Some Buried Caesar

In 5 minutes, in spite of the exposition traffic, we were pulling up at the courthouse. Instead of entering at the front, as with Osgood when calling on Waddell the day before, we went around to a side entrance that was on the ground level. The hall was dark and smelled of disinfectant and stale tobacco juice. The trooper preceding us turned the knob of a door marked SHERI F, with one F gone, and I followed him in with Barrow at my rear. It was a big dingy room with de- crepit desks and chairs, at one desk in a corner being the only occupant, a bald-headed gentleman with a red face and gold- rimmed specs who nodded at us and said nothing.

"We're going through you," Barrow announced.

I nodded indifferently and struck a pose. I know that the whole included all its parts and that that was one of the parts, and it had been necessary for Wolfe to toss me to the dogs so that he could have a private interview with the dis- trict attorney's coat pocket. So I tolerated it, and got ad- ditional proof that they had been to police school. They did everything but rip my seams. When they had finished I re- turned the various items to their proper places, and sat down. Barrow stood and gazed down at me. I was surprised he didn't go and wash his face, because that nicotine and soap must have stung. Tough as they come, those weatherbeaten babies.

"The mistake you made," I told him, "was coming in there breathing fire. Nero Wolfe and I are respectable law-abiding detectives."

He grunted. "Forget it. I'd give a month's pay to know how you did it, and maybe I'll find out sometime, but not now. I'm not going to try any hammering. Not at present." He glanced to see that the trooper was ready at a desk with notebook and pencil. "I just want to know a few things. Do you maintain that you took nothing from Bronson at any time?"

"I do."

"Did you suspect him of being implicated in the murder of Clyde Osgood?"

"You've got the wrong party. Mr. Wolfe does all the sus- pecting for the firm, ask him. I'm the office boy."

"Do you refuse to answer?"

"No indeed. If you want to know whether I personally suspected Bronson of murder, the reply is no. No known motive."

"Wasn't there anything in his relations with Clyde that might have supplied a motive?"