We hadn’t got back to normal, since there was still a small army busy up in the plant rooms, but in many respects things had settled down. Wolfe had on a clean shirt and socks, meals were regular and up to standard, the street was cleared of broken glass, and we had caught up on sleep. Nothing much had yet been done toward making good on Wolfe’s promise to finish the Rony job, but we had only been home fourteen hours and nine of them had been spent in bed.
Then the package came. Wolfe, having been up in the plant room since breakfast, was in the office with me, checking invoices and shipping memos of everything from osmundine fiber to steel sash putty. When I went to the front door to answer the bell, and a boy handed me a package about the size of a small suitcase and a receipt to sign, I left the package in the hall because I supposed it was just another item for the operations upstairs, and I was busy. But after I returned to the office it struck me as queer that there was no shipper’s name on it, so I went back to the hall for another look. There was no mark of any kind on the heavy wrapping paper but Wolfe’s name and address. It was tied securely with thick cord. I lifted it and guessed six pounds. I pressed it against my ear and held my breath for thirty seconds, and heard nothing.
Nuts, I thought, and cut the cord with my knife and slashed the paper. Inside was a fiber carton with the flaps taped down. I got cautious again and severed the flaps from the sides by cutting all the way around, and lifted one corner for a peek. All I saw was newspaper. I inserted the knife point and tore a piece of it off, and what I saw then made me raise my brows. Removing the flaps and the newspaper, and seeing more of the same, I got the carton up under my arm, marched into the office with it, and asked Wolfe, “Do you mind if I unpack this on your desk? I don’t want to make a mess in the hall?”
Ignoring his protest, I put the package down on his desk and started taking out stacks of twenty-dollar bills. They were used bills, not a new one among them as well as I could tell from the edges, and they were banded in bundles of fifty, which meant a thousand bucks to a bundle.
“What the devil is this?” Wolfe demanded.
“Money,” I told him. “Don’t touch it, it may be a trap. It may be covered with germs.” I was arranging the bundles ten to a pile, and there were five piles. “That’s a coincidence,” I remarked. “Of course we’ll have to check the bundles, but if they’re labeled right it’s exactly fifty grand. That’s interesting.”
“Archie.” Wolfe was glowering. “What fatuous flummery is this? I told you to deposit that check, not cash it.” He pointed. “Wrap that up and take it to the bank.”
“Yes, sir. But before I do—” I went to the safe and got the bank book, opened it to the current page, and displayed it to him. “As you see, the check was deposited. This isn’t flummery, it’s merely a coincidence. You heard the doorbell and saw me go to answer it. A boy handed me this package and gave me a receipt to sign — General Messenger Service, Twenty-eight West Forty-seventh Street. I thought it might be a clock bomb and opened it in the hall, away from you. There is nothing on the package or in it to show who sent it. The only clue is the newspaper the carton was lined with — from the second edition of the New York Times. Who do we know that reads the Times and has fifty thousand bucks for a practical joke?” I gestured. “Answer that and we’ve got him.”
Wolfe was still glowering, but at the pile of dough, not at me. He reached for one of the bundles, flipped through it, and put it back. “Put it in the safe. The package too.”
“Shouldn’t we count it first? What if one of the bundles is short a twenty?”