I gathered up the papers from his desk and returned them to my drawer before telling him, “I don’t like it, and you know I don’t. One of my functions is keeping you alive.” I started for the safe. “What if I come down in the morning and find you?”
“Some morning you may. Not this one. Don’t lock the safe.”
“There’s fifty grand in it.”
“I know. Don’t lock it.”
“Okay, I heard you. The guns are in my second drawer but not loaded.”
I told him good night and left him.
Chapter 19
In the morning three-tenths of the fifty grand was no longer there. Fifteen thousand bucks. I told myself that before I died I must manage at least a look from a distance at Mr. Jones. A guy who could demand that kind of dough for piecework, and collect in advance, was something not to be missed.
When I arose at seven I had had only five hours’ sleep. I had not imitated Gwenn and taken to eaves-dropping, but I certainly didn’t intend to snooze peacefully while Wolfe was down in the office with a character so mysterious I couldn’t be allowed to see him or hear him. Therefore, not undressing, I got the gun I keep on my table and went to the hall and sat at the top of the stairs. From there, two flights up, I heard his arrival, and voices in the hall — Wolfe’s and one other — and the office door closing, and then, for nearly three hours, a faint mumble that I had to strain my ears to catch at all. For the last hour of it I had to resort to measures to keep myself awake. Finally the office door opened and the voices were louder, and in half a minute he had gone and I heard Wolfe’s elevator. I beat it to my room. After my head touched the pillow I tossed and turned for nearly three seconds.
In the morning my custom is not to enter the office until after my half an hour in the kitchen with Fritz and food and the morning paper, but that Friday I went there first and opened the safe. Wolfe is not the man to dish out fifteen grand of anybody’s money without having a clear idea of what for, so it seemed likely that something might need attention at any moment, and when, a little after eight, Fritz came down from taking Wolfe’s breakfast tray up to him, I fully expected to be told that I was wanted on the second floor. Nothing doing. According to Fritz, my name hadn’t been mentioned. At the regular time, three minutes to nine, then at my desk in the office, I heard the sound of the elevator ascending. Apparently his sacred schedule, nine to eleven in the plant rooms, was not to be interrupted. He and Theodore were now handling the situation, no more outside help being needed.