“I assure you, sir—”
“Don’t try. Sit down.” Wolfe was disgusted. “I don’t care if you wasted your sister’s money, but there are some things you people know that I do care about, and you are foolish not to tell me.” He wiggled a finger at Brady. “You, doctor, should be ashamed of yourself. You ought to know better. It is idiotic to withhold facts which are bound to be uncovered sooner or later. You said you had nothing to tell me with any bearing on any aspect of this business. What about the box of stable refuse you procured for the stated purpose of extracting tetanus germs from it?”
Daniel made a noise and turned his head to fix Brady with a stare. Brady was taken aback, but not as much as might have been expected. He regarded Wolfe a moment and then said quietly, “I admit I should have told you that.”
“Is that all you have to say about it? Why didn’t you tell the police when they first started to investigate?”
“Because I thought there was nothing to investigate. I continued to think so until this morning, when you phoned me. It would have served no useful purpose—”
“What did you do with that stuff?”
“I took it to the office and did some experiments with two of my colleagues. We were settling an argument. Then we destroyed it. All of it.”
“Did any of these people know about it?”
“I don’t” Brady frowned. “Yes, I remember — I discussed it. Telling them how dangerous any small cut might be—”
“Not me,” Daniel said grimly. “If I had known you did that—”