“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 as 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 reestablished 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.”