In the Best Families

She made a gesture. “It isn't that we want it-the rest of us. It can go to the state or to charity-we don't care. But we think it's wrong and a shame for it to go to his people, whoever will inherit from him. It's not only immoral, it's illegal. It can't be stopped by convicting him of murder, because he's dead and can't be tried. My lawyer and Mr Archer both say we can bring action and get it before a court, but then we'll have to have evidence that he killed her, and Mr

Archer says he hasn't been able to get it from you, and he hasn't got it. But surely you can get it, or anyhow you can try. You see, that would solve both problems, to have a court rule that his heirs can't inherit because he murdered her.

“You have stated it admirably, Archer declared.

“We don't want any of it, Lina blurted.

“My interest, Pierce put in, “is only to have the truth fully and universally known and acknowledged.

That, Wolfe said, “will take more than me. I am by no means up to that. And not only my capacities, but the circumstances themselves, restrict me to a much more modest ambition. I can get you one of the things you want, removal of all suspicion from the innocent, but the other, having Mrs Rackham's bequest to her husband set aside, is beyond me.

They all frowned at him, in their various fashions. Hammond, the banker, protested, “That doesn't seem to make sense. What accomplishes one accomplishes the other. If you prove that Rackham killed his wife-

“But I can't prove that. Wolfe shook his head. “I'm sorry, but it can't be done. It is true that Rackham deserved to die, and as a murderer. He killed a woman here in New York three years ago, a woman named Delia Montrose-one of Mr

Cramer's unsolved cases; Rackham ran his car over her. That was how Zeck originally got a noose on Rackham, by threatening to expose him for the murder he did commit. As you know, Mr Archer, I penetrated some distance-not very far, but far enough-into Zeck's confidence, and I learned a good deal about his methods. I doubt if he ever had conclusive evidence that Rackham had killed

Delia Montrose, but Rackham, conscious of his guilt, hadn't the spine to demand a showdown. Murderers seldom have. Then Rackham got a spine, suddenly and fortuitously, by becoming a millionaire; he thought then he could fight it; he defied Zeck; and Zeck, taking his time, retorted by threatening to expose