Not Quite Dead Enough (The Rex Stout Library)

Rex Stout

Not Quite Dead Enough

Introduction

Archie’s in the army.

He’s Major Archie Goodwin now, and the urbane but reclusive three-hundred-pound master detective Nero Wolfe is emerging from his West 35th Street brownstone with regularity to train with his chef, Fritz Brenner, for some future combat envisioned by Wolfe.

When Major Goodwin calls at the venerable brownstone, he’s told that Wolfe and Brenner are out walking, as they are every morning these days, in an effort to toughen themselves and to sweat some weight off the corpulent Wolfe. They are by the river, where, a shocked Archie is told, Wolfe “obtained permission from the authorities to train on a pier because the boys on the street ridicule him.”

When Wolfe and Fritz return Archie ruefully observes them eating an unappetizing breakfast of prunes, lettuce, and tomatoes. The regimen seems to be working, at least in the mind of Wolfe, and the astounded Archie is told that next week the two intend to begin running.

But beyond these strange circumstances, not much has changed in the universe of Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin. The war years didn’t slow the remarkable Rex Stout’s prolificity or ingenuity. Quite the contrary. The patriotic Stout was the host of three radio programs during the war, and served as chairman of the War Writers’ Board. He was also president of Friends of Democracy, 1941-51, the Authors’ Guild, 1943-45, and the Society for the Prevention of World War III, 1943-46. When it came to serving his country, both during and after World War II, this amazing author was busier than the marines. Yet somehow during the war years he found the time and talent to create four novels, The Broken Vase, Alphabet Hicks, Black Orchids, and Not Quite Dead Enough.

In the latter, the hugely overweight Wolfe might be training for physical rough stuff, but Archie, assigned by the army to obtain Wolfe’s help, realizes it’s Wolfe’s brain and not brawn that would best serve the cause. So, after some neat maneuvering by the shrewd and supremely competent Archie, the two complementary characters are at it as always in Not Quite Dead Enough, Wolfe the lazy, unparalleled genius in his comfortable West Side brownstone, Archie the affable, energetic, and resourceful legman working the streets of Manhattan and environs.