Fritz was in the kitchen doing the dishes, so I got up and went to the hall and flipped the switch of the light out on the stoop and took a look through the one-way glass panel of the front door. What I saw deserved admiration. Sergeant Purley Stebbins of Manhattan Homicide West knew that that panel was one-way glass and he was visible, but he wasn’t striking a pose; he just stood there, his big broad pan a foot away from the glass, to him opaque, a dick doing his duty.
I went and opened the door and spoke through the two-inch crack which was all the chain bolt would allow. “Hello there. It wasn’t me, honest.”
“Okay, comic.” His deep bass was a little hoarse, as usual. “Then I won’t take you. Let me in.”
“For what?”
“I’ll tell you. Do you expect me to talk through this damn crack?”
“Yes. If I let you in you’ll tramp right over me to bust in on Mr. Wolfe, and he’s in a bad humor. So am I. I can spare you ten seconds to loosen up. One, two, three, four—”
He cut me off. “You were just up at the Hotel Churchill. You left there about a half an hour ago with a man named Paul Aubry and his wife, and got into a taxi with them. Where are they? Did you bring them here?”
“May I call you Purley?” I asked.
“You goddam clown.”
“All right, then, I won’t. After all these years you should know better. Eighty-seven and four-tenths percent of the people, including licensed detectives, who are asked impertinent questions by cops, answer quick because they are either scared or ignorant of their rights or anxious to cooperate. That lets me out. Give me one reason why I should tell you anything about my movements or any companions I may have had, and make it good.”