Rex Stout - Nero Wolfe 24 by Three Men Out Page A

three of you can screech and scratch, but what good will it do? I’m willing to try to work this out, but not in pandemonium.”
    She turned and took a step.
    “You should all realize,” Wolfe told them, “what the situation is. You may think that this notion of Mr. Lewent’s is preposterous, that he is in effect deranged, but that doesn’t dispose of it or him. If he clings to it and speaks of it, it can become extremely ugly for all of you. Suing him for slander might settle him, but it wouldn’t settle the stench. From the fact that he chose me to investigate for him, and from his paying me in advance what was for him a substantial sum, I assume that he has high regard for my sagacity, judgment, and integrity. If I am convinced that his suspicions are baseless and unmerited, I think I can persuade him to abandon them; and it may be that you can convince me here and now. Do you want to try?”
    Paul Thayer threw his head back and haw-hawed. It didn’t go over as well as it had when he and I were together in his room. They all looked at him, not admiringly, and when he subsided they transferred the looks to Theodore Huck. He was regarding Wolfe thoughtfully.
    “I am wondering,” he said, “if it would help for me to have a talk with my brother-in-law.”
    “No, it wouldn’t,” Sylvia Marcy said so positively that everyone glanced at her in surprise. Immediately she cooed. “I just mean,” she cooed, “that he’s a case. He is definitely a case.”
    Huck looked at Dorothy Riff. “What do you think?”
    She didn’t hesitate. The gray-green eyes were alert and determined. “I would like to know what it would take to convince Mr. Wolfe.” She looked at him.
    “That depends,” Wolfe told her. “If, for instance, the source of the poison that killed Mrs. Huck has been satisfactorily established, and if none of you was connectedwith in in any way, I would be well on the road to conviction. According to Mr. Lewent, it was ptomaine, and all of you were on the premises at the time. Is that correct?”
    “Yes.”
    “Good God,” Paul Thayer protested, “you don’t really mean it! You’re actually going to ask us?”
    “I’ll ask you, Mr. Thayer, since you are not suspected by Mr. Lewent. Where did Mrs. Huck die? Here?”
    Thayer looked at Huck. “What about it, Uncle Theodore? Do you want me to play?”
    Huck nodded slowly. “I suppose so. Yes.”
    “Whatever you say.” Thayer looked at Wolfe. “My aunt died in this house, in her bed, just about a year ago.”
    “Were you here?”
    “Yes.”
    “Tell me about it. Just tell it, and I’ll ask questions as required.”
    “Well.” Thayer cleared his throat. “It was my uncle’s birthday, and there was a little celebration here in this room. We were all here, we who are here now, and a few other people, four or five—old friends of my aunt and uncle. Do you want to know who they were?”
    “Later, perhaps. Now just the event.”
    “We had drinks and things, and afterward a buffet dinner served in this room, plenty of wine—my aunt liked wine, and so does Uncle Theodore—finishing up with champagne, and some of us were fairly high, including me. In fact I finally got slightly objectionable, so my aunt said, and I left before the party broke up and went up to my room and made music. Did you ever play the piano while you were lit?”
    Wolfe said no.
    “Try it sometime. By the way, will you kindly tell me something? Why did one of these women poison my aunt? What for?”
    “Speaking for Mr. Lewent, because she was on intimate terms with your uncle and wanted to marry him. Where there is room for a deed there is always room for a motive. That can—”
    “You dare!” Mrs. O’Shea blazed. She was back in her chair.
    “No, madam, I don’t. I am only trying to learn if there is any cause for daring. Go on, Mr. Thayer?”
    Thayer shrugged. “At some hour I quit making music and went to bed. In the morning I was told that my aunt had died, and