Murder by the Book

The albacore had cooled off some, but it was good, and I finished it. I felt wonderful. I called Finch at the South Seas and told him we had had a bite and had a fish on the hook, and it might be the big one, and I would drop in on him at eight in the morning. He said he was all set. I lifted the receiver

to put in a call to New York, then replaced it. It was goofy to suppose there could be any risk in George Thompson's calling Nero Wolfe's number, but I'd rather be goofy than sorry. Taking my raincoat and hat, I went down to the lobby, out into the rain, and to a drugstore in the next block. There I made the call from a booth. When I got Wolfe and reported the development, he grunted across the continent, and that was all. He had no additional instructions or suggestions. I got the impression that I had interrupted him at something important like a crossword puzzle.

I only half drowned finding a taxi to take me to the address of the Southwest Agency. With Dolman I didn't have to be as choosy as the day before, since any mug should be able to keep a man from killing a woman right under his nose, but even so I didn't want any part of Gibson or one like him. He produced a fairly good specimen, and I gave him careful and fully detailed instructions and made him repeat them. From there I went to the South Seas Hotel for a surprise call on Finch, thinking it just as well to check him and also to have a look at the room. He was lying on the bed, reading a book entitled Twilight of the Absolute, which seemed a deep dive for a dick, but then, as Finch, he was a literary agent, so I refrained from comment. The room was perfect, of medium size, with the door to the bathroom in the far corner and one to a good big closet off to one side. I didn't stay long because my nerves were jumpy away from the phone in my room at the Riviera. If anything happened I wanted to know it quick. For instance, Clarence Potter would soon be home from work, or was already. What if he didn't understand it some more and decided to take a hand?

But at bedtime the phone hadn't let out a tinkle.

16

AT 8:02 Thursday morning I entered Finch's room at the South Seas. He was up and dressed but hadn't had breakfast, and I had only had orange juice before leaving the Riviera. Hanging my hat and raincoat, which had been sprinkled again, in the rear of the big closet, I gave him my