I cradled the phone and told my audience, “Mr. Wolfe says okay. We’re to be there at noon.”
I didn’t add that I had a strong suspicion there were going to be some script revisions, not by any of us and not by any of the cast.
Chapter 16
The idea, I don’t know whose, was to go in a body, after gathering at the Tenth Precinct station, and it was quite a cavalcade, with two limousines — Skinner’s and Bowen’s — and four PD sedans.
I was in Skinner’s limousine, and at my suggestion it headed the procession. I thought I should be the first to enter, and intended, on crossing the threshold, to change over and become a host, but discovered that it had been planned differently. It was not Fritz who let us in, but Saul Panzer, and he greeted me as an arriving guest, offering to take my hat. He could kid me, and often did, but not in the presence of the Police Commissioner. Wolfe had told him to, no question about it. So I said, “Thank you, sonny,” and handed him the hat, and he said, “Don’t mention it, officer.”
Wolfe and Fritz, with Saul’s help evidently, had managed well enough. The chairs were placed exactly as they had been at the start of proceedings Thursday evening, and the portable bar was at its spot, fully equipped. There was some displacement when Purley and a dick came with the tape recorder and accessories and got it installed, but things were properly rearranged. Since I was being regarded as a guest I thought it was only polite to act like one, so I went to my desk and sat, which was where I belonged as a member of the cast. The other members likewise disposed themselves, and none of them needed any coaching. Nearest me was Viola Duday, then Oliver Pitkin, Jay Brucker, and Bernard Quest, and Perry Helmar in the red leather chair. The couch, to my right and rear as I faced Wolfe’s desk, was not occupied. Sarah Jaffee had sat there Thursday. On a chair near it was Eric Hagh, and beyond him were the two lawyers, Irby and Parker. Andy Fomos was off by himself, over by the bookshelves.
Additional chairs, some of the smaller yellow ones, had been lined up along the wall on the other side of Wolfe’s desk, for the audience. It seemed bad etiquette for VIPs like the Police Commissioner and the District Attorney and Inspector Cramer to be perched on those skimpy little numbers while Helmar, a mere Wall Street lawyer and murder suspect, had the red leather chair all to himself, but the occasion required it. Also in the row of audience were Assistant DA Mandelbaum, Captain Olmstead, and Purley Stebbins. The recorder was on a table at Purley’s elbow.
Saul Panzer stood facing the cast, not the audience. There is nothing impressive about Saul. He is undersized, his nose and ears are too big, and his shoulders slant. With Saul a thousand wrongdoers had made the mistake of believing what they saw. He spoke. “I believe this is the way it was Thursday evening when Mr. Wolfe entered. Does anyone disagree?”
No one did. He went on, “HI sit on the couch where Mrs. Jaffee was. I wasn’t here, but it has been described to me, and if I do anything wrong it can be corrected. Archie, will you ring for Mr. Wolfe as you did Thursday?”
He passed between Viola Duday and me to get to the couch. I stepped to Wolfe’s desk and pressed the button, one long and two short, and returned to my chair. Wolfe entered. On account of the row of audience he couldn’t bear right along the wall, so he navigated through the cast to make his desk. Standing beside his chair, he took his time for a look from right to left, ending with those against the wall, the representatives of the People of the State of New York.