“You weren’t dragged,” the elderly sister retorted. “At least not by me.”
May fluttered a deprecating hand. “You must forgive us, Mr. Wolfe. Our nerves are quite ragged. We do wish to consult you about something serious.” She looked at me and smiled so sweetly that I smiled back. Then she added to Wolfe, “And something extremely confidential.”
“That’s all right,” Wolfe assured her. “Mr. Goodwin is my âme damnée. I could do nothing without him. The spot of botany was my fault; I started it. Tell me about the something serious.”
Prescott inquired reluctantly, “Shall I explain?”
April, waving a hand to extinguish the match with which she had lit a cigarette, and squinting to keep the smoke from her eyes, shook her head at him. “Fat chance of a man explaining anything with all three of us present.”
“I think,” May suggested, “it would be better if June—”
Mrs. Dunn said abruptly, “It’s my brother’s will.”
Wolfe frowned at her. He hated fights about wills, having once gone so far as to tell a prospective client that he refused to engage in a tug of war with a dead man’s guts for a rope. But he asked not too rudely, “Is there something wrong with the will?”
“There is.” June’s tone was incisive. “But first I’d like to say — you’re a detective. It’s not a detective we need. It was my idea we should come to you. Not so much on account of your reputation, more because of what you did once for a friend of mine, Mrs. Llewellyn Frost. She was then Glenna McNair. Also I have heard my husband speak highly of you. I gathered that you had done something difficult for the State Department.”
“Thank you. But,” Wolfe objected, “you say you don’t need a detective.”