"One moment. I was empowered without reservation-"
"That's all right. Fred was tailing us and Neya went down for him and I gave it to him and he's on his way with it now. He can be traced here easy, and so can we. The place has been frisked by someone in a hurry-drawers standing open, things scattered on the floor, and so on. The number of this phone is Hammond 3-4505. Do you want me to keep on talking?"
"No."
"Do you want to ring off and let your genius work and I'll call again in three minutes?"
"No. You had better stay there, both of you. Mr Cramer is here, and I'll tell him about it. Hold the wire."
I heard him telling Cramer, and I heard noises which were presumably the inspector turning somersaults. Then a voice in my ear not Wolfe's.
"Goodwin!" Cramer yapped.
"Yes, sir, speaking."
"You stay there, hear me?"
"Yes, sir."
That was all, except the click I hung up and walked to Neya, took her elbow and steered her to a chair, and put her in it.
"They'll be here in five minutes. Or less. This time Inspector Cramer will get here first. And this time you're connected up. Here in your own front room. What are you going to tell him?"
Her eyes met mine. They didn't waver, but she was having trouble with her chin. She shook her head. "What can I tell him?"
"I don't know. What can you?"
"Nothing."
"Not enough. Under the circumstances. Did your friend Carla do it?"
"I don't know."
"Did you?"
"You know I didn't!"
"I do not Is there a lot of stuff around here about Bosnian forests and Barrett amp; De Russy and secret codes-"
"No, nothing. I am very careful."
"Yeah, this looks like it. All I'm saying, if you try telling Cramer that you know nothing about Faber and you can't imagine why in the world he came here to get killed, you'll find yourself out on a limb If you tell the truth, that won't be it, and if you decide on lies, you'll have to do a lot better than that. One little fact is that whoever killed Faber deprived you of your alibi for the murder of Ludlow. I'm not trying to scare you, I'm only trying to make you grab hold-"
The phone rang and I went and got it.
"This is Hammond 3-45-"
"Archie. Mr Cramer will be there shortly."
"Goody!"
"How is Miss Tormic?"
"She's all right. She says her mind's a blank."
"Shock?"
"No, just ignorance."
"When she is questioned about anything except her movements since ten o'clock this morning-which is the time Mr Faber left this house alive-she will decline to reply except in the presence of her attorney. That is amply justified in the circumstances."
"I'll tell her that."
"Do so. I'll arrange for Mr Parker to represent her. What does she say about Miss Lovchen?"
"More ignorance. The first thing she did when she entered the room and looked at the floor was let out a yell for Carla."
"I see. That's too bad. By the way, where did you put those germination records on the oncidium hybrids? I want to check them over."
"Christalmighty," I said bitterly. "Here's your daughter sizzling on a spot, and here am I with blood on my fingers off of Faber's shirt, and you prate-why don't you try doing a little work for a change-?"
"I can't work with nothing to work on. Get away as soon as you can. Where did you put those records?"
I told him. He thanked me and rang off. I looked at Neya, sitting there with her jaw clamped and her fingers twisted, and observed grimly, "You certainly picked a lulu for an adopted daddy. Do you know what he's doing? Checking up on orchid seeds he planted a year ago! Incidentally, he says you are to answer any questions the cops ask about your movements since ten o'clock this morning. All other questions, refuse to answer until you see a lawyer. He's getting one."
"A lawyer for me?"
"Yes."
A police siren sounded through the window I had left open.
Chapter Fourteen At five minutes past two Wolfe sipped the last drop of his luncheon coffee, put down his cup, and made two distinct and separate oral noises. The first was meant to express his pleasure and satisfaction in the immediate past, the hour spent at the table; the second was a grunt of resigned dismay at the prospect of the immediate future, which was embodied in the bulky figure of Inspector Cramer, planted in a chair in the office. He had arrived on the stroke of two and was waiting.
Wolfe and I went in and sat down. The end of the unlighted cigar in Cramer's mouth described a figure-eight.
"I hate to hurry your meal," he said sarcastically.
Wolfe eructed.
The inspector turned the sarcasm on me. "Have you had any new ideas about the purpose of your going there with Miss Tormic?"
I shook my head. "No, sir. As I told you, we merely went there to get Miss Lovchen."
"And what were you going to do with her?"
"We were going to bring her to see Mr Wolfe. To go over things."
"Had she suddenly developed paralysis of the legs?"
"Please, Mr Cramer," Wolfe murmured. "That's childish, and you know it is. Flopping your arms around is no way to discuss anything. If Archie and Miss Tormic were engaged on a mysterious errand, you don't suppose you're going to squeeze it out of him, do you?"
With his fingers entwined, Cramer rubbed his thumb-tips together, back and forth, with the cigar in his mouth aimed at the ceiling.
Finally he said, "I've been sitting here thinking."
Wolfe nodded sympathetically. "It's a good room to think in. The faint sounds from the street are just right."
Silence.
Cramer said, "I'm not a fool."
Wolfe nodded again. "We all feel like that occasionally. The poison of conceit. It's all right if you keep an antidote handy."
"Hell, I'm not conceited." The inspector removed the cigar. "What I chiefly meant about not being a fool, I meant that I'm sitting here because I doubt very much if I'll get a start on this case anywhere except right here in this room."
"Well, as I say, it's a good room to think in."
"Yeah. I'm not talking about thinking. I'm talking about you. This case is a hush-hush and I don't know why, and as sure as God made little apples you do know why. I don't expect you to blurt it out, but you've given me a hint before and you might do it again. I wouldn't be surprised if you know right now who killed Ludlow and who killed Faber."
"You're wrong. I don't."
"Well, you know something about it that I don't know. Take your client, for instance. Why is that girl your client? Can she pay the kind of fee you charge? She cannot. Then who's going to pay you? You know that, don't you? You're damn right you do. You go in for fancy tricks only when someone makes it well worth your while. For example, that Durkin that works for you that was there in the taxi. And Goodwin admits he called him up to that room and then sent him away in his car. Your car. I'm betting the Lovchen girl went with him."
"Nonsense. Fred came directly here alone."
"You say."
"Well, ask Fritz who opened the door-"
"Nuts. What good does it do to ask questions of anybody who works for you? But we'll find Lovchen, and we'll find Zorka too, don't think we won't."
"You've found no trace of them?"
"Not yet. We will. We had a tail on Lovchen, but he hasn't reported and we don't know where he is. Another thing, you had Zorka right here in this house, on the grill-"
"She was drunk."
"She wasn't too drunk to climb down a fire escape. According to you." Cramer brandished the cigar at him. "Do you realize that this time I could actually slap a charge of obstructing justice on you?"