“Oh, hello. Keep it down, my ears are sensitive.”
“Durkin sent me to phone so he could stay on the subject. The subject came out of the house at seven nineteen East Fifty-first Street at eleven forty-one. He was alone. He walked to Lexington and around the corner to a drugstore and is in there now in a phone booth. I’m across the street in a restaurant. Any instructions?”
“Not a thing, thank you. Give my love to the family.”
“Right.”
It clicked off, and I hung up and swiveled back to rejoin the party, but apparently it was over. They were on their feet, and Wengert was turning to go. Cramer was saying, “… but it’s not all off the record. I just want that understood.”
He turned and followed Wengert out. I saw no point in dashing past them out to the door, since two grown men should be up to turning a knob and pulling, but I stepped to the hall to observe. When they were outside and the door closed I went back in and remarked to Wolfe, “Very neat. But what if they had let me phone her?”
He made a face. “Pfui. If they had got it from her they wouldn’t have called on me. They would have sent for you, possibly with a warrant. That was one of the contingencies.”
“They might have let me phone her anyway.”
“Unlikely, since that would have disclosed their knowledge — to her and therefore to anyone — and betrayed their informant. But if they had, while she was on her way I would have proceeded with them, and they would have left before she arrived.”
I put the yellow chair back in place. “All the same I’m glad they didn’t and so are you. That was Rattner on the phone, reporting for Fred. Heath was with Miss Devlin an hour and four minutes. He left at eleven forty-one and was in a phone booth in a drugstore when Rattner called.”