Not Quite Dead Enough (The Rex Stout Library)

Around noon I dropped in at 316 Barnum Street, and found Leon Furey still in bed, or anyhow still in pajamas. He said he had to sleep late because he did his hawk hunting mostly at night. I learned that killing hawks was his only visible means of support, that the Army had turned him down on account of a leaky valve, that Roy Douglas lived on the floor above him, the one next to the roof, and a few other items, but nothing that seemed likely to help me any. I found Roy up on the roof, in his loft. He wouldn’t let me in and wasn’t inclined for conversation. He said he was busy working on the widower system, and all I got out of him was that the widower system was a method of keeping a male pigeon away from his mate for a certain period, and letting him in with her for a couple of minutes just before shipping him to the liberation point for a race, the result being that he flew to get back as he had never flown before. I disapproved of it on moral grounds, but that didn’t seem to interest Roy either, so I left him to his widower system, descended again to the street, and began exploring the community.

For over three hours I collected neighborhood gossip, and it wasn’t worth a dime a bushel. I didn’t even get any significant dirt, let alone useful information. On the question of the death of old Mrs. Leeds, fourteen of them divided as follows:

4 Mrs. Chack killed her.

1 Miss Leeds killed her.

6 She died of old age.

3 She died of meanness.

No majority for anybody or anything. No nothing. I went home, arriving a little before 5:00, to think it over and decide whether it was worth while springing Ann on Wolfe at all and as I stood in the office frowning at the dust on Wolfe’s desk, the doorbell rang. I went and pulled the curtain aside for a look through the glass panel, and there was Roy Douglas on the stoop. My heart skipped a beat. Was something going to break? I pulled the door open and invited him in.

He acted embarrassed, as if he had something he wanted to say but wasn’t quite sure what it was. I took him to the office and dusted off a chair for him, and he sat down and opened his mouth for air a couple of times and then said:

“I guess I wasn’t very courteous down there at the loft today. I never am very polite when I’m working with the birds. You see, it makes them nervous to have strangers around.”

I nodded sympathetically. “Me too. By the way, I forgot to ask, how’s Dusky Diana coming along?”