Not Quite Dead Enough (The Rex Stout Library)

I breezed through to the inner corridor. No one in sight. The door to my room was about twenty paces down normally, and it took me not more than fourteen. Inside I took a breath, and deposited the big suitcase on my desk. It began to seem more possible. Like this. I go to the scene and tell the corporal Nero Wolfe sent me back to do a close-up on something. I enter and examine the top of Ryder’s desk with my little glass. I make noises of dissatisfaction and tell the corporal to go ask Major Goodman if I may borrow his big magnifying glass, Goodman’s office being on the eleventh floor. The corporal goes, I grab the suitcase, dive down the hall to my room, and cache it in Wolfe’s case. That would be the only risk, the five seconds negotiating the hall. The rest would be pie. I turned it over and around, looking for a way to reduce the risk still more, but decided that was the minimum.

I got the little glass from a drawer of my desk and stuck it in my pocket, went out and down the corridor, turned the corner, saw that the same corporal was on guard and no one else around, said my little piece to him, was passed in without any question, crossed to Ryder’s desk, and began inspecting it with the glass. But my heart wasn’t in my work because I had had plenty of time, approaching the desk, to perceive that the suitcase wasn’t there.

Chapter 4

I continued to inspect the desk, remarking to myself meanwhile, “Of all the blank blink blonk blunk luck.”

Since nothing more helpful than that occurred to me, I finally straightened up for a comprehensive survey. As far as I could see, everything was as before with the single exception of the suitcase. I went over to the corporal.

“Anyone been in here since Colonel Tinkham and Wolfe and I left?”

“No, sir. Oh yes, Colonel Tinkham came back shortly afterward. General Fife was with him.”

“Oh,” I said casually, “then I guess they took that chair.”

“Chair?”

“Yeah, one of the chairs Wolfe wanted me to examine-it seems to be gone-I’ll go and see-”

“There can’t be a chair gone, sir. Nobody took any chair or anything else.”

“You’re sure of that? Not even General Fife or Colonel Tinkham?”

“No, sir. Nobody.”