She looked around too. I saw that the kid wasn’t the son and heir after all, it was the daughter he was interested in, probably had it signed up. Mrs. Burton said, “What does it matter? Go to my room — you don’t mind, Alice?”
The woman in the chair said she didn’t, and got up. The kid took hold of the daughter’s arm to steer her, by golly he wasn’t going to let her fall and hurt herself. They went on out.
Mrs. Burton said, “Well?”
I said, “The confidential part is really about me. Do you know who Nero Wolfe is?”
“Nero Wolfe? Yes.”
“Dr. Burton and his friends entered into an agreement—”
She interrupted me. “I know all about it. My husband...” She stopped. The way she suddenly clasped her fingers tight and tried to keep her lips from moving showed that a bust-up was nearer to coming through than I had supposed. But she soon got it shoved under again. “My husband told me all about it.”
I nodded. “That saves time. I’m not a city detective. I’m private. I work for Nero Wolfe, my name’s Goodwin. If you ask me what I’m here for there’s lots of ways to answer you, but you’d have to help me pick the right one. It depends on how you feel.” I had the innocence turned on, the candid eye. I was talking fast. “Of course you feel terrible, certainly, but no matter how bad it is inside of you right now, you’ll go on living. I’ve got some questions to ask for Nero Wolfe, and I can’t be polite and wait for a week until your nerves have had a chance to grow some new skin, I’ve got to ask them now or never. I’m here now, just tell me this and get rid of me. Did you see Paul Chapin shoot your husband?”
“No. But I’ve already—”
“Sure. Let’s get it done. Did anybody see him?”