Before I Die

IV

I made a full and honest report to Wolfe, when he came down to the office from the plant rooms at six o’clock, only because it no longer mattered. Not only did I not want to try to persuade him to lay off, I was even afraid he might. With me crammed to the gills with Dazy Perrit’s closest and fondest secrets, no kind of a brush-off would have been worth a damn. I was, if you want the facts, scared stiff. So nothing was further from my mind than trying to make Wolfe obstinate by riding him.

At seven o’clock I was telling him, “Incidentally, that Lincoln number he gave me is probably the real thing. T-bone. Chateaubriand, as Fritz calls it. Pig’s liver. Fresh pork tenderloin. Of course it will be useless to ring Tom in the morning if we’re not still in good with Dazy — and his five grand in our safe.”

Wolfe muttered at me, “Get Mr. Perrit.”

Then difficulties arose. At the third number on the list I finally got Perrit, and he said we could expect Violet at Wolfe’s office at nine o’clock that evening. It took less than twenty words, discreetly selected at both ends, with no names mentioned, to complete the conversation. Perrit could have been on a party line and no harm done. But in ten minutes he called back to say that previous engagements interfered and the visitor wouldn’t arrive until eleven-thirty. I said that was pretty late and maybe tomorrow would do. No, he said, it would be tonight, between eleven-thirty and midnight.

Wolfe, who had listened in at his desk, grunted and told me, “Get the daughter.”

“Violet? Or Beulah?”

“The daughter. Miss Page.”

“But what the hell. There’s no rush about making her stop straightening up with a jerk. That was just—”

“We don’t even know there is a daughter. All we have is what Mr. Perrit told us. I want to see her. At the very least, I want you to see her.”

“You going to introduce me to her?”

“Pfui. She is twenty-one years old. Flummox her.”

That wasn’t as much of a chore as some he had been known to give me, since Perrit had given me what he thought would be an in. I referred to the list of numbers, dialed one, and after the third buzz there was a voice in my ear.

“Hello, hello, hello?”

It didn’t sound at all like a Phi Beta Kappa, but I reserved judgment and proceeded.

“May I speak to Miss Beulah Page?”

“Sure. Talking. Are you a preacher?”

“No, Miss Page, I’m not. My name is Stevens, Harold Stevens, from Dayton, Ohio. May I have a minute?”

“Sure. Only it’s too bad you’re not a preacher.”

“It certainly is, if you want one. What I want to ask, I would like very much to have a talk with you, this evening, if possible, because I’ll be in the city only a short while. I want to tell you about the Dayton Community Health Center, and, frankly, we thought you might be willing to help us out with a small contribution. You see, the fame of your generosity in matters of community health work has gone pretty far. And I’d like to tell you what we’re doing and planning. I promise not to take much of your time. Perhaps I could run up to see you right now? I could be there in twenty minutes.”

“I don’t—” A pause. “I’m particularly interested in health work.”

“I know you are,” I said warmly.

“The reason I spoke about a preacher, I’m going to be married. We just decided to, just before the phone rang.”

“Well! That’s just fine! I can be there in twenty minutes. Of course I shouldn’t butt in, but I won’t be in the city—”

“That’s all right. Come ahead. Come on and come ahead.”

“Thank you very much.”

I pushed the phone back and told Wolfe, “Lit. Not plastered, but lit.”

He was busy pouring beer, which Fritz had brought, and uttered only a low growl. Nor did he make any comment as he observed me returning the gun, still lying on my desk, to my side coat-pocket, and arranging its little brother, which I got from a drawer, in an armpit holster of my own design.

I did not actually expect ambush and sudden death as I emerged from the house into the early October dark, but I wasn’t kidding myself that any street or any two-legged animal that had become an object of interest to Dazy Perrit was exactly the same street or the same animal it had been before. And though there is absolutely nothing wrong with my nervous system, things looked and felt different as I went to the garage around the corner, got the convertible, and headed uptown.