I got up and went to the billiard table and asked Ferris politely, “Shall I rack ’em up and we’ll lag for the break?”
He was too mad to speak. He just nodded.
A couple of hours later, going on ten o’clock, Nero Wolfe said to me, “Archie. About your leaving the dinner table. You know what I think of any disturbance at a meal.”
“Yes, sir.”
We were in his room, bound for bed. Mine was down the hall, and I had stopped in at his by request.
“I concede,” he said, “that there may be exceptions, and this was one. Mr. Bragan is either a dunce or a ruffian.”
“Or both. At least, I wasn’t tied to a stake — I must remember to thank him... You going fishing tomorrow?”
“You know I’m not.” Seated, he grunted as he bent over to unlace his shoes. That done, he straightened. “I inspected the kitchen and equipment, and it will serve. They’ll be back at 11:30. I’ll take over the kitchen at ten. The cook is civil and fairly competent. I wish to make an avowal. You were right to oppose this expedition. These people are engaged in bitter and savage combat, with Ambassador Kelefy at the center of it, and in his present humor I doubt if he could distinguish between trout Montbarry and carp fried in lard. As for the others, their mouths would water only at the prospect of long pig. Do you know what that is?”
I nodded. “Cannibal stew. Only, each one would want to pick the pig.”
“No doubt.” He kicked his shoes off. “If we leave after lunch, say 3 o’clock, will we be home by bedtime?”
I said sure, and told him good night. As I opened the door he spoke to my back: “By the way, it is not lumbago.”
The next morning at 9:30 Wolfe and I had breakfast together at a little table in the big room. The five fishermen had gone off before 8 o’clock, each to his assigned stretch of the three miles of private water.
I had my own personal fishing program and had cleared it with our host the evening before. The five anglers were due back at the lodge at 11:30, leaving the whole three miles vacant. Wolfe didn’t intend to join them at the lunch table anyhow, and certainly I wouldn’t be missed. I would have two hours of it, and Bragan told me, though not very cordially, to help myself to tackle and waders from the cabinets and drawers.
After breakfast I offered to go and help in the kitchen, but Wolfe said I would only be in the way; so I went to the cabinets and started poking around. That was quite a collection, considering that five men had already helped themselves, presumably to the best. I finally ended up with a three-piece rod and a reel, tapered leaders, a fly box with two dozen assorted flies, a 14-inch willow creel, an aluminum-frame net, and waders. Assaying at around four hundred bucks on the hoof, I went to the kitchen and got three roast-beef sandwiches and a pair of chocolate bars and stowed them in the creel.
Not bothering to take off the waders, I moseyed outdoors for a look at the sky and a feel of the wind. It was a fine day, maybe too fine for good fishing, with a few white clouds floating high above the pines. The river curved around the lodge in almost a full semicircle, with the lodge’s main veranda facing the big bulge of the curve. I found myself faced with a problem in etiquette. Toward one end of the veranda, ten yards to my left, was seated Adria Kelefy, reading a magazine. Towards the other end, ten yards to my right, was seated Sally Leeson, her chin propped on her fist, gazing across the veranda rail at nature. Neither had paid me any visible or audible attention. The problem was, should I wish them good morning, and, if so, which was first?
I passed. If they wanted a snubbing contest, okay. But I thought they might as well realize the kind of man they were snubbing, so I acted. There were no trees between the veranda and the river — which wasn’t a river at all, merely a creek. From the assortment on the veranda I took an aluminum chair with a canvas seat, carried it down the steps and across the clearing, put it on a level spot ten feet from the creek’s edge, put a Gray Hackle on the leader, sat in the chair, whipped a little line out, and dropped the fly onto the ripples.
If you ask whether I expected a hit in that unlikely piece of riffle, the answer is yes. I figured that a guy who went to that much trouble to put on an act for two women who had snubbed him deserved some cooperation from a mature male trout, and if he deserved it why shouldn’t he get it? I might have, too, if Junior hadn’t come along and spoiled it. About the twentieth cast my eyes caught a tiny flash and my fingers felt the take, and there I was with Junior on. I gave him the air immediately, hoping he would flop off, but he had it good. If it had been Daddy I could have tired him out, swung him in to me, and taken him off the hook with a dry hand, since he would soon be on the menu, but that little cuss had to be put back with a wet hand. So I had to leave the chair, to dip a hand in the creek before I touched him, which ruined the act.
As I put him back where he belonged, having taught him a lesson, the sound of steps came, and a voice:
“I didn’t know you could fish like that from a chair! Where is it?” She said “feesh.”
“Good morning, Mrs. Kelefy. I put it back. Too small.”
“Oh!” She had reached me. “Let me.” She put out a hand. “I’m going to catch one.”
She looked fully as portable in the strong daylight as she had at night, and the dark eyes just as sleepy. When a woman has eyes like that, a man with any scientific instinct at all wants to find out what it takes to light them up. But a glance at my wrist told me I would be shoving off in eighteen minutes, not time enough to start on research, especially with Sally Leeson sitting there on the veranda gazing, apparently now, at us.
I shook my head. “It would be fun to see you catch a fish,” I told her, “but I can’t give you this rod because it isn’t mine. Mr. Bragan lent it to me, and I’m sure he’ll lend you one. I’m sorry. To show you how sorry I am, would you care to know one thing I thought as I looked at you last evening at the dinner table?”
“I want to catch a fish. I never saw a fish caught before.” She actually reached to close her fingers on the rod.
I held on. “Mr. Bragan will be here any minute.”
“If you give it to me I’ll let you tell me what you thought last evening.”
I shrugged. “I’m not sure I remember it, anyhow. Skip it.”
No spark in the eyes. But her hand left the rod and her voice changed a little, person to person: “Of course you remember. What was it?”
“Let’s see — how did it go? Oh, yes. That big, green thing in the ring on your husband’s left hand — is it an emerald?”
“Certainly.”
“I thought it might be. So I was thinking your husband should display his assets more effectively. With those two assets, the emerald and you, he should have combined them. The best way would be an earring on your right ear, with nothing on the left ear. I had a notion to suggest it to him.”
She shook her head. “I wouldn’t like it. I like pearls.” She reached again for a hold on the rod. “Now I’ll catch a fish.”
It looked as if we were headed for a tussle, but an arrival broke it up. James Arthur Ferris, his lanky length fully accoutered, approached, speaking:
“Good morning, Mrs. Kelefy! A glorious day, glorious!”
“I want to catch a fish,” Mrs. Kelefy told him, “and this man won’t give me his rod. I’ll take yours.”
“Of course,” he gushed. “With great pleasure. I have a Blue Dun on, but if you’d rather try something else—”
I was on my way.
The general run of the creek — all right, river, then — was to the north, but of course it did a lot of twisting and dodging, as shown on a big wall map at the lodge. The three miles of private water were divided into five equal stretches for solo fishing, with the boundaries of the stretches marked by numbered stakes. Two of the stretches were to the south of the lodge, upstream, and the other three to the north, downstream. As arranged the evening before, for that day Nicholas Papps and Ambassador Kelefy had the two to the south, and Ferris, Leeson, and Bragan the three to the north.