In the Best Families

I grinned at her. “Showing off. Okay? Want to try it? Get him and send him out from behind that same bush, with orders to take me, and any amount up to two bits, even, that he won't reach me. I returned the gun to the holster.

“Ready?

She blinked. “You mean you would?

Hammond giggled. He was a full-sized middle-aged man and he looked like a banker, and I want to be fair to him, but he giggled. “Look out, Annabel, he said warningly. “He might.›

“Of course, I told her, “you would be in the line of fire, and I've never shot a fast-moving dog, so we would both be taking a risk. Only I don't like you being sceptical. Stick around and you'll see.

That was a mistake, caused by my temperament. It is natural and wholesome for a man of my age to enjoy association with a woman of her age, maid, wife, or widow, but I should have had sense enough to stop to realise what I was getting in for. She had said that she had come to watch me work, and there I was asking for it. As a result, I had to spend a solid hour pretending that I was hell bent to find out who had poisoned one of Leeds' dogs when I didn't care a hang. Not that I love dog poisoners, but that wasn't what was on my mind.

When Calvin Leeds showed up, as he did soon in an old station wagon with its rear taken up with a big wire cage, the four of us made a tour of the kennels and the runs, with Leeds briefing me, and me asking questions and making notes, and then we went in the house and extended the inquiry to aspects such as the poison used, the method employed, the known suspects, and so on. It was a strain. I had to make it good, because that was what I was supposed to be there for, and also because Annabel was too good-looking to let her be sceptical about me. And the dog hadn't even died! He was alive and well. But I went to it as if it were the biggest case of the year for Nero Wolfe and me, and Leeds got a good fifty bucks' worth of detection for nothing. Of course nobody got detected, but

I asked damn' good questions.

After Annabel and Hammond left to return to Birchvale next door, I asked Leeds about Hammond, and sure enough he was a banker. He was a vice-president of the

Metropolitan Trust Company, who handled affairs for Mrs Rackham-had done so ever since the death of her first husband. When I remarked that Hammond seemed to have it in mind to handle Mrs Rackham's daughter-in-law also, Leeds said he hadn't noticed. I asked who else would be there at dinner.