“You’ll tell her later, or I will. I’ll pay Saul’s fee and expenses.”
“She will want to.”
“Then she may. That’s of no consequence.”
I said okay and released the brake. As I steered back onto the blacktop I filed for future reference his amazing statement that a grand or two, maybe more, was of no consequence.
Chapter 6
The Monroe County Register, eight pages, was published in Timberburg once a week, on Friday afternoon, and copies of it arrived at Vawter’s in Lame Horse around five o’clock. At the cabin we were usually willing to wait until Saturday to get our copy, or even Monday or Tuesday, but that Friday I was at Vawter’s when it came, not by accident, and I got two extra copies. At five-thirty Wolfe and I were in his room discussing an item on the front page which said:
County Attorney Thomas R. Jessup announced today that he has arranged with Nero Wolfe, the internationally known private detective, and his confidential assistant, Archie Goodwin, to act as special investigators in the inquiry into the murder of Philip Brodell of St. Louis, a guest at the ranch of William T. Farnham, near Lame Horse, on July 25th.
Asked by a Register reporter if he expected Wolfe and Goodwin to get evidence that would strengthen the case against Harvey Greve, who is in the county jail charged with the murder, Jessup said, “Not specifically or necessarily. If I considered the case against Greve to be weak he wouldn’t have been charged and held without bail. It is simply that I learned that Nero Wolfe was available, and this case has aroused intense and nationwide interest, and I felt that the people of Monroe County, the people of the entire State of Montana, would expect me to use the services of such an outstanding investigator as Nero Wolfe if that was possible, and it was.”
The county attorney added, “Wolfe and Goodwin will of course be under my supervision and control. There will be no additional expense to the county, since they ask no fee, and any evidence they secure will be scrutinized and checked by my office. If they find no new evidence no harm will be done. If they do find new evidence, and my office finds it to be valid and material, I think the people of Monroe County will agree with me that they have rendered us a service.”
Asked if he was aware that it is generally known that Archie Goodwin, who is a guest at the cabin of Miss Lily Rowan, owner of the Bar JR Ranch, has been trying to find evidence that would weaken the case against Greve, not strengthen it, the county attorney stated that the personal opinion or interest of Archie Goodwin, or of anyone else, would not be permitted to affect the performance of his duty.
“What I want,” he said, “and what the people of Monroe County want, is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”
Asked by a Register reporter if he had been consulted about the entry of Wolfe and Goodwin into the investigation, Sheriff Morley Haight said, “No comment.” Further questions got the same reply. “No comment.”
Nero Wolfe, reached by telephone at Miss Rowan’s cabin, where he is also a guest, would say only that he would say nothing because he thought it proper that all information about his participation in the case should come only from County Attorney Jessup.
Word of this development came just as we were preparing to go to press, and we’re giving ourselves a pat on the back at being the first paper in the country to get it into type. It isn’t often a weekly gets a national scoop. We’re sending five copies of this edition to the Library of Congress. Hang onto yours. It may be worth money some day.
Reading it, Wolfe had made a face several times, but in our discussion of it he had criticized only two words. He said “sleuth” was a vulgarism, and “supervision” was jugglery. But he admitted that everybody knows that if an elected person means everything he says he’s a damn fool, so there was no argument.
There had been an argument the previous evening when Jessup had phoned to say he had decided that it would be in the public interest to accept our offer to assist him in the investigation, and we could get our credentials at his office at eleven o’clock in the morning, and Wolfe had said I would go for them. I was a little surprised that Jessup hadn’t said that Wolfe must come too, but probably he was afraid that he would try to talk him into letting us go through the file, which hadn’t been mentioned. The argument had come afterward between Wolfe and me. I had said that my first stop after getting the credentials would be the Presto filling station for some conversation with Gil Haight, and he said no, and I said that aside from the chance of starting something I wanted the satisfaction of seeing his face when I flashed the credentials on him.
“No,” Wolfe repeated, emphatic. “His alibi can be attacked only through the men who support it, and that can wait until there is nothing better to do.”
“For me,” I said, “there’s nothing better to do than telling Gilbert Haight I’ve got some questions and asking him if he would prefer to go to the county attorney’s office to answer them. So that’s what I’ll do.”
“I said no.”
“But I say yes, and the question is what I do.”
A confrontation. Our eyes were meeting. Mine were just the eyes of a friendly equal who knew he had a point so there was no use squabbling, but his were narrowed to slits. He closed them long enough for a couple of good deep breaths, then opened them to normal. “This is the eighth of August,” he said. “Thursday.”
“Right.”
“Your vacation ended Wednesday, July thirty-first. As you know, I brought a checkbook. Draw a check for your salary for a week and a half, which will cover it to the end of this week and put you on a weekly basis as usual.”
I raised one brow, which I often find helpful because he can’t do it. There were angles both pro and con. Con, I knew the people and the atmosphere and he didn’t; and my taking a leave of absence without pay had been by my decision, not by agreement. Pro, his coming to get me back sooner had been by his decision, not by agreement; and while a grand or two might be of no consequence to him it was to me; and the strain of trying to remember to say please was cramping his style. It took pro about a minute to get the verdict. I figured it on a sheet from my notebook — $600 minus federal income tax withheld $153.75, state income tax $33.00, and Social Security tax $23.88 — went and got the checkbook from a dresser drawer, drew a check to the order of Archie Goodwin for $389.37, and handed it to him with a pen, and he signed it and forked it over.
“Okay,” I said, “instructions, please. What’s better to do than riding Gil Haight?”
“I don’t know.” He stood up. “It’s bedtime. We’ll see tomorrow.”
Tomorrow, Friday, the weather horned in. There on the eastern slopes of the Rockies the summer sun bats around.900. There had been only three days in July when you had to bother about a poncho when you saddled your horse. But Friday it was raining, good and steady, when I got up, when I drove to Timberburg, when I got back, late for lunch, and when I drove to Lame Horse a little before five to get the Monroe County Register. I don’t accuse Wolfe of stalling. The credentials, which were “To Whom It May Concern” typed on Jessup’s official letterhead and signed by him — one for each of us — cleared the deck, but I agreed that it was a good idea to wait until the Register had spread the news.