Homicide Trinity by Rex Stout

live with, but even then she won’t panic. She is a very tough article and she is still after thirty million bucks. Looking at her as she smiled at me and told me I was handsome, which may have been her honest opinion in spite of my flat nose, you would never have guessed that I had just sent her a card announcing that her pet secret had been spilled. She’s a gem. If I had thirty million I’d be glad to buy her a lunch. What’s biting Gregory Jett?”
    “I don’t know. We shall see.” He pushed the door open and passed through and I followed.
    As Wolfe detoured around the red leather chair Jett spoke. “I said my business was urgent. You’re rather cheeky, aren’t you?”
    “Moderately so.” Wolfe got his mass adjusted in hisseat and swiveled to face him. “If there is pressure, sir, it is on you, not on me. Am I concerned?”
    “You are involved.” The deep-set dreamy eyes came to me. “Is your name Goodwin? Archie Goodwin?”
    I said yes.
    “Last night you gave a statement to the police about your conversation with Bertha Aaron, and you gave a copy of it to Lamont Otis, the senior member of my firm.”
    “Did I?” I was polite. “I only work here. I only do what Mr. Wolfe tells me to. Ask him.”
    “I’m not asking, I’m telling.” He returned to Wolfe. “I want to know what is in that statement. Mr. Otis is an old man and his heart is weak. He was under shock when he came here, from the tragic news of the death of his secretary, who was murdered here in your office, in circumstances which as far as I know them were certainly no credit to you or Goodwin. It must have been obvious that he was under shock, and it was certainly obvious that he is an old man. To show him that statement was irresponsible and reprehensible. As his associate, his partner, I want to know what is in it.”
    Wolfe had leaned back and lowered his chin. “Well. When cheek meets cheek. You are manifestly indomitable and I must buckle my breastplate. I choose to deny that there is any such statement. Then?”
    “Poppycock. I know there is.”
    “Your evidence?” Wolfe wiggled a finger. “Mr. Jett. This is fatuous. Someone has told you the statement exists or you would be an idiot to come and bark at me. Who told you, and when?”
    “Someone who—in whom I have the utmost confidence.”
    “Mr. Otis himself?”
    “No.”
    “Her name?”
    Jett set his teeth on his lower lip. After chewing on it a little he shifted to the upper lip. He had nice white teeth.
    “You must be under shock too,” Wolfe said, “to supposeyou could come with that demand without disclosing the source of your information. Is her name Ann Paige?”
    “I will tell you that only in confidence.”
    “Then I don’t want it. I will take it as private information entrusted to my discretion, but not in confidence. I am still denying that such a statement exists.”
    “Damn you!” Jett hit the arm of his chair. “She was here with him! She saw Goodwin hand it to him! She saw him read it!”
    Wolfe nodded. “That’s better. When did Miss Paige tell you about it? This morning?”
    “No. Last night. She phoned me.”
    “At what hour?”
    “Around midnight. A little after.”
    “Had she left here with Mr. Otis?”
    “You know damn well she hadn’t. She had climbed out a window.”
    “And phoned you at once.” Wolfe straightened up. “If you are to trust my discretion you must give it ground. I may then tell you what the statement contains, or I may not. I reject the reason you have given, or implied, for your concern—solicitude for Mr. Otis. Your explanation must account not only for your concern but also for Miss Paige’s flight through a window. You—”
    “It wasn’t a flight! Goodwin had locked the door!”
    “He would have opened it on request. You said your business is urgent. How and to whom? You are trying my patience. With your trained legal mind, you know it is futile to feed me inanities.”
    Jett looked at me. I set my jaw