What was the matter with leaving Fred and Johnny here and letting me go to Fifty-fifth Street to do my own scouting?
That might have been sensible, if you want me to see Mike Walsh by seven o’clock.
All I’m suggesting is a little friendly chat.
I’ve heard you admit you’ve got lots of bad habits, but the worst one is the way you dig up odd facts out of phone calls and other sources when my back is turned and then expect me …” I waved a hand.
Wolfe said,
“Nonsense.
When have my expectations of you ventured beyond your capacity?”
“Never.
How could they?
But, for instance, if it’s so important for me to see Mike Walsh it might be a good idea for me to know why, unless you want him wrapped up and brought here.”
Wolfe shook his head.
“Not that, I think.
I’ll inform you, Archie.
In good time.” He reached out and touched the button, then sighed and pushed the tray away. “As for my sending Johnny and letting you sit here, you may be needed.
While you were out Mr. Muir telephoned to ask if he might call here at half past two.
It is that now—”
“The devil he did. Muir?”
“Yes.
Mr. Ramsey Muir.
And as for my keeping you in ignorance of facts, you already interfere so persistently with my mental processes that I am disinclined to furnish you further grounds for speculation.
In the present case you know the general situation as well as I do.
Chiefly you lack patience, and my exercise of it infuriates you.
If I know who killed Harlan Scotland since talking with Mr. Lindquist over long distance I think I do—why do I not act at once?
Firstly because I require confirmation, and secondly because our primary interest in this case is not the solution of a murder but the collection of a debt.
If I expect to get the confirmation I require from Mr. Walsh, why do I not get him at once, secure my confirmation, and let the police have him?
Because the course they would probably take, after beating his story out of him, would make it difficult to collect from Lord Clivers, and would greatly complicate the matter of clearing Miss Fox of the larceny charge.
We have three separate goals to reach, and since it will be necessary to arrive at all of them simultaneously—but there is the doorbell.
Mr. Muir is three minutes late.”
I went to the hall and took a look through the panel.
Sure enough, it was Muir.
I opened up and let him in.
From the way he stepped over the door sill and snapped out that he wanted to see Wolfe, it was fairly plain that he was mad as hell.
He had on a brown plaid topcoat cut by a tailor that was out of my class, but twenty-five years too young for him, and apparently he wasn’t taking it off.
I motioned him ahead of me into the office and introduced him, and allowed myself a polite grin when I saw that he wasn’t shaking hands any more than Wolfe was.
I pushed a chair around and he sat with his hat on his knees.
Wolfe said,
“Your secretary, on the telephone, seemed not to know what you wished to see me about.
My surmise was, your charge against Miss Clara Fox.
You understand of course that I am representing Miss Fox.”
“Yes.
I understand that.”
“Well, sir?”
The bones of Muir’s face seemed to show, and his ears seemed to point forward, more than they had the day before.
He kept his lips pressed together and his jaw was working from side to side as if all this emotion in his old age was nearly too much for him.
I remembered how he had looked at Clara Fox the day before and thought it was remarkable that he could keep his digestion going with all the stew there must have been inside of him.
He said,
“I have come here at the insistence of Mr. Perry.” His voice trembled a little, and when he stopped his jaw slid around. “I want you to understand that I know she took that money.
She is the only one who could have taken it.
It was found in her car.” He stopped a little to control his jaw. “Mr. Perry told me of your threat to sue for damages.
The insinuation in it is contemptible.