an interesting situation, I was willing to hand him that, but I wasn't at all sure I liked my part. However, I found that I was to be allowed to sleep on it. By the time I got back Wolfe had gone to bed, which suited me fine.

  The next morning, Tuesday, there was a clash. I was having orange juice and griddle cakes and grilled Georgia ham and honey and coffee and melon and more coffee in the kitchen, as usual, when Fritz came back down from taking Wolfe's breakfast tray up to him and said I was wanted. That was according to precedent. Since Wolfe didn't come downstairs before going up to the plant rooms at nine o'clock, his habit was to send for me if he had morning instructions not suited to the house phone. Fritz said nothing had been said about urgency, so I finished my second cup of coffee without gulping and then went up the one flight to Wolfe's room, directly under the one Priscilla had not slept in. He had finished breakfast and was out of bed, standing by a window in his two acres of yellow pajamas, massaging his scalp with his fingertips. I wished him good morning, and he was good enough to reciprocate.

  "What time is it?" he demanded.

  There were two clocks in the room, one on his bed table and one on the wall not ten feet from where he was standing, but I humored him, looking at my wrist.

  "Eight thirty-two."

  "Please get Mr. Helmar at his office sharp at ten o'clock and put him through to me upstairs. It would be pointless for you to go there, since we are more up-to-date than he is. Meanwhile it won't hurt to ring Miss Eads's apartment to learn if she's at home. Unless you already have?"

  "No, sir."

  "Then try it. If she's not there we should be prepared to waste no time. Get after Saul, Fred, and Orrie at once, and tell them to be here by eleven o'clock if possible."

  I shook my head, regretfully but firmly. "No, sir. I warned you that you may have to fire me. I don't refuse to play, but I will not help with any fudging. You told her that we would forget her existence until ten this morning. I have done so. I have no idea who or what you're talking about. Do you want me to come upstairs at ten o'clock to see if you have any instructions?"

  "No," he snapped, and headed for the bathroom. Reaching it and opening the door, he yelled at me over his shoulder, "I mean yes!" and disappeared within. To save Fritz a trip, I took the breakfast tray down with me.

  Ordinarily, unless there is a job on, I don't go to the office until the morning mail comes, somewhere between 8:45 and nine o'clock. So when the doorbell rang a little before nine I was still in the kitchen, discussing the Giants and Dodgers with Fritz. Going through to the hall and proceeding toward the front, I stopped dead when I saw through the one-way glass who it was.

  I'm just reporting. As far as I know, no electrons had darted in either direction when I first laid eyes on Priscilla Eads, nor had I felt faint or dizzy at any point during my association with her, but the fact remains that I have never had swifter or stronger hunches than the two that were connected with her. Monday evening, before Helmar had said much more than twenty words about his missing ward, I had said to myself, "She's upstairs," and knew it. Tuesday morning, when I saw Inspector Cramer of Manhattan Homicide on the stoop, I said to myself, "She's dead," and knew it. Halting, I stood three seconds before advancing to open the door.

  I greeted him. He said, "Hello, Goodwin," strode in and past me, and on to the office. I followed and crossed to my desk, noting that instead of going for the red leather chair he was taking a yellow one, indicating that I and not Wolfe was it this time. I told him that Wolfe would not be available for two hours, which he knew already, since he was as familiar with the schedule as I was.

  "Will I do?" I asked.

  "You will for a start," he growled. "Last night a woman was murdered, and your fresh fingerprints are on her luggage. How did they get there?"

  I met his eye. "That's no way to do it," I objected. "My fingerprints could be found on women's luggage from Maine to California. Name and address and description of luggage?"

  "Priscilla Eads, Six-eighteen East Seventy-fourth Street. A suitcase and a hatbox, both light tan leather."

  "She was murdered?"

  "Yes. Your prints were fresh. How come?"

  Inspector Cramer was no Sir Laurence Olivier, but I would not previously have called him ugly. At that moment it suddenly struck me that he was ugly. His big round face always got redder in the summertime, and seemed to be puffier, making his eyes appear smaller but no less quick and sharp. "Like a baboon," I said.

  "What?"

  "Nothing." I swiveled and buzzed the plant rooms on the house phone, and in a moment Wolfe answered.

  "Inspector Cramer is here," I told him. "A woman named Priscilla Eads has been murdered, and Cramer says my fingerprints are on her luggage and wants to know how come. Have I ever heard of her?"

  "Confound it."

  "Yes, sir. I double. Do you want to come down here?"

  "No."

  "Shall we go up there?"

  "No. You know all that I do."

  "I sure do. So I unload?"

  "Certainly. Why not?"

  "Yeah, why not. She's dead."

  I hung up and turned to Cramer.

  Chapter 4

  I am inclined to believe that Cramer has a fairly good understanding of Wolfe in most respects, but not all. For instance, he exaggerates Wolfe's appetite for dough, which I suppose is natural, since if he goes on being an honest cop, which he is, the most he can ever expect to get is considerably less than Wolfe pays me, whereas Wolfe's annual take is well up in six figures. I admit Wolfe is not in business for my health, but he is quite capable of letting a customer leave the premises with a dime for carfare or even a buck for a taxi.

  However, Cramer is not under that impression, and therefore, when he learned that we had no client connected in any way with Priscilla Eads, now that she was dead, and apparently no prospect of any, and hence no fee to build up and safeguard, he started calling me Archie, which had happened before, but not often. He expressed appreciation for the information I provided, taking a dozen pages of notes in his small neat hand, and asking plenty of questions, not to challenge but just to elucidate. He did offer a pointed comment about what he called our dodge with Helmar, with his ward upstairs, and I rebutted.

  "Okay," I told him, "you name it. She came here uninvited, and so did he. We had made no engagement with either one. They couldn't both have what they wanted. Let's hear how you would have handled it."

  "I'm not a genius like Wolfe. He could have been too busy to consider taking Helmar's job."

  "And use what to meet his payroll? Speaking of busy, are you too busy to answer a question from a citizen in good standing?"

  He looked at his wrist. "I'm due at the DA's office at ten-thirty."

  "Then we've got hours-anyhow, minutes. Why did you want to make it so tight about the time Helmar left here? It was shortly after ten, and it was more than an hour later that Miss Eads left."

  "Uh-huh." He got out a cigar. "What paper do you read?"

  "The Times, but today I've seen only page one and sports."

  "It didn't make the Times. A little after one o'clock last night the body of a woman was found in a vestibule on East Twenty-ninth Street. She had been strangled with some kind of cord, not very thick. There was trouble identifying her because her bag had been taken, but she lived in a nearby tenement and it didn't take too long. Her name was Margaret Fomos, and she worked as a maid at the apartment of Miss Priscilla Eads on Seventy-fourth Street. It was a full-time job, but she lived on Twe
nty-ninth Street with her husband. She usually got home around nine, but last evening she phoned her husband that she wouldn't arrive until eleven. He says she sounded upset, and he asked her why, and she said she would tell him when she saw him."

  "So she was killed about eleven o'clock?"

  "Not known. The building on Seventy-fourth Street is a private house done over into luxes, one to a floor, except Miss Eads-she had the two top floors-and the elevator is self-service, so there is no staff around to see people coming and going. The ME puts it between ten-thirty and midnight."

  Cramer glanced at his wrist, stuck the cigar between his teeth at the left corner of his mouth, and clamped down on it. He never lit one. "I was home in bed. Rowcliff took it. He had four men on it, following routine, and around four o'clock one of them, a young fellow named Auerbach, decided he had brains and he might as well give 'em a chance. It occurred to him that he had never heard of a bag-snatcher going so far as to strangle the victim, and there was no evidence of any attempt at rape. What was there about her, or about the bag, that called for strangling? According to the husband, nothing about her, nor the bag either. But listing the contents of the bag as well as he could with the husband's help, one item struck Auerbach as worth considering-Mrs. Fomos's key to the apartment where she worked."

  "He'll have your job someday."

  "He's welcome to it now. He went to Seventy-fourth Street and rang the bell to the Eads apartment and got no answer. He got the janitor and had him open the door and take a look. The body of Priscilla Eads was there on the floor, half in a bathroom and half in a hall. She had been hit on the side of the head with the poker from her fireplace and then strangled with some kind of cord, not very thick. Her hat was lying near her, and she had her jacket on, so he had probably been there waiting for her when she came in. We'll know more about that when we find the hackie, which should be soon with what you gave me. The ME puts it between one and two."

  "Then she didn't go straight home. As I told you, I put her in the taxi about twenty to twelve."

  "I know. Auerbach got Rowcliff, and the boys moved in. The crop of prints was below average-I guess Mrs. Fomos was a good cleaner and duster-and the best of the lot were some nice fresh ones on the luggage. When the word came that they were yours Rowcliff phoned me, and I decided to drop by here on my way downtown. He doesn't know how to handle Wolfe at all, and you have the same effect on him as a bee on a dog's nose."

  "Some day I'll describe the effect he has on me."

  "I'd rather not." Cramer looked at his wrist. "I had it in mind to have a word with Wolfe, but I know how he is about being disturbed up there about a little thing like a homicide, and I'd just as soon take it from you, so long as I get it."

  "You've got it all right."

  "I believe you, for a change." He left his chair. "Especially since he has no client, and none in sight that I can see. He'll be in one hell of a humor, and I don't envy you. I'll be going. You understand you're a material witness and you'll be around."

  I said I would.

  When I went back down the hall after letting Cramer out I started to re-enter the office, but suddenly braked at the door, pivoted, and made for the stairs. Two flights up, I went into the south room, stood in its center, and looked around. Fritz hadn't been in it yet, and the bed was turned down as Priscilla had left it, with the folded coverlet on the other bed. I went and lifted the coverlet to look under it and dropped it again. I raised the pillow on the turned-down bed and glanced under that. I crossed to the large bureau between the windows and started opening and closing drawers.

  I was not being completely cuckoo. I was a trained and experienced detective, there had been a murder that I was interested in and wanted to know more about, and the closest I could get to it at the moment was this room in which Priscilla had expected to sleep and eat her breakfast. I hadn't the slightest expectation of finding anything helpful, and so wasn't disappointed when I didn't; and I did find something at that. On a shelf in the bathroom was a toothbrush and a soiled handkerchief. I took them to my room and put them on my dresser, and I still have them, in a drawer where I keep a collection of assorted professional relics.

  There was no point in going up to the plant rooms and starting a squabble, so I went down to the office and opened the morning mail and fiddled around with chores. Somewhat later, when I became aware that I was entering a germination date of Cymbidium holfordianum on the card of Cymbidium pauwelsi, I decided I wasn't in the mood for clerical work, returned things to the files, and sat and stared at my toes. There were four thousand things I wanted to know, and there were people I might have started asking, like Sergeant Purley Stebbins or Lon Cohen of the Gazette, but after all this was Nero Wolfe's office and phone.

  At eleven o'clock he came down, entered and crossed to his desk, got himself settled in his chair, and glanced through the little stack of mail I had put there under a paperweight. There was nothing of much interest and certainly nothing urgent. He cocked his head, focused on me, and stated, "It would have been like you to come up at ten o'clock for instructions as arranged."

  I nodded. "I know, but Cramer didn't leave until five after, and I knew how you would react. Do you care to hear the details?"

  "Go ahead."

  I gave him what I had got from Cramer. When I had finished he sat frowning at me with his eyes half closed, through a long silence. Finally he spoke. "You reported in full to Mr. Cramer?"

  "I did. You said to unload."

  "Yes. Then Mr. Helmar will soon know, if he doesn't already, of our stratagem, and I doubt if it's worth the trouble to communicate with him. He wanted his ward alive and well, so he said, and that's out of the question."

  I disagreed, not offensively. "But he's our only contact, and, no matter how sore he is, we can start with him. We have to start somewhere with someone?"

  "Start?" He was peevish. "Start what? For whom? We have no client. There's nothing to start."

  The simple and direct thing to do would have been to blow my top, and it would have been a satisfaction-but then what? I refused to boil, and kept my voice even. "I don't deny," I told him, "that that's one way to look at it, but only one, and there is at least one other. Like this. She was here and wanted to stay, and we kicked her out, and she got killed. I should think that would have some bearing on your self-esteem, which you were discussing last night. I should think that you do have something to start-a murder investigation. And you also have a client-your self-esteem."

  "Nonsense!"

  "Maybe." I stayed calm. "I would like to explain at length why I think it's up to us to get the guy that killed Priscilla Eads, but I don't want to waste your time or my breath just for the hell of it. Would it do any good?"

  "No."

  "You won't even consider it?"

  "Why should I?" He fluttered a hand. "I am under no onus and am offered no reward. No."

  "Okay," I stood up. "I guess I knew how it would be. You realize that I have my personal problem, and it's different from yours. If I had turned her down and put her out yesterday afternoon as soon as I found out what she wanted, would she be in the morgue now? I doubt it. When you came down and I sprung her on you, you told me to get her out of the house before dinner. If I had, would she be in the morgue now? Probably not. It was absolutely my fault that she didn't leave until nearly midnight, and she decided to go home, it doesn't matter why. It may have been just to change her clothes and luggage, or she may have decided not to play-anyhow, she went home, and she got it. That's my personal problem."

  "Archie." He was gruff. "No man can hold himself accountable for the results of his psychological defects, especially those he shares with all his fellow men, such as lack of omniscience. It is a vulgar fallacy that what you don't know can't hurt you; but it is true that what you don't know can't convict you."

  "It's still my personal problem. I can get along without omniscience, but I can't get along with a goddam strangler going around being grateful to me for sending
his victim to him, and I don't intend to try. I'll quit if you prefer it, but I'd rather take an indefinite leave of absence, starting now-without pay, of course. You can get Saul in. I'll move to a hotel, but I suppose you won't mind if I drop in occasionally in case I need something."

  He was glowering at me. "Do I understand you? Do you intend to go single-handed for the murderer of Miss Eads?"

  "I don't know about single-handed. I may need some hired help, but I'm going for him."

  "Pfui." He was contemptuous. "Poppycock. Is Mr. Cramer such a bungler? And his men? So inept that you must assume their functions?"

  I stared at him. "I'll be damned. That, from you?"

  He shook his head. "It won't do, Archie. You're trying to coerce me, and I won't have it. I will not undertake a major and expensive operation, with no chance of income, merely because you have been piqued by circumstance. Your bluff won't work. It would of course be folly for you to try any-what's that for?"

  I was too busy to answer him. With my jacket off, I had got a shoulder holster from a drawer and was strapping it on. That done, I took a Marley.32 and a box of cartridges, filled the cylinder, put the gun in the holster, and put my jacket back on. It was an effective retort to Wolfe, but that was not the sole reason for it. Ever since a certain regrettable experience some years back, I never left the house on an errand connected with a murder case without taking a gun, so I was merely following habit.

  I faced Wolfe. "I'll do my best to see that everybody understands that I'm not working for you. Some of them won't believe it, but I can't help that. I'll come back for some things, and if I can't make it until late I'll phone to tell you what hotel I'm at. If you decide you'd rather have me quit, okay. I haven't got time to discuss it now because I want to catch a guy before lunch."

  He sat with his lips pressed tight, scowling. I turned and went. Passing the hall rack, I snared my straw hat, not that I don't hate to monkey with a hat in summer, but I might need the tone. Descending the seven steps of the stoop, I turned east as if I knew exactly where I was headed for, walked to Tenth Avenue and turned downtown, and at the corner of Thirty-fourth Street entered a drugstore, mounted a stool at the soda fountain, and ordered a chocolate egg malted with three eggs.