XIII
We were back again to the headline we had started with: MAN ALIVE. This time, however, I did not regard it as a letdown. I took it for granted that by the time I got back everyone there would know who was coming with me, even if one or two of them hadn’t caught on before I left. I thought it would be interesting to see how they would welcome, under those difficult circumstances, their former employer and associate on his return from a watery grave, but he took charge of the script himself as he entered the office. He strode across to face Bernard and glare down at him. Bernard scrambled to his feet.
Dickson asked, his tone cold and biting, “What the hell’s the matter with you? Can’t you handle anything at all?”
“Not this I can’t,” Bernard said, and he was by no means whimpering. “This man Wolfe is one for you to handle, and I only hope to God you can!”
Without moving his shoulders, Dickson pivoted his head to take them in. “Well, I’m back,” he announced. “I would have been back soon anyway, but this bright nephew of mine has hurried it up a little. Ward, you’re looking like a window display in a fire sale. Still putting up with them, Polly? Now you’ll have to put up with me again. Cynthia, I hear you’re on the way to lead the whole pack.” His head pivoted some more. “Where’s Henry? I thought he was here.”
I was asking that question myself. Neither Wolfe nor Demarest was in sight. I had turned to ask Fritz where they were, but he had left the room as soon as I appeared. And not only were those two missing, but what was fully as surprising, there had been two additions to the party. Inspector Cramer and my favorite sergeant, Purley Stebbins, were seated side by side on the couch over in the far corner.
I dodged my way through the welcomers, some sitting and some standing, and asked Cramer respectfully, “Where’s Mr. Wolfe?”
“Somewhere with a lawyer,” Cramer growled, “making up charades. Who’s that you brought in?”
“George Dickson, so I’m told. I suppose Mr. Wolfe phoned you to come and get a murderer?”
“He did.”