“Okay. On one condition, that you promise not to phone Mr. Wolfe. If you did you’d be sure to tell him that you got what he’s after, and I want to surprise him with it.”
He said he wouldn’t, and that he wanted two sandwiches and plenty of coffee, and I departed. Two men and a woman who were standing in the corridor, talking, inspected me head to foot as I passed but didn’t try to trip me, and I went on out to the elevators, descended, and got directed to a phone booth in the lobby.
Orrie Cather answered again, and I began to suspect that he and Saul were continuing the pinochle game with Wolfe.
“I’m on my way,” I told Wolfe when he was on, “to get corned-beef sandwiches for Pohl and me but I’ve got a plan. He promised not to phone you while I’m gone, and if I don’t go back he’s stuck. He has installed himself in Keyes’ room, which you ought to see, against Dorothy’s protests, and intends to stay. Been there all day. What shall I do, come home or go to a movie?”
“Has Mr. Pohl had lunch?”
“Certainly not. That’s what the sandwiches are for.”
“Then you’ll have to take them to him.”
I remained calm because I knew he meant it from his heart, or at least his stomach. He couldn’t bear the idea of even his bitterest enemy missing a meal.
“All right,” I conceded, “and I may get a tip. By the way, that trick you tried didn’t work. Right away he found a record of Talbott’s travels in Keyes’ desk and copied it off on a sheet from Keyes’ memo pad. I’ve got it in my pocket.”
“Read it to me.”