As luck would have it, Saul Panzer was not to be had at the moment. Since he was free-lancing, you never knew. I finally got it that he was out on Long Island on a job for Atlantic and left word for him to call. He did so around three and said he would be able to get to the office soon after six o’clock.
It became obvious that to Wolfe, who had been stirred up, money was no object, since he blew another dollar and eighty cents on a phone call to Washington. I got it through without any trouble to General Carpenter, head of G-2, under whom I had been a major and for whom Wolfe had helped to solve certain problems connected with the war. The favor he asked of Carpenter, and of course got, was a telegram that would open doors at the premises of the Beck Products Corporation.
Not satisfied with that, he opened another valve. At ten minutes to four he said to me, “Archie. Find out whether it seems advisable for me to talk with that man Joe Groll.”
“Yes, sir. Tea leaves? Or there’s a palmist over on Seventh—”
“See him and find out. Why did he ask where Blaney was up there Tuesday evening? Anything else.”
“As, for instance, when does he marry Mrs. Poor and did she ever eat him?”
“Anything.”
So after he went up to the plant rooms I phoned the office of Blaney and Poor and got Joe Groll. No persuasion was required. His tone implied that he would be glad to talk with anybody, any time, anywhere, after business hours. He would be free at five-thirty. I told him I’d be waiting for him at the corner of Varick and Adams in a brown Wethersill sedan.
He was twenty minutes late. “Sorry to keep you waiting,” he apologized as he climbed in front beside me. “I only quit being a GI hero two months ago, and they gave me my old job back, and it keeps me busy catching up.”
His glance at me was a question, but I postponed answering it, because my eye being used to taking in things, I had noticed something on the sidewalk in the twilight. Sure enough, as I let the clutch in and we slid away from the sidewalk, somebody’s desire to find a taxi got practically frantic. To oblige, I took my time. When I saw in the mirror that a taxi had actually been snagged, I fed gas and went ahead. Then I answered the question his glance had asked.
“I don’t sport a ruptured duck because I didn’t get over to kill any Germans. They gave me a majority so I could run errands for Nero Wolfe while he was winning the war. There’s a bar and grill on Nineteenth Street that has good Scotch. All right?”
He didn’t object, so I kept my course, crowding no lights so as not to complicate matters for the taxi behind. Its driver was no bargain, because when I pulled up in front of Pete’s Bar & Grill, instead of going on by the sap swerved toward the curb not more than thirty yards back.
In addition to good Scotch, Pete’s had booths partitioned to the ceiling, which furnished privacy. Seated in one of them, I was surprised to realize that you could make out a case for calling Joe Groll handsome. They had overdone it a little on the ears, but on the whole he was at least up to grade if not fancy. After we got our drinks I remarked casually, “As I told you on the phone, I want to discuss this murder. You may have heard of Nero Wolfe. Poor and his wife came to see him Tuesday afternoon, to tell him Blaney was going to dissolve the partnership by killing Poor.”
He nodded. “Yes, I know.”
“Oh. The cops told you?”
“No, Martha told me yesterday. Mrs. Poor. She asked me to come up and help about things — the funeral.” He made a gesture. “Gosh, one lousy civilian funeral makes more fuss than a thousand dead men over there did.”
I nodded. “Sure, the retail business always has more headaches than the wholesale.” I sipped my highball. “I don’t go for this theory that it was Helen Vardis that killed Poor. Do you?”
“What?” He stared. “What are you talking about? What theory?” His fingers had tightened around his glass.
“Why, this idea that Helen Vardis would do anything for Blaney, God knows why, and she made the cigars for him, and she went there Tuesday night—”
“Well, for Christ’s sake.” He said that calmly, and then suddenly his voice went up high. “Who thought that one up? Was it that cop Rowcliff? That buzzard? Was it Nero Wolfe? Was it you?”
He sounded next door to hysterical. I sure had pushed the wrong button, or maybe the right one, but I didn’t want him sore at me. “It wasn’t me,” I assured him. “Don’t get excited.”
He laughed. It sounded bitter but not hysterical. “That’s right,” he said, “I must remember that, not to get excited. Everybody is very thoughtful. They put you in uniform and teach you what every young man ought to know, and take you across the ocean into the middle of hell, bombs, bullets, shells, flame-throwers, your friends die right against you and bleed down your neck, and after two years of that they bring you home and turn you loose and tell you now remember don’t get excited.”
He drank his highball, clear to the bottom, and put his glass down. “I’m all right,” he said calmly. “So I am loose again and come back to my job. Don’t get excited. Here’s what I find. A girl I had been sort of counting on, named Martha Davis, has married the boss and no one told me. It wasn’t her fault, she never promised me anything, not even to write to me, but I had been looking forward to seeing her. Oh, I saw her, because she was in trouble and asked me to help. She thought her husband was going to get killed, and knowing Blaney as I did I saw no reason to doubt it. I met her places a few times because she wanted to talk it over with me, and she wanted me to watch Blaney. Why am I spilling all this to you? You weren’t in the Army.”
“I was in the Army,” I said, “but I admit nobody bled down my neck. I did what I was told.”
“So did I, brother. Didn’t we all. Anyhow, I wasn’t heartbroken, because she seemed a little older than I had remembered her, and besides there was another girl who had been nothing but a kid in the factory but she had grown up. I’m not telling you anything the cops don’t know. God, the cops are something! That’s Helen Vardis. You saw her the other night.”
“Yeah, she seemed upset.”
“Upset?” He laughed a one-second laugh. “Sure she was upset. I fell for her like a Sherman tank roaring down a cliff. I certainly hit bottom— All right, I guess I will. Thanks.”
That was for the second drink, arriving. He picked it up and swallowed half.
“It is good Scotch. She seemed to reciprocate. I guess I was a little leery of all civilians, even her, but she seemed to reciprocate. I can’t understand what that guy Poor had that attracted girls, and at his age, too. That I will never understand. First Martha, and then her. I saw her with him in a restaurant. Then I saw them together in his car. Then I followed her from the office and watched her meet him on Fourteenth Street, and they took a taxi and I lost them. Naturally I sprung it on her, and she the same as told me to go to hell. She refused to explain.”
He finished the drink. “So they say don’t get excited. The cops told me yesterday, and again today, don’t get excited. Which one is it that thinks Helen Vardis was helping Blaney? Is it you?”
I shook my head. “I am not a cop. It’s just something I heard and I wondered what you thought of it. In a murder case you’re apt to hear anything.”
“Why do you listen?”
“Why not? I’m listening to you.”
He laughed, somewhat better. “You’re a hell of a guy to work on a murder. You don’t try to hammer me and you don’t try to uncle. Do you want to come along and help me do something?”
“I might if you’d describe it. I promised my mother I would always be helpful to people.”
“Wait a minute. I want to make a phone call.”
He slid along the seat and left the booth. I sipped my highball and lit a cigarette, wondering whether the feel of blood going down his neck had really loosened a screw in him or if he was just temporarily rattled. In less than five minutes he was back, sliding along the seat again, and announcing, “Blaney’s up at his place in Westchester. I phoned to ask him about a job we’re doing, but really to find out if he was up there.”
“Good. Now we know. Is that where we’re going?”
“No.” He gazed at his glass. “I thought I drank that— oh. You had it filled again. Thanks.” He took some. “Anyway, that idea about Helen is silly because it was obviously either Martha or Blaney, if the cops have any brains at all. Martha says she went to Blaney’s place in Westchester at six-fifteen Tuesday to keep a date she and Poor had with him, and there was no one there and she waited around until ten minutes to seven. Blaney says he was there all the time, from a quarter to six on, all evening, until he got the phone call from the police that Poor had been killed. So one of them is lying, and the one that’s lying is obviously the one that killed Poor. So it’s Blaney.”
“Why, because Martha wouldn’t lie?”
He frowned at me. “Now don’t smart up. What the hell would she kill him for? She only got him two years ago and he had everything he ever had. Anyway, it was Blaney, and I am fed up with all the gear-grinding, and he is now through with me and I’ll be out of a job, so to hell with him. I’m going to see what I can find. On account of the trick cigars the cops wanted to go through the office and factory, and Blaney told them sure, go ahead, go as far as you like, but he didn’t tell them about the abditories and they didn’t find them.”
“How do you spell it?”
He spelled it “Abditory. Place to hide things. Blaney says it’s a scientific term. The office is full of them. I haven’t had a chance before now since Tuesday night, but with him up in Westchester I’m going to take a look. With a nut like Blaney you never can tell. Want to come along?”
“Have you got keys?”
“Keys? I’m the foreman.”
“Okay, finish your drink.”
He did so, and I got the bill and paid it, and we got our hats and coats and emerged. Meanwhile I was considering a complication and deciding how to handle it. Of course with the sedan I could have lost a dozen taxis if I had wanted to, but it would take time and gas and wear on the tires, and anyhow, the way it was shaping up, it seemed uncalled-for. So when we were on the sidewalk alongside the sedan I asked him to wait a minute, marched back to where the taxi was still parked, jerked the door open and stuck my head in, and said, “There’s no sense in this, Helen. Look at that meter! Come on and ride with us.”
Even in the dim light she recognized me at the first glance, which I took as a compliment. After gasping, she left her mouth hanging open, but in spite of that handicap no one with an eye for essentials would have had any fault to find with the outlook, or perhaps I should say the inlook.
She re-established control of her jaw muscles enough to say briefly, “Get out!”
“Lookit, mister—” the taxi driver began like a menace.
“Everybody relax,” I said pleasantly. “I can’t get out because I’m not in, I’m only looking in.” I told the temples, “This is absolutely childish. You don’t know the first principle of tailing, and this driver you happened to get is, if anything, worse. If you insist on tailing Joe, okay, well put him in the cab and let them go ahead, and you ride with me and I’ll show you how it’s done.”
“Yeah?” the menace croaked. “Show her how what’s done?”
“See that,” I told her. “See the kind of mind he’s got.”
All her muscles were now under control. “You’re smart as they come, aren’t you?”
“That,” I said, “you will learn more about as time goes on. I’m at least smarter than you are if you let that meter continue to tick. Pay him and come on.”
She moved, so I stood aside and held the door while she got out. On the sidewalk she faced me and said, “You seem to be in charge of everything, so you pay him.”
It was an unpleasant surprise, but I didn’t hesitate, first, because I liked the way she was handling herself, and second, because all expenses would come out of the five grand anyway. So I parted with two bucks, took her elbow and steered her to the sedan, opened the front door and told Joe Groll, “Move over a little. There’s room for three.”
It was his turn to let his jaw hang. Apparently it was going to be prolonged, and he didn’t budge, so I took her elbow again and escorted her around to the other side and told her, “Slide in under the wheel. I’d rather have you next to me anyhow.”
She did so, and I got in and slammed the door. By the time I had got the engine started and rolled to the corner and turned downtown, neither of them had said a word.
“If I were you folks,” I told them, “I would incorporate and call it the Greater New York Mutual Tailing League. I don’t see how you keep track of who is following whom on any given day. Of course if one of you gets convicted of murder that will put a stop to it. You have now, however, the one good reason that I know of for getting married, the fact that a wife can’t testify against a husband or vice versa.” I swerved around a pushcart. “One thing you want to watch. Now that Poor is dead, Helen will try to sell you the idea, Joe, that she was meeting him on the sly merely to keep him informed of anything Blaney seemed to be up to, and Joe will try to sell you the idea, Helen, that he was seeing Martha merely for that too. Now, of course, he can’t marry her, at least not for a long time, because it would look suspicious, and he may want you for a stopgap. You should both be realistic—”
“Can it,” Joe croaked. “We’re not going there, where I said. Stop and let me out.”
“Oh, yes we are.” I stepped on it. “Stopgap or not, you are enjoying feeling her sit next to you as much as I am, and I could keep right on going to the foot of the rainbow. If you really wanted out, what was wrong with any of the stops for traffic lights? She can help us, and it won’t hurt to have a witness. The idea is, Helen, we are bound for the Blaney and Poor office to go through the abditories. We think we hid something in them.”
“What?” she demanded.
“We don’t know. Maybe a detailed estimate in triplicate of what it would cost to kill Poor. Maybe a blueprint of the cigar. Even a rough sketch would help.”
“That’s ridiculous. You sound to me like a clown.”
“Good. It is a well-known fact that clowns have the biggest and warmest hearts on record except mothers and three characters in books by Dickens. So if and when you get tired of being a stopgap, just give me a ring and— here we are.”
I pulled over to the curb in front of Blaney and Poor’s on Varick Street.