Might as Well Be Dead

Chapter 8

I joined Wolfe in the dining room at seven-fifteen as usual, and sat at table, but I didn’t really dine because I had an eight-thirty date down in the Village and had to rush it some. Par for Wolfe from clams to cheese is an hour and a half.

Dating Delia Brandt hadn’t been any strain on my talents. I had got her on the phone at the first try, given her my own name and occupation, and told her I had been asked by a client to see her and find out if she could supply enough material on Michael M. Molloy, her late employer, for a magazine article under her by-line, to be ghosted by the client. The proceeds would be split. After a few questions she said she would be willing to consider it and would be at home for me at eight-thirty. So I hurried a little with the roast duckling and left Wolfe alone with the salad.

It wouldn’t have hurt the house at 43 Arbor Street any to get the same treatment as the one at 171 East 52nd. The outside could have used some paint, and a do-it-yourself elevator would have been a big improvement on the narrow, dingy wooden stairs. Three flights up, she was not waiting on the threshold to greet me, and, finding no button to push, I tapped on the door. From the time it took her you might have thought she had to traverse a spacious reception hall, but when the door opened the room was right there. I spoke.

“My name’s Goodwin. I phoned.”

“Oh,” she said, “of course. I had forgotten. Come in.”

It was one of those rooms that call for expert dodging to get anywhere. God knows why the piano bench was smack in the main traffic lane, and He also knows why there was a piano bench at all, since there was no piano. Anyway it was handy for my hat and coat. She crossed to a couch and invited me to sit, and since there was no chair nearby I perched on the couch too, twisting around to face her.

“I really had forgotten,” she said apologetically. “My mind must have been soaring around.” She waved a hand to show how a mind soars.

She was young, well shaped and well kept, well dressed and well shod, with a soft, clear skin and bright brown eyes, and well-cut fine brown hair, but a mind that soared...

“Didn’t you say you were a detective?” she asked. “Something about a magazine?”

“That’s right,” I told her. “This editor thinks he’d like to try a new slant on a murder. There have been thousands of pieces about murderers. He thinks he might use one called ‘The Last Month of a Murdered Man’ or ‘The Last Year of a Murdered Man.’ By his secretary.”

“Oh, not my name?”

“Sure, your name too. And, now that I’ve seen you, a good big picture of you. I wouldn’t mind having one myself.”

“Now don’t get personal.”

It was hard to believe, the contrast between what my eyes saw and my ears heard. Any man would have been glad to walk down a theater aisle with her, but there would have to be an understanding that she would keep her mouth shut.

“I’ll try not to,” I assured her. “I can always turn my back. The idea is this: you’ll tell me things about Mr. Molloy, what he said and did and how he acted, and I’ll report to the editor, and if he thinks there’s an article in it he’ll come and talk with you. How’s that?”

“Well, it couldn’t be called ‘The Last Year of a Murdered Man.’ It would have to be called ‘The Last Ten Months of a Murdered Man’ because I only worked for him ten months.”

“Okay, that’s even better. Now. I understand—”

“How many days are there in ten months?”

“It depends on the months. Roughly three hundred.”

“We could call it ‘The Last Three Hundred Days of a Murdered Man.’”

“A good idea. I understand that occasionally you had dinner with Molloy at a restaurant. Was it—”

“Who told you that?”

I had three choices: get up and go, strangle her, or sit on her. “Look, Miss Brandt. I’m being paid by the hour and I’ve got to earn it. Was it to discuss business matters or was it social?”

She smiled, which made her even prettier. “Oh, that was just social. He never talked about business to me. It had got so he didn’t want to have dinner with his wife, and he hated to eat alone. I’d love to put that in. I know some people think I allowed him liberties, but I never did.”

“Did he try to take liberties?”

“Oh, of course. Married men always do. That’s because with their wives it’s not a liberty any more.”

“Yeah, that’s why I’ve never married. Did he—”

“Oh, aren’t you married?”

But you’ve had enough of her. So had I, but I was on duty, and I stuck with it for three solid hours. I had to go through another ordeal, about halfway through. We were thirsty, and she went to the kitchenette for liquid, and came back with a bottle of ginger ale, a bottle of gin, and two glasses with one cube of ice in each. I apologized, said I had ulcers, and asked for milk. She said she didn’t have any, and I asked for water. I will go beyond the call of duty in a pinch, but I wouldn’t drink gin and ginger ale to get the lowdown on Lizzie Borden. It was bad enough to sit there and watch her sipping away at it.

In the taxi on my way downtown to keep the date, I had felt some slight compunction at imposing on a poor working girl with a phony approach. In the taxi on my way home, having told her I would let her know if the editor still liked the idea, my conscience was sound asleep. If a conscience could snore, it probably would have.

Wolfe, who rarely turns in before midnight, was at his desk, reading A Secret Understanding by Merle Miller. He didn’t look up when I entered, so I went to the safe for the expense book and entered the amounts I had given the hired help for expenses, a hundred bucks for each, put the book back and closed the safe and locked it, and cleared up my desk. I refuse to meet a cluttered desk in the morning.

Then I stood and looked down at him. “Excuse me. Anything from Fred or Johnny that needs attention?”

He finished a paragraph and looked up. “No. Fred called at eleven and reported no progress. Johnny didn’t call.”

“Shall I save mine for morning?”

“No. That woman will be here. Did you get anything?”

“I don’t know.” I sat. “She’s either a featherbrain or a damn good imitation. She starts every other sentence with ‘Oh.’ You’d walk out on her in three minutes. She drinks four parts ginger ale and one part gin.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“Good heavens. Did you?”

“No. But I had to watch her. Two items. One day last October a button on his coat was loose and she offered to sew it on for him. While she was doing so some papers fell out of the pocket and when she picked them up she glanced at them. So she says; papers can fall out of pockets or they can be taken out. Anyhow, she was looking at one of the papers which was a list of names and figures when he suddenly entered from his room, snatched the paper from her, and gave her hell. He slapped her, but that’s off the record because she doesn’t want it to be in the article, and besides he apologized and bought her champagne at dinner that evening. She says he was so mad he turned white.”

“And the names and figures?”

“I hoped you would ask that. She can’t remember. She thinks the figures were amounts of money, but she’s not sure.”

“Hardly a bonanza.”

“No, sir. Neither is the other item, but it’s more recent. One day between Christmas and New Year’s he asked her how she would like to take a trip to South America with him. He had to go on business and would need a secretary. I should mention that he had been trying to take liberties and she hadn’t allowed it. She liked the idea of a trip to South America, but, knowing that what are liberties up here are just a matter of course down there, she told him she’d think it over. He said there wouldn’t be much time for thinking it over because the business matters wouldn’t wait. He also said they were confidential matters and made her promise she wouldn’t mention the proposed trip to anyone. She put him off and hadn’t said yes or no by January third, the day he died. So she says. I think she said yes. She is not a good liar. I didn’t mention that her mind soars.”

“Soars where?”

I waved a hand. “Just soars. You would enjoy her.”

“No doubt.” He looked up at the clock. Past midnight. “Has she a job?”

“Oh, yes. With an import firm downtown. Apparently no connection.”

“Very well.” He pushed his chair back, yawned, and got up. “Johnny should have reported. Confound him, he’s too set on a master stroke.”

“Instructions for morning?”

“No. I’ll need you here for developments. If any. Good night.”

He went, to the elevator, and I went, to the stairs. Up in my room, undressing, I decided to dream of Selma Molloy — something like her being trapped in a blazing building, at an upper window, afraid to jump for the firemen’s net. I would march up, wave the firemen aside, stretch my arms, and down she would come, light as a feather, into my embrace. The light as a feather part was important, since otherwise there might have been some bones broken. I didn’t consider this reneging on my decision, because you can’t hold a man responsible for his dreams. But I didn’t follow through on it. No dreams at all. In the morning I didn’t even remember that I had been going to dream, but I never do remember anything in the morning until I have washed and showered and shaved and dressed and made my way down to the kitchen. With the orange juice the fog begins to lift, and with the coffee it’s all clear. It’s a good thing Wolfe breakfasts in his room, on a tray taken up by Fritz, and then goes up to the plant rooms. If we met before breakfast he would have fired me or I would have quit long ago.

Thursday started busy and kept it up. There were three letters from P.H.’s, answers to the ad, in the morning mail, and I had to answer them. There was a phone call from Omaha, from James R. Herold. His wife was impatient. I told him we had five men working on the case, including Saul Panzer and me, and we would report as soon as there was anything worth reporting. Fred Durkin came in person to confer. He had visited five establishments with phone booths within two blocks of the 52nd Street house, and had found no one who remembered anything about any user of the phone around nine o’clock on January 3. The soda jerk who had been on duty at the drugstore that evening had left and gone somewhere in Jersey. Should Fred find him? I told him yes and wished him luck.

Orrie Cather phoned from Freyer’s office to ask if we had arranged with Mrs. Molloy to hire a lawyer to establish her position legally, and I told him no, that would be done when she came to see Wolfe.

Lon Cohen of the Gazette phoned and said he had a riddle for me. It goes like this, he said. “Archie Goodwin tells me on Tuesday that he and Nero Wolfe aren’t interested in the Hays murder trial. The P.H. in Wolfe’s ad is a different person, no connection. But Wednesday evening I get a note from Goodwin asking me to give the bearer, Saul Panzer, a good clear print of a picture of Michael M. Molloy. Here’s the riddle: what’s the difference between Archie Goodwin and a double-breasted liar?”

I couldn’t blame him, but neither could I straighten him out. I told him the note Saul had brought him must have been a forgery, and promised to give him a front-page spread as soon as we had one.

Selma Molloy came on the dot at eleven. I let her in and took her coat, a quiet gray plaid, in the hall, and was putting it on a hanger when the elevator bumped to a stop and Wolfe emerged. He stopped, facing her, inclined his head nearly an inch when I pronounced her name, turned, and made for the office, and I convoyed her in and to the red leather chair. He sat and leveled his eyes at her, trying not to scowl. He hates to work, and this would probably be not only an all-day session, but all day with a woman. Then he had an idea. His head turned and he spoke.

“Archie. Since I’m a stranger to Mrs. Molloy, and you are not, it might be better for you to tell her about the legal situation regarding her husband’s estate.”

She looked at me. In her apartment she had sat with her back to a window, and here she was facing one, but the stronger light gave me no reason to lower my guard.

She squinted at me. “His estate? I thought you wanted to go on from yesterday.”

“We do,” I assured her. “By the way, I told you I wouldn’t be here, but my program was changed. The estate thing is a part of the investigation. We want access to Molloy’s records and papers, and since no will has been found the widow has a right to them, and you’re the widow. Of course you can let us look at anything that’s in the apartment, but there should be some legal steps — for instance, you should be named as administrator.”

“But I don’t want to be administrator. I don’t want anything to do with his estate. I might have wanted some of the furniture, if—” She let it hang. She shook her head. “I don’t want anything.”

“What about cash for your current expenses?”

“I wondered about that yesterday, after you had gone.” Her eyes were meeting mine, straight. “Whether Nero Wolfe was expecting me to pay him.”

“He isn’t.” I looked at Wolfe, and his head moved left, just perceptibly, and back. So we were still keeping our client under our hat. I met her eyes again. “Our interest in the case developed through a conversation with Mr. Freyer, and all we expect from you is information. I asked about cash only because there must be some in your husband’s estate.”

“If there is I don’t want it. I have some savings of my own, enough to go along on a while. I just don’t know what I’m going to do.” She pinned her lower lip with her teeth, and after a moment released it. “I don’t know what I’m going to do, but I don’t want to be administrator or have anything to do with it. I should have left him long ago, but I had married him with my eyes open and my silly pride—”

“Okay, but it might help if we could take a look at his papers. For instance, his checkbook. Miss Brandt tells me that the furniture in the office was sold, and that before it was taken away some man went through the desks and removed the contents. Do you know about that?”

“Yes, that was a friend of mine — and he had been a friend of my husband’s — Tom Irwin. He said the office should be closed up and I asked him to attend to it.”

“What happened to the stuff he took?”

“He brought it to the apartment. It’s there now, in three cartons. I’ve never looked at it.”

“I would like to. You’ll be here with Mr. Wolfe for quite a while. I could go up to the apartment and do it now if you’re willing to let me have the key.”

Without the slightest hesitation she said, “Of course,” and opened her handbag. It didn’t put her down a notch in my book — her being so trustful with a comparative stranger. All it meant was that with her P.H. convicted of murder she didn’t give a damn about anything at all, and besides, I was the comparative stranger. Glancing at Wolfe and getting a nod, I went to her and took the keys, told her I would let her know if I found anything helpful and would give her a receipt for anything I brought away, and headed for the hall. I had just taken my topcoat from the rack when the doorbell rang, and a look through the one-way glass panel showed me Saul Panzer out on the stoop. Putting the coat back, I opened up.

There are things about Saul I don’t understand and never will. For instance, the old cap he always wears. If I wore that cap while tailing a subject I’d be spotted in the first block. If I wore it while calling on people for information they would suspect I was cuckoo or quaint and draw the curtains. But Saul never gets spotted unless he wants to, and for extracting material from people’s insides nothing can equal him except a stomach pump. While he was hanging up his coat and sticking the cap in its pocket I stepped to the office door to tell Wolfe, and Wolfe said to bring him in. He came, and I followed him.

“Yes?” Wolfe inquired.

Saul, standing, shot a glance at the red leather chair and said, “A report.”

“Go ahead. Mrs. Molloy’s interest runs with ours. Mrs. Molloy, this is Mr. Panzer.”

She asked him how he did and he bowed. That’s another thing about him, his bow; it’s as bad as his cap. He sat down on the nearest yellow chair, knowing that Wolfe wants people at eye level, and reported.

“Two employees of the Metropolitan Safe Deposit Company identified a picture of Michael M. Molloy. They say it’s a picture of Richard Randall, a renter of a box there. I didn’t tell them it was Molloy, but I think one of them suspects it. I didn’t try to find out what size the box is or when he first rented it or any other details, because I thought I’d better get instructions. If they get stirred up enough to look into it and decide that one of their boxes was probably rented under another name by a man who has been murdered, they’ll notify the District Attorney. I don’t know the law, I don’t know what rights the DA has after he has got a conviction, since he couldn’t be looking for evidence, but I thought you might want to get to the box first.”

“I do,” Wolfe declared. “How good is the identification?”

“I’d bank on it. I’m satisfied. Do you want to know just how it went?”

“No. Not if you’re satisfied. How much are they already stirred up?”

“I think not much. I was pretty careful. I doubt if either of them will go upstairs with it, but they might, and I thought you might want to move.”

“I do.” Wolfe turned. “Mrs. Molloy. Do you know what this is about?”

“Yes, I think so.” She looked at me. “Isn’t it what I told you yesterday, the envelope and slip of paper when I was looking for the hockey ticket?”

“That’s it,” I told her.

“And you’ve found out already that my husband was Richard Randall?”

“We have,” Wolfe said, “and that changes the situation. We must find out what is in that box as soon as possible, and to do so we must, first, demonstrate that Randall was Molloy, and, second, establish your right to access. Since in handling his safe-deposit box a man certainly makes fingerprints, the first presents no technical problem, but it must wait upon the second. When you said, madam, that you would have nothing to do with your husband’s estate, I understood and respected your attitude. Rationally it could not be defended, but emotionally it was formidable; and when feeling takes over sense is impotent. Now it’s different. We must see the contents of that box, and we can get to it only through you. You will have to assert your rights as the widow and take control of the estate. The law can crawl and usually does, but in an emergency it can — What are you shaking your head for?”

“I’ve told you. I won’t do that.”

Hearing her tone, and seeing her eyes and her jaw, he started to glare but decided it wouldn’t work. So he turned to me. “Archie.”

I did the glaring, at him, and then toned the glare down as I transferred it to her. “Mrs. Molloy,” I said, “Mr. Wolfe is a genius, but geniuses have their weak spots, and one of his is that he pretends to believe that attractive young women can refuse me nothing. It comes in handy when an attractive young woman says no to something he wants, because it’s an excuse for passing the buck to me, which he just did. I don’t know what to do with it and he can’t expect me to — he just said himself that when feeling takes over sense is impotent, so what good will it do to try to reason with you? But may I ask you a question?”

She said yes.

“Suppose no good grounds for a retrial or an appeal are found, and the sentence is carried out, and Peter Hays dies in the electric chair, and some time later, when a court gets around to it, that safe-deposit box is opened and it contains something that starts an investigation and leads to evidence that someone else committed the murder. What would your feeling be then?”

She had her lip pinned again, and had to release it to say, “I don’t think that’s a fair question.”

“Why not? All I did was suppose, and it wasn’t inconceivable. That box may be empty, but it could contain what I said. I think the trouble is that you don’t believe there is any evidence, in that safe-deposit box or anywhere else, that will clear Peter Hays, because he’s guilty, so why should you do something you don’t want to do?”

“That’s not true! It’s not true!”

“You know damn well it’s true.”

Her head went down, forward, and her hands came up to cover her face. Wolfe glowered at me. From that room he has walked out on a lot of different people, but when a woman goes to pieces he doesn’t walk out, he runs. I shook my head at him. I didn’t think Selma Molloy was going to slip the bit.

She didn’t. When she finally raised her head her eyes met mine and she said calmly, “Listen, Mr. Goodwin. Didn’t I help all I could yesterday and didn’t I come today? You know I did. But how can I claim any rights as Mike Molloy’s widow when for two years I bitterly regretted I was his wife? Don’t you see it’s impossible? Isn’t there some other way? Can’t I ask for someone else to be administrator and he can have rights?”

“I don’t know,” I told her. “That’s a legal question.”

“Get Mr. Parker,” Wolfe snapped.

I turned and pulled the phone to me and dialed. Since Nathaniel Parker had answered some ten thousand legal questions for us over the years I didn’t have to look up the number. While I was getting him Saul Panzer asked Wolfe if he should leave, and was told to wait until there was some place for him to leave for. When I had Parker, Wolfe took his phone.

I had to admire his performance. He would have liked to tell Parker that we were being obstructed by a perverse and capricious female, but with her sitting there that would have been inadvisable, so he merely said that for reasons of her own the widow refused to assert her claims, and put the legal problem. From there on his part was mostly grunts.

When he hung up he turned to the female. “Mr. Parker says it’s complicated, and since it’s urgent he wants to ask you some questions. He will be here in twenty minutes. He says it will expedite matters if you will decide whom you would like to suggest as administrator. Have you anyone in mind?”

“Why — no.” She frowned. She looked at me, and back at him. “Could it be Mr. Goodwin?”

“My dear madam.” Wolfe was exasperated. “Use your faculties. You met Mr. Goodwin yesterday for the first time, in his capacity as a private investigator. It would be highly inappropriate, and the court would find it so. It should be someone you know well, and trust. What about the man who closed the office and took the cartons to your apartment? Thomas Irwin.”

“I don’t think—” She considered it. “I don’t think I’d want to ask him to do this. His wife wouldn’t like it. But I wouldn’t mind asking Pat Degan. He might say no, but I could ask him.”

“Who is he?”

“Patrick A. Degan. He’s the head of the Mechanics Alliance Welfare Association. His office isn’t far from here, on Thirty-ninth Street. I could call him now.”

“How long have you known him?”

“Three years, since I was married. He was a friend of my husband’s, but he always — I mean, he really is my friend, I’m sure he is. Shall I call him? What will I say?”

“Tell him you wish to request a favor of him, and ask him to come here. Now, if possible. If he asks questions tell him you would rather not discuss it on the phone. And I venture a suggestion, in case he comes and consents to act. Legal services will be required, and he may want to name the lawyer to be engaged to perform them. I urge you not to agree. From a legal standpoint it will be your interests the lawyer will represent, whether you wish to renounce them or not, and it will be proper and desirable for you to choose him.”

“Why can’t I choose the lawyer he names?”

“Because I wouldn’t trust him. Because I suspect Mr. Degan of having killed your husband.”

She goggled at him. “You suspect Pat Degan? You never heard of him until just now!”

Wolfe nodded. “I made it sensational. Purposely. I suspect each and all of your husband’s associates, as I must until I have reason to discriminate, and Mr. Degan is one of them. I advise you not to let him name the lawyer. If you are at a loss to choose one, I suggest Nathaniel Parker, who will be here shortly. I have dealt with him many years, and I recommend him without reservation. As for trusting me, either you believe that I am earnestly seeking an end you desire or it is folly for you to be here at all.”

It was a good pitch, but it didn’t do the job — not completely. She looked at me, looking the question instead of asking it.

I gave her a strictly professional smile. “Parker is as good as they come, Mrs. Molloy.”

“All right, then.” She arose. “May I use the phone?”