And Be a Villain

Chapter Nine

I had a bad break., An idea that came to me at the dinner table, while I was pretending to listen to Wolfe telling how men with moustaches a foot long used to teach mathematics in schools in Montenegro, required, if it was to bear fruit, some information from the janitor at 829 Wixley Avenue. But when, immediately after dinner, I drove up there, he had gone to the movies and I had to wait over an hour for him. I got what I hoped would be all I needed, generously ladled out another buck of Starlite money, drove back downtown and put the car in the garage, and went home and up to my room. Wolfe, of course, was in the office, and the door was standing open, but I didn't even stop to nod as I went by.

In my room I gave my teeth an extra good brush, being uncertain how long they would have to wait for the next one, and then did my packing for the trip by putting a comb and hairbrush in my topcoat pocket. I didn't want to have a bag to take care of. Also, I made a phone call. I made it there instead of in the office because Wolfe had put it off on me without a trace of a hint regarding ways and means, and if he wanted it like that, okay. In that case there was no reason why he should listen to me giving careful and explicit instructions to Saul Panzer. Downstairs again, I did pause at the office door to tell him good night, but that was all I had for him.

Tuesday night I had had a little over three hours' sleep, and Wednesday night about the same. That night Thursday, I had less than three, and only in snatches. At six-thirty Friday morning, when I emerged to the cab platform at the Atlantic City railroad station, it was still half-dark, murky, chilly, and generally unattractive. I had me a good yawn, shivered from head to foot, told a taxi driver I was his customer but he would please wait for me a minute, and then stepped to the taxi just behind him and spoke to the driver of it: “This time of day one taxi isn't enough for me, I always need two. I'll take the one in front and you follow, and when we stop we'll have a conference.”

“Where you going?”

“Not far.” I pushed a dollar bill at him. “You won't get lost.”

He nodded without enthusiasm and kicked his starter. I climbed into the front cab and told the driver to pull up somewhere in the vicinity of the Ambassador Hotel. It wasn't much of a haul, and a few minutes later he rolled to the kerb, which at that time of day had space to spare. When the other driver stopped right behind us I signalled to him, and he came and joined us.

“I have enemies,” I told him.

They exchanged a glance and one of them said, “Work it out yourself, bud, we're just hackies. My meter says sixty cents.”

“I don't mean that kind of enemies. It's wife and daughter. They're ruining my life. How many ways are there for people to leave the Ambassador Hotel? I don't mean dodges like fire escapes and coal chutes, just normal ways.”

“Two,” one said.

Three,” the other said.

“Make up your minds.”

They agreed on three, and gave me the layout.

“Then there's enough of us,” I decided. “Here.” I shelled out two fives, with an extra single for the one who had carried me to even it up. “The final payment will depend on how long it takes, but you won't have to sue me. Now listen,”

They did so.

Ten minutes later, a little before seven, I was standing by some kind of a bush with no leaves on it, keeping an eye on the oceanfront entrance of the Ambassador. Gobs of dirty grey mist being batted around by icy gusts made it seem more like a last resort than a resort. Also, I was realizing that I had made a serious mistake when I had postponed breakfast until there would be time to do it right. My stomach had decided that since it wasn't going to be needed any more it might as well try shrivelling into a ball and see how I liked that.

I tried to kid it along by swallowing, but because I hadn't brushed my teeth it didn't taste like me at all, so I tried spitting instead, but that only made my stomach shrivel faster. After less than half an hour of it, when my watch said a quarter-past seven, I was wishing to God I had done my planning better when one of my taxis came dashing around a corner to a stop, and the driver called to me and opened the door.

“They're off, bud.”

“The station?”

“I guess so. That way.” He made a U turn and stepped on the gas. “They came out the cab entrance and took one there. Tony's on their tail.”

I didn't have to spur him on because he was already taking it hop, skip, and jump. My wrist watch told me nineteen past-eleven minutes before the seven-thirty for New York would leave. Only four of them had been used up when we did a fancy swerve and jerked to a stop in front of the railroad station. I hopped out. Just ahead of us a woman was paying her driver while a girl stood at her elbow.

“Duck, you damn' fool,” my driver growled at me. “They ain't blind, are they?”

“That's all right,” I assured him. “They know I'm after them. It's a war of nerves.”

Tony appeared from somewhere, and I separated myself from another pair of fives and then entered the station. There was only one ticket window working, and mother and child were at it, buying. I moseyed on to the train shed, still with three minutes to go, and was about to glance over my shoulder to see what was keeping them when they passed me on the run, holding hands, daughter in front and pulling Mom along. From the rear I saw them climb on board the train, but I stayed on the platform until the signal had been given and the wheels had started to turn, and then got on.

The diner wasn't crowded. I had a double orange juice, griddle cakes with broiled ham, coffee, French toast with sausage cakes, grape jelly, and more coffee. My stomach and I made up, and we agreed to forget it ever happened.

I decided to go have a look at the family, and here is something I'm not proud of. I had been so damn' hungry that no thought of other stomachs had entered my head. But when, three cars back, I saw them and the look on their faces, the thought did come. Of course they were under other strains too, one in particular, but part of that pale, tight, anguished expression unquestionably came from hunger. They had had no time to grab anything on the way, and their manner of life was such that the idea of buying a meal on a train might not even occur to them.

I went back to the end of the car, stood facing the occupants, and called out: “Get your breakfast in the dining car, three cars ahead! Moderate prices!”

Then I passed down the aisle, repeating it at suitable intervals, once right at their seat. It worked. They exchanged some words and then got up and staggered forward. Not only that, I had made other sales too: a woman, a man, and a couple.

By the time the family returned we were less than an hour from New York. I looked them over as they came down the aisle. Mother was small and round-shouldered and her hair was going grey. Her nose still looked thin and sharp-pointed, but not as much so as it had when she was starving. Nancylee was better-looking, and much more intelligent-looking, than I would have expected from her pictures in the papers or from Saul's description. She had lots of medium-brown hair coming below her shoulders, and blue eyes, so dark that you had to be fairly close to see the blue, that were always on the go. She showed no trace either of Mom's pointed nose or of Pop's acreage of brow. If I had been in high school I would gladly have bought her a Coke or even a sundae.

Danger would begin, I well knew, the minute they stepped off the train at Pennsylvania Station and mounted the stairs. I had decided what to do if they headed for a taxi or bus or the subway, or if Mom started to enter a phone booth. So I was right on their heels when the moment for action came, but the only action called for was a pleasant walk. They took the escalator to the street level, left the station by the north exit, and turned left. I trailed. At Ninth Avenue they turned uptown, and at Thirty-fifth Street left again. That cinched it that they were aiming straight for Wolfe's house, non-stop, and naturally I was anything but crestfallen, but what really did my heart good was the timing. It was exactly eleven o'clock, and Wolfe would get down from the plant rooms and settled in his chair just in time to welcome them.

So it was. West of Tenth Avenue they began looking at the numbers, and I began to close up. At our stoop they halted, took another look, and mounted the steps.

By the time they were pushing the button I was at the bottom of the stoop, but they had taken no notice of me. It would have been more triumphant if I could have done it another way, but the trouble was that Fritz wouldn't let them in until he had checked with Wolfe. So I took the steps two at a time, used my key and flung the door open, and invited them: “Mrs Shepherd? Go right in.”

She crossed the threshold. But Nancylee snapped at me: “You were on the train. There's something funny about this.”

“Mr Wolfe's expecting you,” I said, “if you want to call that funny. Anyway, come inside to laugh, so I can shut the door.”

She entered, not taking her eyes off me. I asked them if they wanted to leave their things in the hall, and they didn't, so I escorted them to the office.

Wolfe, in his chair behind his desk, looked undecided for an instant and then got to his feet. I really appreciated that. He never rises when men enter, and his customary routine when a woman enters is to explain, if he feels like taking the trouble, that he keeps his chair because getting out of it and back in again is a more serious undertaking for him than for most men. I knew why he was breaking his rule. It was a salute to me, not just for producing them, but for getting them there exactly at the first minute of the day that he would be ready for them.

“Mrs Shepherd,” I said, “this is Mr Nero Wolfe. Miss Nancylee Shepherd.”

Wolfe bowed. “How do you do, ladies.”

“My husband,” Mom said in a scared but determined voice. “Where's my husband?”

“He'll be here soon,” Wolfe assured her. “He was detained. Sit down, madam.”

I grinned at him and shook my head. “Much obliged for trying to help, but that's not the line.” I shifted the grin to the family. “I'll have to explain not only to you but to Mr Wolfe too. Have you got the telegram with you? Let me have it a minute?”

Mom would have opened her handbag, but Nancylee stopped her. “Don't give it to him!” She snapped at me, “You let us out of here right now!”

“No,” I said, “not right now, but I will in about five minutes if you still want to go. What are you afraid of? Didn't I see to it that you got some breakfast?

First I would like to explain to Mr Wolfe, and then I'll explain to you.” I turned to Wolfe. “The telegram Mrs Shepherd has in her bag reads as follows:

Take first train to New York and go to office of Nero Wolfe at 918 West Thirty-fifth Street. He is paying for this telegram. Bring Nan with you. Meet me there. Leave your things in your hotel room. Shake a leg. Al. Saul sent it from a telegraph office in the Bronx at six-thirty this morning. You will understand why I had to go up there again to see the janitor. The shake a leg made it absolutely authentic, along with other things.”

“Then Father didn't send it!” Nancylee was glaring at me. “I thought there was something funny about it!” She took her mother's arm. “Come on, we're going!”

“Where, Nan?”

“We're leaving here!”

“But where are we going?” Near-panic was in Mom's eyes and voice. “Home?”

“That's the point,” I said emphatically. “That's just it. Where? You have three choices. First, you can go home, and when the head of the family comes from work you can tell him how you were taken in by a fake telegram. Your faces show how much that appeals to you. Second, you can take the next train back to Atlantic City, but in that case I phone immediately, before you leave, to Mr Shepherd at the warehouse where he works, and tell him that you're here with a wild tale about a telegram, and of course he'll want to speak to you. So again you would have to tell him about being fooled by a fake telegram.”

Mom looked as if she needed some support, so I moved a chair up behind her and she sat.

“You're utterly awful,” Nancylee said. “Just utterly!”

I ignored her and continued to her mother. “Or, third, you can stay here and Mr Wolfe will discuss some matters with Nancylee, and ask her some questions. It may take two hours, or three, or four, so the sooner he gets started the better.

You'll get an extra good lunch. As soon as Mr Wolfe is through I'll take you to the station and put you on a train for Atlantic City. We'll pay your fare both ways and all expenses, such as taxi fare, and your breakfast, and dinner on the train going back. Mr Shepherd, whom I have met, will never know anything about it.” I screwed my lips. “Those are the only choices I can think of, those three.”

Nancylee sat down and-another indication of her intelligence - in the red leather chair.

“This is terrible,” Mom said hopelessly. “This is the worst thing…you don't look like a man that would do a thing like this. Are you absolutely sure my husband didn't send the telegram? Honestly?”

“Positively not,” I assured her. “He doesn't know a thing about it and never will. There's nothing terrible about it. Long before bedtime you'll be back in that wonderful hotel room.”

She shook her head as if all was lost.

“It's not so wonderful,” Nancylee asserted. “The shower squirts sideways and they won't fix it.” Suddenly she clapped a hand to her mouth, went pop-eyed, and sprang from the chair.

“Jumping cats!” she squealed. “Where's your radio? It's Friday! She's broadcasting!”

“No radio,” I said firmly. “It's out of order. Here, let me take your coat and hat.”