The Golden Spiders (Crime Line)

Horan opened up. He said that he had not intended, on the phone that morning, to intimate that Wolfe was doing or contemplating anything improper or unethical. He had merely been trying to safeguard the interests of his former friend and client, Mrs. Damon Fromm, who had been-

“Not your client,” interposed Maddox in a tone that matched his face perfectly.

“I advised her,” Horan snapped.

“Badly,” Maddox snapped back.

They regarded each other. Not sidekicks.

“Perhaps,” Wolfe suggested dryly, “it would be well for each of you to tell me, without interruption, to what extent and with what authority you represent Mrs. Fromm. Then contradictions can be composed or ignored as may seem desirable. Mr. Horan?”

He was controlling himself. His thin tenor was still thin, but it wasn’t as close to a squeak as it had been on the phone. “It is true that I was never Mrs. Fromm’s attorney of record in any action. She consulted me in many matters and showed that she valued my advice by frequently acting upon it. As counsel for the Association for the Aid of Displaced Persons, which I still am, I was closely associated with her. If she were alive I don’t think she would challenge my right to call myself her friend.”

“Are you an executor of her estate?”

“No.”

“Thank you. Mr. Maddox?”

It hurt him, but he delivered. “My law firm, Maddox and Welling, was counsel for Damon Fromm for twelve years. Since his death we have been counsel for Mrs. Fromm. I am the executor of her estate. I interrupted because Mr. Horan’s statement that Mrs. Fromm was his client was not true. I have something to add.”

“Go ahead.”

“This morning-no, this afternoon-Mr. Horan phoned and told me of the check Mrs. Fromm gave you yesterday, and of his conversation with you. His call to you was gratuitous and impertinent. My call on you now is not. I ask you formally, as Mrs. Fromm’s counsel and executor of her estate, under what arrangement and for what purpose did she give you her check for ten thousand dollars? If you prefer to tell me privately, let us withdraw. Mr. Horan insisted on coming with me, but this is your house, and that young man looks quite capable of dealing with him.”

If he intended the glance he shot at me to be complimentary, I’d hate to have him give me one of disapproval.

Wolfe spoke. “I don’t prefer to tell you privately, Mr. Maddox. I prefer not to tell you at all.”

Maddox didn’t look any sourer, because he couldn’t. “Do you know law, Mr. Wolfe?”

“No.”