Murder by the Book

"We don't expect a commitment. We just want to get you off our necks as soon as possible without having our organization and our reputation hurt worse than they are already."

"Very well. Here's a question. Which one of you first suggested this meeting with me?"

"What difference does that make?"

"I'm asking the questions, Mr. Corrigan."

"So you are. It was-" The senior partner hesitated. "Yes, it was Phelps."

"No," Phelps contradicted him. "You came to my room and asked me what I thought of it."

"Then it was you, Fred?"

Briggs blinked. "I really couldn't say, Jim. I make so many suggestions, I may well have made this one. I know Louis phoned in at his lunch recess to ask for some figures, and we were discussing it."

"That's right," Kustin agreed. "You said it was being considered."

"You're having a hell of a time answering a simple question," a biting voice told them. It was Conroy O'Malley, the ex. "The suggestion came from me. I phoned you around eleven o'clock, Jim, and you told me about Nero Wolfe smashing in, and I said the only thing to do was have a talk with him."

Corrigan screwed up his lips. "That's right. Then I went in to get Emmett's opinion."

Wolfe went at O'Malley. "You phoned Mr. Corrigan around eleven this morning?"

"Yes."

"What about?"

'To get the news. I had been out of town for a week, and the minute I returned the police had got ct me again about Baird Archer. I wondered why."

"What were you doing out of town?"

"I was in Atlanta, Georgia, getting facts about the delivery of steel for a bridge."

"On behalf of whom?"

"This firm." O'Malley's mouth twisted until it was distorted almost to a diagonal. "You don't think my old associates would let me starve, do you? No indeed. I eat every day. Not only do I get a share of the income from unfinished business when I left, I am also given work to do outside the office. Do you know what is the outstanding characteristic of my former associates? Love for their fellow man." He tapped his chest with a forefinger. "I am their fellow man."

"Goddam it, Con," Phelps blurted, "where does that get you? What do you want? What do you expect?"

A gleam had come and gone in Kustin's sleepy eyes as O'Malley spoke. He said dryly, "We're here to answer Wolfe's questions. Let's keep the answers responsive."