Free The Black Mountain by Rex Stout Page B

it’s your turn. Where will you carry yours'
    In my handiest pocket. Threatened with seizure and search, in my hand.
    Threatened more imminently, the capsule out of the tube and into my mouth. It can be kept in the mouth indefinitely if it is not crushed with the teeth. The case against carrying it there is the risk of being stampeded into using it prematurely.
    I’ll take the chance. I put the tube in my pocket.
    Anyway, if you did that you’d never know it, so why worry'
    The lullabies completed our equipment. It was considered undesirable for Telesio to be seen delivering us at the waterfront, so we said good-by there, with the help of a bottle of wine, and then he took us in the Fiat to the center of town,
    let us out, and drove away. We walked a block to a cab stand. I guess we weren’t half as conspicuous as I thought we were, but the people of Bari didn’t have the basis for comparison that I had. To think of Wolfe as I knew him best, seated in his custom-built chair behind his desk, prying the cap from a bottle of beer, a Laeliocattleya Jaquetta sporting four flowers to his left and a spray of Dendrobium nobilius to his right, and then to look at him tramping along in blue pants, yellow shirt, and brown jacket, with a blue sweater hanging over his arm and a bulging old knapsack on his back - I couldn’t help being surprised that nobody turned to stare at him. Also, in that getup, I regarded myself as worth a glance, but none came our way. The hackie showed no sign of interest when we climbed into his cab and Wolfe told him where to go. His attitude toward obstacles was somewhat similar to Telesio’s, but he got us into the old city and through its narrow winding streets to the edge of a wharf without making contact. I paid him and followed Wolfe out, and had my first view of the Cispadana sitting alongside the wharf. Guido, standing there, left a man he was talking to and came to Wolfe. Here where he belonged he looked more probable than in the pink living room. He was tall, thin except his shoulders, and stooped some, and moved like a cat. He had told Wolfe he was sixty years old,
    but his long hair was jet black. The hair on his face was gray and raised questions. It was half an inch long. If he never shaved why wasn’t it longer'If he did shave, when'I would have liked to ask him after we got acquainted, but we weren’t communicating. Telesio had said that with the three hundred bucks I had forked over he would take care of everything - our equipment, Guido, and a certain waterfront party - and apparently he had. I don’t know what kind of voyage it was supposed to be officially, but no one around seemed to be interested. A couple of characters stood on the wharf and watched as we climbed aboard, and two others untied us and shoved the bow off when Guido had the engine going and gave the sign, and we slid away. I supposed one or both of them would jump on as we cleared, but they didn’t. Wolfe and I were seated in the cockpit.
    Where’s the crew'I asked him. He said Guido was the crew.
    Just him'
    Yes.
    Good God. I’m not a mariner. When the engine quits or something else, who steers'
    I do.
    Oh. You are a mariner.
    I have crossed this sea eighty times. He was working at the buckle of a knapsack strap.
    Help me get this thing off. My tongue was ready with a remark about a man of action who had to have help to do off his knapsack, but I thought I’d better save it. If the engine did quit, and a squall hit us, and he saved our lives with a display of masterly seamanship, I’d have to eat it. Nothing happened at all the whole way. The engine was noisy, but that was all right, the point was,
    it never stopped being noisy and no squall. Late in the afternoon clouds began coming over from the east, and a light wind started up, but not enough to curl the water. I even took a nap, stretched out on a cockpit seat. A couple of times, when Guido went forward on errands, Wolfe took the wheel, but there was no