Prisoner's Base

"I'm repeating it. When I say, 'Go ahead,' you say, 'I don't think so, but if you'll hold the line I'll go to the foyer and see if it's there.' As soon as you say that, put the phone down, go to the foyer, open the outside door, go out, bang the door shut, ring for the elevator, and keep your finger on the button until it comes. Go downstairs and stick with the night man until I arrive. Wherever he goes, you go. Will you follow instructions?"

"Yes."

"Are you all set?"

"Yes."

"Go ahead."

"I don't think so, but will you hold the line? Uh-hold the line, and I'll go and see if it's in the foyer."

Good enough, I thought, with no rehearsal. There was a little clatter as she put the phone down. I could hear no footsteps, but the living room had rugs. Figuring that fifteen to twenty seconds ought to do it, and that thirty was the maximum if there were no snags, I started counting as I heard the phone drop. I can count and never be out more than three seconds in five minutes. As I counted I remembered that I had told Wolfe, when he gave Priscilla Eads eleven hours to hide, that it was like run sheep run, but this was more like prisoner's base. The phone in the living room was one base, and the elevator outside was the other, and it was up to Sarah Jaffee to make the run without being tagged. It had been a lot of years since I had played prisoner's base.

That had darted through my mind by the time I had counted ten. From then on the strain of listening kept it empty. If she gave it a healthy bang I would unquestionably hear it. I got to fifteen, to twenty-no bang. Thirty. I had the phone pressed to my ear. Forty, fifty, sixty-a full minute. It couldn't possibly have taken her that long, but I held onto the damn thing, counting automatically-ninety-four, ninety-five, ninety-six…

I hung up, with my brain humming, but one thing was a cinch-I needed clothes. As I got them on, I considered. If I spent time calling the Nineteenth Precinct, which was nearest to her, I might or might not get a lieutenant who preferred acting to arguing, especially since my one fact was that a woman's keys were missing. There were several possible explanations for my not hearing the door bang, including the chance that she had failed to bang it. Various alternatives to calling the precinct offered themselves, but by the time I was dressed, and that wasn't long, they had all been discarded.