Free Gambit by Rex Stout Page A

of his broad burly shoulders, the redness of his big round face, the angle of his old felt hat. When it’s obvious,
    as it often is, that he intends to dingdong, I open the door a crack and say something with a point to it, such as, “A man’s house is his castle.” But that time he looked fairly human, so I swung the door wide and greeted him without prejudice, and, entering, he let me take his coat and hat, and even made a remark about the weather before proceeding to the office. You might have thought we had signed up for peaceful coexistence. In the office, of course he didn’t offer Wolfe a hand, since he knows how he feels about shaking, but, as he lowered his big fanny onto the red leather chair, he said, “I suppose I should have phoned, but you’re always here. I wish to God I could always be somewhere.
    What I want to ask, the Jerin case. Matthew Blount. According to the papers,
    you’ve been hired to work on it. According to Goodwin.”
    “Yes,” Wolfe said.
    “But according to Blount’s attorney you haven’t been hired. Who’s right?”
    “Possibly both of us.” Wolfe turned a palm up. “Mr. Cramer. There are alternatives. Mr. Kalmus has hired me but prefers not to avow it, or Mr. Blount has hired me independently of his attorney, or someone else had hired me. In any case, I have been hired.”
    “By whom?”
    “By someone with a legitimate interest.”
    “Who?”
    “No.”
    “You’re working on it?”
    “Yes.”
    “You refuse to tell me who hired you?”
    “Yes. That has no bearing on your performance of your duty or the demands of justice.”
    Cramer got a cigar from a pocket, rolled it between his palms, and stuck it in his mouth. Since he never lights one, the palm-rolling is irrelevant and immaterial. He looked at me, went back to Wolfe, and said, “I think I know you as well as anybody else, except maybe Goodwin. I don’t believe Kalmus would hire you and then say he hadn’t. What possible reason could he have to deny it'I don’t believe Blount would hire you without his lawyer’s approval. What the hell, if it was like that he’d get another lawyer. As for someone else, who'The wife or daughter or nephew wouldn’t unless Blount and Kalmus approved, and neither would anyone else. I don’t believe it. Nobody has hired you.”
    A corner of Wolfe’s mouth was up. “Then why bother to pay me a call?”
    “Because I know you. Because you may be on to something. You had Goodwin pass that to his friend Lon Cohen, that you had been hired, to start something that would result in your being hired and getting a fee. I don’t know what you expected to start, I don’t know why you played it like that instead of going to Kalmus with it, whatever you’ve got, but the point is that you’ve got something or you wouldn’t have played it at all. You’ve got something that you think will get you a fat fee, and the only way to get a fat fee would be to spring Blount.
    So what have you got?”
    Wolfe’s brows were up. “You actually believe that, don’t you?”
    “You’re damn right I do. I think you know something that you think will get Blount out, or at least that there’s a good chance. Understand me, I don’t object to your copping a fee. But if there’s any reason to think Blount didn’t murder Paul Jerin I want to know it. We got the evidence that put him in, and if there’s anything wrong with it I have a right to know it. Do you have any kind of an idea that I would like to see an innocent man take a murder rap?”
    “That you would like to, no.”
    “Well, I wouldn’t.” Cramer pointed the cigar at Wolfe and waggled it. “I’ll be frank. Do you know that Blount went down to the kitchen for the chocolate and took it up to Jerin?”
    “Yes.”
    “Do you know that when Jerin drank most of it and got sick Blount went and got the pot and cup and took them down to the kitchen and rinsed them out, and got fresh chocolate and took it up?”
    “Yes.”
    “Then is he