Gambit

15

Cramer, seated in the red leather chair, said, “Skip the buildup. What have you got?”

It was a family party, with Saul and Fred and Orrie in chairs lined up before Wolfe’s desk, with refreshments. Fred had bourbon and water, and Saul and Orrie and I were sharing a bottle of champagne. Wolfe had beer. Cramer had nothing, though he had been invited.

Wolfe put his glass down and licked his lips. “It’s a preamble, Mr. Cramer, not a buildup. It’s necessary, and it will be brief. You may recollect an event that occurred four years ago in Piotti’s restaurant on Thirteenth Street.”

“I do. Sergeant Stebbins in the kitchen with Goodwin, with earphones.”

“Yes. A similar event took place there today, with variations. Mr. Panzer was in the kitchen, with a tape recorder instead of earphones. Mr. Durkin and Mr. Cather were in the restaurant, at separate tables. At still another table was Mr. Goodwin, alone, and the bowl of hideous artificial flowers on that table contained a microphone. He had an appointment with Dr. Victor Avery. Shortly before one o’clock Dr. Avery entered the restaurant, went to the table where Mr. Goodwin was, and sat, and Mr. Piotti notified Mr. Panzer in the kitchen, and he started the tape recorder. You are now going to hear the playback. Have I described the circumstances sufficiently?”

“Yes.”

“Have you any questions?”

“I’ll hear it first.”

Wolfe turned. “All right, Saul.” Saul got up and left, taking a glass of champagne along. The speaker was already on. In a moment came the crackles and background noises, and then my voice:

“The spaghetti here is something special. Better have some.”

There was no point in watching Cramer; he would sit with his eyes on Wolfe, his lips tight and his eyes narrowed, no matter what he heard. It was more interesting to watch Fred and Orrie, who hadn’t heard it and knew next to nothing about it. They had turned on their chairs to face the grill. Fred assumed a deadpan, but broke into a broad grin when I told Avery to ring the DA’s office. Orrie cocked his head critically, to judge a colleague’s performance, and he glanced at me off and on to show that he appreciated the fine points. He smiled and nodded approvingly when I pried it out of Avery that he had entered the house, and he pursed his lips when I told Avery that Wolfe had him wrapped up and addressed straight to hell. Just jealous because he knew such a fine line was out of his class — followed by my exit line, “Do you prefer hell or are you coming?” Curtain.

Cramer pulled his feet back, not to get up. “By God,” he said hoarsely. “Did he come? Here?”

“Yes. After he had heard the recording he offered me one hundred thousand dollars in cash, in the hearing of these four men, for the tape and the statement signed by Mr. Goodwin... Give it to him, Archie.”

I got the slip of paper from my pocket and went and handed it over. Cramer read it and looked up. “This is in his handwriting?”

“I don’t know. Presumably.”

He read it again, folded it, and stuck it in his pocket. “I have known you to pull some awful fancy ones. How fancy is this?”

“If by ‘fancy’ you mean specious, not at all. Knowing that Dr. Avery was twice a murderer, I determined to establish it. Since it was impossible—”

“When did you know it? Did you know it when—” Cramer chopped it and got up and made for me, and, knowing what he wanted, I left my chair and he sat. While he took the phone and dialed I helped myself to some champagne, and by the time I had the bottle back in the ice he had Sergeant Stebbins.

“Purley? I’m at Wolfe’s. Get Dr. Victor Avery and bring him in and keep him until I get there. Go yourself. Don’t stop for a warrant. Take him as a material witness in the Kalmus murder, and I mean take him. I want him there when I come — half an hour, maybe more.”

He stood, gave me as sour a look as he had ever favored me with, returned to the red leather chair, gave Wolfe the same look if not worse, and said, “And when I go you and Goodwin are going with me. Who do you two baboons think you are? Goodwin told a barefaced lie and it’s in his signed statement, and yesterday morning you told me I was better acquainted with all the circumstances surrounding the death of Kalmus than you were. How you expect to get away with — damn you, don’t sit there with that curl on your lip! I’ll wipe that off!”

“I’ll save you the trouble,” Wolfe said, no hard feeling. “Mr. Goodwin lied to Dr. Avery, not to you. He didn’t have that house under surveillance Wednesday. As he told you, he arrived there shortly after ten o’clock, accompanied by Miss Blount, so he couldn’t have seen the murderer enter or leave. We gulled Dr. Avery. Since it was impossible—”

That interruption wasn’t by Cramer. Saul had entered with another bottle of champagne. Stopping three steps in and seeing that Wolfe was giving him the floor, he came and got the extra glass and filled it and handed it to Cramer, refilled Orrie’s and mine and his own, put the bottle in the bucket, and sat. Cramer, who had accepted the glass without knowing it, spilled a little on his pants, glared at the glass in his hand as if demanding how it got there, moved it to his mouth, drained it in three gulps, and put it down on the stand.

He sent the glare at Wolfe. “I don’t believe it,” he said. “To make me swallow it, try telling me how you knew Avery had entered that house if Goodwin hadn’t seen him. And knew he had killed Jerin. Let’s hear you.”

Wolfe nodded. “That’s the point, of course. It’s complicated.”

“I’ll bet it is. I’ll try to understand it. Well?”

Wolfe leaned back. “It was an inference, not a conclusion from demonstrable evidence, for I had none. The inference had three legs. First, Blount had not killed Jerin. As you know, I had previously made that assumption, and the murder of Kalmus established it. Second, Jerin had not been killed by one of the messengers — Hausman, Yerkes, Farrow. I have already apologized to myself for my preposterous pretense that that was possible; I now apologize to you. With Jerin sitting there, the tray at his elbow, and with other messengers entering momentarily?”

He jerked a hand to brush it off. “Pfui. Third, only Avery was left. He had had an opportunity, as good as Blount’s if not better; he had made a concoction, ostensibly mustard water, and administered it to Jerin. It was credible that he had had a motive; as recorded on that tape, Mr. Goodwin told him that he had had no malice for Jerin, his purpose was to destroy Blount. That can’t be—”

“Why did he want to destroy Blount?”

“Because he wanted Blount’s wife. That can’t be established, since the only evidence for it is inside him, but neither can it be impeached. I presume you have spoken with Mrs. Blount?”

“Yes. Several times.”

“Is it credible that she might provoke an appetite unwittingly?”

“Hell yes.”

“Then motive is at least plausible. But granted opportunity and motive, two questions remain: why was Jerin taken ill so conveniently before Avery was called in to attend him, and why, again so conveniently, did Avery have arsenic on his person? Indeed, it was not until the answers to those two questions were supplied by Mr. Goodwin, after his conversation with Mr. Blount at the prison yesterday, that my attention was on Dr. Avery at all. There’s a third question, did Dr. Avery know in advance that Jerin would be taken ill, but that’s merely a part of the second one, and the answer is that he could have and almost certainly did. Kalmus had told him. That was what—”

“Come on,” Cramer cut in. “Goodwin got that from Blount. He’s in jail for murder. He’s your client. He’s not mine.”

“I’ll come to that. I’m telling you why I hit on Avery. That was what made Kalmus suspect him, and he made the mistake of undertaking to deal with him tête-à-tête — a mistake that cost him his life.” Wolfe turned a palm up. “So there it was. When Mr. Goodwin reported on his talk with Mr. Blount, I was satisfied that Avery was the man, but I had no scrap of evidence and no hope of getting any. I say I was satisfied, but satisfaction isn’t certainty, and only certainty would do. I decided to test it and made elaborate arrangements. I asked Mrs. Blount to get all of them here last evening — all of those involved, including Dr. Avery — and, when they were assembled, I announced that I had discharged Mr. Goodwin, who was not present, and that I was withdrawing from the case. I returned to Miss Blount the fee she had paid me. She was privy to the plan. I told them that I had discharged Mr. Goodwin for dereliction of duty; that he had had Kalmus’s house under surveillance Wednesday evening and had deserted his post for an hour or more, and so had failed to see the murderer enter and leave.”

“They don’t know Goodwin,” Cramer muttered, and I raised a brow at him.

“They do now,” Wolfe said, “or I should say Avery does. From a hotel room he telephoned Avery, told him he had been discharged and why, told him he had not deserted his post, gave him to understand that he had seen him enter and leave Kalmus’s house Wednesday evening, and told him to bring one hundred thousand dollars to a rendezvous at Piotti’s restaurant. Of course Avery’s reaction settled it. If, innocent or guilty, he had disdained the challenge, I would have been through. May I digress?”

Cramer grunted. “You always do.”

“It’s relevant but not material. I believe he would have disdained it if he had had nothing to fear but the law. He knew there was no conclusive evidence against him and that the prospect of getting any was remote; his having been seen entering and leaving the house wouldn’t convict him of murder, even if Mr. Goodwin’s word were credited. There could have been no motive for him to kill Kalmus unless he had killed Jerin, and the possibility of getting proof that he had killed Jerin was more than remote, it was nonexistent. His compelling dread was not of the law, it was of Mrs. Blount. Would she believe Mr. Goodwin? Or, more to the point, would she disbelieve him? If she merely doubted, his purpose was defeated. It was not to be borne. He made the appointment with Mr. Goodwin and kept it. You have heard the result.”

Wolfe folded his arms. “That’s all, Mr. Cramer. You could legally get that tape by a court order, but I won’t stand on formality. Take it, with the understanding that I may arrange for Mr. and Mrs. Blount to hear it should that be necessary. Will Mr. Blount be released today or must he wait until tomorrow?”

“Like hell it’s all.” Cramer was trying not to explode. “We can’t keep Blount, I give you that, and you’re damn right I’ll take the tape, and you heard me tell Stebbins to get Avery, but when I get him what have I got? As you said yourself, not a scrap of evidence. You got information that identified a murderer, and what did you do with it?”

“Nonsense.” Wolfe was curt. “Just now you contemned that information as coming from a man in jail for murder and my client. Am I obliged to disclose information entrusted to me by a client for investigation in his interest?”

“It’s not a—”

“I want an answer. Am I?”

“No. But you are now. You trap a murderer, and you let him listen to that tape, and you let him go, before you call me. Now you’re obliged to give me the information, and I want it. What made Jerin sick? Was it in the chocolate? Who put it in? How did Avery know he would get sick? What did Kalmus know? Exactly what did Blount tell Goodwin? Well?”

Wolfe turned. “Archie. What was your commitment to Mr. Blount?”

I admit I was slightly keyed. I seldom drink champagne when on duty, to prevent dereliction. “Everything he told me,” I said, “was in absolute confidence. There was no Bible handy, so I crossed my heart. If you pass it on to a cop, even an inspector, I’m sunk. Possibly Saul and Fred and Orrie combined can fill my shoes.”

Wolfe turned to Cramer. “Mr. Goodwin is tipsy. But his commitment extends to me. I suggest that before you release Mr. Blount you ask him to give you the information he gave Mr. Goodwin, in confidence of course, and probably he will oblige you. You know very well—”

The phone rang, and I swiveled and got it. After the first two words of my phone formula a deep gritty voice interrupted, “I want Inspector Cramer,” and I turned and told him, “For you. Stebbins.”

In writing these reports I try not to give the impression that I think I can see through solid doors or around corners. If I had a hunch at a certain point, as I do now and then, I usually omit it because I can’t expect you to take my word for it. But if Wolfe can break his rules I can break mine, and here goes one. When I handed Cramer the receiver I knew what he was going to hear. I didn’t suspect, I knew. I suppose Purley’s interrupting me, his tone of voice, his not asking if Cramer was there but just saying he wanted him — anyway, I knew, and I was even surer when Cramer said practically nothing, just listened, with only a couple of growls and a couple of questions. So it was no surprise when he cradled the phone and wheeled to Wolfe and croaked, “Damn you and your lousy tricks! Goddam you!”

“Mr. Cramer, if you—”

“Don’t Mister me! You think you’re a — I don’t know what you think you are, but I know what I know you are! Avery stuck a gun in his mouth and blew the top of his head off. Go ahead and collect your fee. That will satisfy you, won’t it? Are you satisfied?” He hit the desk with his fist. “Are you?”

Wolfe turned his head to look at the wall clock. Quarter past four. He would be late for his date with the orchids.

“Yes,” he said politely, “I’m satisfied. You will be too when you cool off. You have been delivered from the ignominy of convicting an innocent man, and from the embarrassment of arresting a guilty man who couldn’t be convicted.”