“Thank you for coming to tell me,” Wolfe murmured. “If you’ll show Miss Lowell the way out, please, Archie?”
I stood up. She looked at me as if I had offered her a deadly insult, and looked back at Wolfe. “I don’t think,” she said, “that your attitude is very sensible. I think you and Mr. Koven should come to an agreement on this. Why wouldn’t this be the way to do it — say the claims cancel each other, and you abandon yours and he abandons his?”
“Because,” Wolfe said dryly, “my claim is valid and his isn’t. If you’re a member of the bar, Miss Lowell, you should know that this is a little improper, or anyway unconventional. You should be talking with my attorney, not with me.”
“I’m not a lawyer, Mr. Wolfe. I’m Mr. Koven’s agent and business manager. He thinks lawyers would just make this more of a mess than it is, and I agree with him. He thinks you and he should settle it between you. Isn’t that possible?”
“I don’t know. We can try. There’s a phone. Get him down here.”
She shook her head. “He’s not — he’s too upset. I’m sure you’ll find it more practical to deal with me, and if we come to an understanding he’ll approve, I guarantee that. Why don’t we go into it — the two claims?”
“I doubt if it will get us anywhere.” Wolfe sounded perfectly willing to come halfway. “For one thing, a factor in both claims is the question who killed Adrian Getz and why? If it was Mr. Goodwin, Mr. Koven’s claim has a footing, and I freely concede it; if it was someone else I concede nothing. If I discussed it with you I would have to begin by considering that aspect; I would have to ask you some pointed questions; and I doubt if you would dare to risk answering them.”
“I can always button up. What kind of questions?”
“Well—” Wolfe pursed his lips. “For example, how’s the monkey?”
“I can risk answering that. It’s sick. It’s at the Speyer Hospital. They don’t expect it to live.”