“Don’t try,” Wolfe growled.
“I wish I could, I certainly do. What a really, really terrible thing! I wouldn’t have dreamed such a thing could happen — the Manhattan Flower Club! Of course, she wasn’t a member, but that only makes it worse in a way.” McNab turned to Cramer. “I’m responsible for this.”
“You are?”
“Yes. It was my idea. I persuaded Mr. Wolfe to arrange it. He let me word the invitations. And I was congratulating myself on the great success! The club has only a hundred and eighty-nine members, and there were over two hundred people here. Then this! What can I do?” He turned. “I want you to know this, Mr. Wolfe. I got a message from my paper; they wanted me to do a story on it for the news columns, and I refused point-blank. Even if I get fired — I don’t think I will.”
“Sit down a minute,” Cramer invited him.
McNab varied the monotony on one detail, at least. He admitted that he had left the plant rooms three times during the afternoon, once to accompany a departing guest down to the ground floor, and twice to go down alone to check on who had come and who hadn’t. Aside from that, he was more of the same. He had never heard of Cynthia Brown. By now it was beginning to seem not only futile but silly to spend time on seven or eight of them merely because they happened to be the last to go and so were at hand. Also it was something new to me from a technical standpoint. I had never seen one stack up like that. Any precinct dick knows that every question you ask of everybody is aimed at one of the three targets: motive, means, and opportunity. In this case there were no questions to ask because those were already answered. Motive: the guy had followed her downstairs, knowing she had recognized him, had seen her enter Wolfe’s office and thought she was doing exactly what she was doing, getting set to tell Wolfe, and had decided to prevent that the quickest and best way he knew. Means: any piece of cloth; even his handkerchief would do. Opportunity: he was there — all of them on Saul’s list were.
So if you wanted to learn who strangled Cynthia Brown, first you had to find out who had strangled Doris Hatten, and the cops had already been working on that for five months.
As soon as Bill McNab had been sent on his way, Colonel Percy Brown was brought in.
Brown was not exactly at ease, but he had himself well in hand. You would never have picked him for a con man, and neither would I. His mouth and jaw were strong and attractive, and as he sat down he leveled his keen gray eyes at Cramer and kept them there. He wasn’t interested in Wolfe or me. He said his name was Colonel Percy Brown, and Cramer asked him which army he was a colonel in.
“I think,” Brown said in a cool even tone, “it will save time if I state my position. I will answer fully and freely all questions that relate to what I saw or heard or did since I arrived here this afternoon. To that extent I’ll help you all I can. Answers to any other questions will have to wait until I consult my attorney.”