When they had gone Wolfe sat and stared across the room at nothing a full three minutes before he pushed back his chair, though Fritz had announced lunch. Then he heaved a deep sigh, got himself up, and growled at me to come on.
We had just returned to the office after a silent meal that was anything but convivial when the doorbell rang and I went to answer it. Not many times has it given me pleasure to see a cop on that stoop, but that was one of them. Even a humble dick would have been a sign that something had happened or might be ready to happen, and this was Inspector Cramer himself. I opened up and invited him to cross the sill, took his hat and coat, and escorted him to the office without bothering to announce him.
He grunted at Wolfe, and Wolfe grunted back. He sat, got a cigar from his vest pocket, inspected it, stuck it between his teeth, moved his jaw to try it at various angles, and took it out again.
"I'm deciding how to start this," he muttered.
"Can I help?" Wolfe asked politely.
"Yes. But you won't. One tiling, I'm not going to get sore. It wouldn't do any good, because I doubt if I've got anything on you that would stick. Is that deal we made still on?"
"Of course. Why not?"
"Then you will kindly fill me in. When you decided to trick us into taking a jab at someone, why did you pick Corrigan?"
Wolfe shook his head. "You had better start over, Mr. Cramer. That's the worst possible way. There was no trick -"
Cramer cut in rudely and emphatically with a vulgar word. He went on. "I said I'm not going to get sore, and I'm not, but look at it. You get hold of that letter with that notation on it, the first real evidence anyone has seen that links someone in that office with Baird Archer and therefore with the murders. A real hot find. There were several ways you could have used it, but you pass them all up and send the letter down to me. I sent Lieutenant Rowcliff up there this morning. Corrigan admits the notation resembles his handwriting, but absolutely denies that he made it or ever saw it or has any idea what it stands for. The others all make the same denials."
Cramer cocked his head. "I've sat here many a time and listened to you making an assumption on poorer ground than what I've made this one on. I don't know how you got hold of a sample of Corrigan's handwriting, but that would have been easy. And I don't know whether it was you or Goodwin who made that notation on that letter, and I don't care. One of you did. All I want to know is, why? You're too smart and too lazy to play a trick like that just for the hell of it. That's why I'm not sore and I'm not going to get sore. You expected it to get you something. What?"
He put the cigar in his mouth and sank his teeth in it.
Wolfe regarded him. "Confound it," he said regretfully, "we're not going to get anywhere."
"Why not? I'm being goddam reasonable."
"You are indeed. But we can't meet. You will listen to me only if I concede your assumption that Mr. Goodwin or I made the notation on the letter, imitating Corrigan's hand. You will not listen to me if I deny that and substitute my own assumption, that the notation was in fact a trick but not mine. Will you?"
'Try it."
"Very well. Someone wanted to provide me with evidence that would support the line I was taking, but of such a nature and in such a manner that I would be left exactly where I was. Its pointing at Corrigan may have been deliberate or merely adventitious; it had to point at someone, and it may be that Corrigan was selected because he is somehow invulnerable. I preferred not to make an ass of myself by acting on it. All I would have got was a collection of denials. As it now stands, Lieutenant Rowcliff got the denials, and I am uncommitted. They don't know - he doesn't know - how I took it. For my part, I don't know who he is or what is moving him or why he wants to prod me, but I would like to know. If he acts again I may find out." Wolfe upturned a palm. "That's all."
"I don't believe it."
"I didn't expect you to."
"Okay. I've listened to it on your assumption, now try mine. You made the notation on the letter yourself and made me a present of it. Why?"
"No, Mr. Cramer. I'm sorry, but that's beyond my powers. Unless you also assume that I've lost my senses, and in that case why waste time on me?"
"I won't." Cramer left his chair, and as he did so his determination not to get sore suddenly went up the flue. He hurled his unlit cigar at my wastebasket, missed by a yard, and hit me on the ankle. "Fat bloated lousy liar," he rasped, and turned and tramped out.
Thinking that under the circumstances it was just as well to let him wriggle into his coat unaided, I stayed put. But also thinking that he might take a notion to try a simple little trick himself, when the front door slammed I got up and moseyed to the hall for a look through the one-way glass panel, and saw him cross to the sidewalk and get into his car, the door of which had been opened for an inspector.
When I returned to the office Wolfe was leaning back with his eyes closed and his brow creased. I sat. I hoped to God he didn't feel as helpless and useless as I did, but from the expression on his face I had another hope coming. I looked at my wrist and saw 2:52. When I looked again it said 3:06. I wanted to yawn but thought I didn't deserve to, and choked it.
Wolfe's voice blurted, "Where's Mr. Wellman?"
"In Peoria. He went Friday."
He had opened his-eyes and straightened up. "How long does it take an airplane to get to Los Angeles?"
"Ten or eleven hours. Some of them more."
"When does the next one go?"
"I don't know."
"Find out. Wait. Have we ever before been driven to extremities as now?"
"No."
"I agree. His gambit of that notation on that letter - what for? Confound him! Nothing but denials. You have the name and address of Dykes's sister in California."
"Yes, sir."
"Phone Mr. Wellman and tell him that I propose to send you to see her. Tell him it is either that or abandon the case. If he approves the expenditure, reserve a seat on the next plane and get packed. By then I shall have instructions ready for you. Is there plenty of cash in the safe?"
"Yes."
"Take enough. You are willing to cross the continent in an airplane?"
"I'll risk it."
He shuddered. He regards a twenty-block taxi ride as a reckless gamble.
14
I HADN'T been to the West Coast for several years. I slept most of the night but woke up when the stewardess brought morning coffee and then kept my eyes open for a look down at the country. There is no question that a desert landscape is neater than where things have simply got to grow, and of course they don't have the weed problem, but from up above I saw stretches where even a few good big weeds would have been a help.
My watch said 11:10 as the plane taxied to a stop on the concrete of the Los Angeles airport, and I set it back to ten past eight before I arose and filed out to the gangway and off. It was warm and muggy, with no sign of the sun. By the time I got my suitcase and found a taxi I had to use a handkerchief on my face and neck. Then the breeze through the open window came at me, and, not wanting to get pneumonia in a foreign country, I shut the window. The people didn't look as foreign as some of the architecture and most of the vegetation. Before we got to the hotel it started to rain.
I had a regulation breakfast and then went up and had a regulation bath. My room - it was the Riviera - had too many colors scattered around but was okay. It smelled swampy, but I couldn't open a window on account of the rain. When I was through bathing and shaving and dressing and unpacking it was after eleven, and I got at the phone and asked Information for the number of Clarence O. Potter, 2819 Whitecrest Avenue, Glendale.
I called the number, and after three whirs a female voice told my ear hello.
I was friendly but not sugary. "May I speak to Mrs. Clarence Potter, please?"