Wolfe sighed. “That abominable clatter. It’s more than two miles, nearer three I suppose. The last time I left this house was early in September, for the privilege of dining at the same table with Albert Einstein, and coming home it rained. You remember that.”
“Yeah. Will I ever forget it. There was such a downpour the pavements were damp.”
“You deride me. Confound it... ah well. I will not make a virtue of necessity, but neither will I whimper under its lash. Since there is no such thing as bail for a man charged with murder, and since I must have a conversation with Mr. Chapin, there is no escaping an expedition to Centre Street. Not, however, until we know who killed Dr. Burton.”
“And not forgetting that before the night’s out the cripple may empty the bag for Cramer by confessing that he did it.”
“Archie.” Wolfe wiggled a finger at me. “If you persist... but no. King Canute tried that. I only say again, nonsense. Have I not made it clear to you? It is the fashion to say anything is possible. The truth is, very few things are possible, pitiably few. That Mr. Chapin killed Dr. Burton is not among them. We are engaged on a project. It is futile to ask you to exclude from your brain all the fallacies which creep, familiar worms, through its chambers, but I do expect you not to let them interfere with our necessary operations. It is late, past two o’clock, time for bed. I have outlined your activities for tomorrow — today. I have explained what may be done, and what may not. Good night, sleep well.”
I stood up and yawned. I was too sleepy to be sore, so it was automatic that I said, “Okay, boss.” I went upstairs to bed.
Sunday morning I slept late. I had been given three chores for that day, and the first one on the list probably wouldn’t be practical at any early hour, so twice when I woke up to glance at the clock I burrowed in again. I finally tumbled out around nine-thirty and got the body rinsed off and the face scraped. When I found myself whistling as I buttoned my shirt I stopped to seek the source of all the gaiety, and discovered I probably felt satisfied because Paul Chapin was behind bars and couldn’t see the sunshine which I was seeing on the front of the houses across the street. I stopped whistling. That was no way to feel about a guy when I was supposed to be fighting for his freedom.
It was Sunday morning in November, and I knew what had happened when I had called down to Fritz that I was out of the bathtub: he had lined a casserole with butter, put in it six tablespoons of cream, three fresh eggs, four Lambert sausages, salt, pepper, paprika and chives, and conveyed it to the oven. But before I went to the kitchen I stopped in the office. Andrew Hibbard was there with the morning paper. He said that he hadn’t been able to sleep much, that he had had breakfast, and that he wished to God he had some of his own clothes. I told him that Wolfe was up on the top floor with the orchids and that he would be welcome up there if he cared to see them. He decided to go. I went to the phone and called up Centre Street and was told that Inspector Cramer hadn’t shown up yet and they weren’t sure when he would. So I went to the kitchen and took my time with the casserole and accessories. Of course the murder of Dr. Burton was front page in both papers. I read the pieces through and enjoyed them very much.
Then I went to the garage and got the roadster and moseyed downtown.
Cramer was in his office when I got there, and didn’t keep me waiting. He was smoking a big cigar and looked contented. I sat down and listened to him discussing with a couple of dicks the best way to persuade some Harlem citizen to quit his anatomy experiments on the skulls of drugstore cashiers, and when they went I looked at him and grinned. He didn’t grin back. He whirled his chair around to face me and asked me what I wanted. I told him I didn’t want anything, I just wanted to thank him for letting me squat on the sidelines up at Doc Burton’s last night.