“My husband is.”
“We both are,” Carlisle stated. “Vague again. It’s a joint membership. In my greenhouse at my country home I have over four thousand plants, including several hundred orchids.” He looked at his wrist watch. “Isn’t this about enough?”
“Plenty,” Cramer conceded. “Thank you, both of you. We won’t bother you again unless we have to. Levy, pass them out.”
Mrs. Carlisle got to her feet and moved off, but halfway to the door she turned. “I don’t suppose — would it be possible for me to look at the globe now? Just a peek?”
“For God’s sake!” Her husband took her by the arm. “Come on. Come on!”
When the door had closed behind them Cramer glared at me and then at Wolfe. “This is sure a sweet one,” he said grimly. “Say it’s within the range of possibility that Carlisle is it, and the way it stands right now, why not? So we look into him. We check back on him for six months, and try doing it without getting roars out of him — a man like that, in his position. However, it can be done — by three or four men in two or three weeks. Multiply that by what? How many men were here?”
“Around a hundred and twenty,” I told him. “Ten dozen. But you’ll find that at least half of them are disqualified one way or another. As I told you, I took a survey. Say sixty.”
“All right, multiply it by sixty. Do you care for it?”
“No.”
“Neither do I.” Cramer took the cigar from his mouth, removed a nearly severed piece with his fingers and put it in an ashtray, and replaced the cigar with a fresh tooth-hold. “Of course,” he said sarcastically, “when she sat in there telling you about him the situation was different. You wanted her to enjoy being with you. You couldn’t reach for the phone and tell us you had a self-confessed crook who could put a quick finger on a murderer and let us come and take over — hell no! You had to save it for a fee for Wolfe! You had to sit and admire her legs!”