That Tuesday morning, however, it didn’t matter much, since I was kept busy from eight o’clock on by the phone and the doorbell. After nine Saul was there to help, but not with the phone because the orders were that I was to answer all calls. They were mostly from newspapers, but there were a couple from Homicide — once Rowcliff and once Purley Stebbins — and a few scattered ones, including one with comic relief from the president of the Manhattan Flower Club. I took them on the extension in the kitchen. Every time I lifted the thing and told the transmitter, “Nero Wolfe’s office, Archie Goodwin speaking,” my pulse went up a notch and then had to level off again. I had one argument, with a bozo in the District Attorney’s office who had the strange idea that he could order me to report for an interview at eleven-thirty sharp, which ended by my agreeing to call later to fix an hour.
A little before eleven I was in the kitchen with Saul, who at Wolfe’s direction had been briefed to date, trying to come to terms on a bet. I was offering him even money that the call would come by noon and he was holding out for five to three, having originally asked for two to one. I was suggesting sarcastically that we change sides when the phone rang and I got it and said distinctly, “Nero Wolfe’s office, Archie Goodwin speaking.”
“Mr. Goodwin?”
“Right.”
“You sent me a note.”
My hand wanted to grip the phone the way Vedder had gripped the flowerpot, but I wouldn’t let it.
“Did I? What about?”
“You suggested that we make an appointment. Are you in a position to discuss it?”
“Sure. I’m alone and no extensions are on. But I don’t recognize your voice. Who is this?”
That was just putting a nickel’s worth of breath on a long shot. Saul, at a signal from me, had raced up to the extension in Wolfe’s room, and this bird might possibly be completely loony. But no.