The Rubber Band/The Red Box 2-In-1 by Rex Stout

adventuresses. He said he would sell some calves. Saturday morning I got a telegram that he would get here Monday, so I telephoned your office for an appointment. When I saw him this noon I showed him two pictures of the Marquis of Clivers, and he said it was George Rowley. I had a hard time to keep him from going to the hotel after the marquis right then.”
    Wolfe wiggled a finger at her. “But what made you think you needed me? I detect no lack of confidence in your operations to date.”
    “Oh, I always thought we’d have to have a lawyer at the windup. I had read about you and admired you.”
    “I’m not a lawyer.”
    “I shouldn’t think that would matter. I only know three lawyers, and if you saw them you would know why I chose you.”
    “You sound like a fool again.” Wolfe sighed. “Do you wish me to believe that I was selected for my looks?”
    “No, indeed. That would be … anyhow, I selected you. When I told you what your fee might be, I wasn’t exaggerating. Let’s say his estates and mines and so on are worth fifty million—”
    “Pounds?”
    “Dollars. That’s conservative. He agreed to pay half of it. Twenty-five million. But there are two of the men I can’t find. I haven’t found a trace of Rubber Coleman, the leader,or the man called Turtle-back. I have tried hard to find Rubber Coleman, because he had the papers, but I couldn’t. On the twenty-five million take off their share, one-third, and that leaves roughly sixteen million. Make allowances for all kinds of things, anything you could think of—take off, say, just for good measure, fifteen million. That leaves a million dollars. That’s what I asked him for a week ago.”
    “You asked who for? Lord Clivers?”
    “Yes.”
    “You said you were unable to see him.”
    “That was before he went to Washington. When he came back I tried again. I had made an acquaintance … he has some assistants with him on his mission—diplomats and so on—and I had got acquainted with one two weeks ago, and through him I got to the marquis, thinking I might manage it without any help. He was very unpleasant. When he found out what I was getting at, he ordered me out. He claimed he didn’t know what I was talking about, and when I wanted to show him the letter my father had written in 1918, he wouldn’t look at it. He told the young man whom he called to take me away that I was an adventuress.”
    She wasn’t through. But the doorbell rang, and I went to answer it. I thought it just possible that a pair might rush me, and there was no advantage in a roughhouse, so I left the bolt and chain on until I saw it was Saul Panzer. Then I opened up and let him in, and shut the door and slid the bolt again.
    Saul is about the smallest practicing dick, public or private, that I’ve ever seen, and he has the biggest scope. He can’t push over buildings because he simply hasn’t got the size, but there’s no other kind of a job he wouldn’t earn his money on. It’s hard to tell what he looks like, because you can’t see his face for his nose. He had a big long cardboard box under his arm.
    I took him to the office. As he sidled past a chair to get to Wolfe’s desk he passed one sharp glance around, and I knew that gave him a print of those three sitting there which would fade out only when he did.
    Wolfe greeted him. “Good evening, Saul.”
    “Good evening, Mr. Wolfe. Of course Archie told you my phone call. There’s not much to add. When I arrived the detective was there on the sidewalk. His name is Bill Purvil. I saw him once about four years ago in Brooklyn, when we had that Moschenden case. He didn’t recognize me on the sidewalk. But when I went in at that entrance he followed me. Ifigured it was better to go ahead. There was a phone in the apartment. If I found the package I could phone Archie to come and get into the court from 60th Street, and throw it to him from a back window. When the detective saw I was going into that