Rex Stout - Nero Wolfe 17 by Three Doors to Death

think he can’t use a phone, because he don’t speak English? Even if it were a put-up job as you say, I don’t quite see what you can do except to come along and unput it, unless you’d rather do it here. They’ve got the impression that your help is badly needed. My understanding was that if I didn’t get there with you by eleven o’clock they would all pile into a taxi, including Mr. Daumery, and come here to see you. So if you turn me down all I can do is push on inside and wait with you till they arrive. If you try to bounce me, we’ll see. If you call on that skinny elevator pilot for help, we’ll still see. If you summon cops, I’ll try my hardest to wiggle out of it by explaining the situation to them. That seems to cover it, don’t you think? I’ve got a taxi waiting out front.”
    From the look in his eye I thought it likely that he was destined to take a poke at me, or even make a dash for some tool, say a window pole, to work with. There was certainly no part of me he liked. But, as Demarest had said, he was anything but a fool. Most men would have needed a good ten minutes alone in a quiet corner to get the right answer to the problem this bird suddenly found himself confronted with. Not Mr. Dickson. It took him a scant thirty seconds, during which he stood with his eyes on me but his brain doing hurdles, high jumps, and fancy dives.
    He wheeled and opened a door, got a hat from a shelf and put it on, emerged to the hall as I backed out, pulled the door shut, marched to the elevator, and pushed the button.
    By the time we had descended to the sidewalk, climbed into the taxi, been driven to Wolfe’s address, mounted the stoop and entered, and proceeded to the office, he had not uttered another word. Neither had I. I am not the kind that shoves in where he isn’t wanted.
XIII
    We were back again to the headline we had started with: MAN ALIVE . This time, however, I did not regard it as a letdown. I took it for granted that by the time I got back everyone there would know who was coming with me, even if one or two of them hadn’t caught on before I left. I thought it would be interesting to see how they would welcome, under those difficult circumstances, their former employer and associate on his return from a watery grave, but he took charge of the script himself as he entered the office. He strodeacross to face Bernard and glare down at him. Bernard scrambled to his feet.
    Dickson asked, his tone cold and biting, “What the hell’s the matter with you? Can’t you handle anything at all?”
    “Not this I can’t,” Bernard said, and he was by no means whimpering. “This man Wolfe is one for you to handle, and I only hope to God you can!”
    Without moving his shoulders, Dickson pivoted his head to take them in. “Well, I’m back,” he announced. “I would have been back soon anyway, but this bright nephew of mine has hurried it up a little. Ward, you’re looking like a window display in a fire sale. Still putting up with them, Polly? Now you’ll have to put up with me again. Cynthia, I hear you’re on the way to lead the whole pack.” His head pivoted some more. “Where’s Henry? I thought he was here.”
    I was asking that question myself. Neither Wolfe nor Demarest was in sight. I had turned to ask Fritz where they were, but he had left the room as soon as I appeared. And not only were those two missing, but what was fully as surprising, there had been two additions to the party. Inspector Cramer and my favorite sergeant, Purley Stebbins, were seated side by side on the couch over in the far corner.
    I dodged my way through the welcomers, some sitting and some standing, and asked Cramer respectfully, “Where’s Mr. Wolfe?”
    “Somewhere with a lawyer,” Cramer growled, “making up charades. Who’s that you brought in?”
    “George Dickson, so I’m told. I suppose Mr. Wolfe phoned you to come and get a murderer?”
    “He did.”
    “Your face is dirty, Purley.”
    “Go to