Read Too Many Clients for Free Online Page B

me. That is, she slapped at me. She was certainly impetuous. Also she was quick, but so was I. I caught her wrist and gave it a little twist, not enough to hurt much, and let go. There was a gleam in her eyes, and she looked more like Meg Duncan. “You’re a man, aren’t you?” she said.
    “I can be. Right now I’m just a working detective. Did you kill Yeager?”
    “No. Of course not.” Her hand came up again, but only to touch my sleeve. “Let me get my cigarette case and go.”
    I shook my head. “You’ll have to manage without it for a while. Do you know who killed Yeager?”
    “Of course not.” Her fingers curved around my arm, not a grip, just a touch. “I know I can’t bribe you, Mr. Goodwin, I know enough about you to know that, but detectives do things for people, don’t they'I can pay you to do something for me, can’t I'
    If you won’t let me get my cigarette case you can get it for me, and keep it for me. You can give it to me later, you can decide when, I don’t care as long as you keep it.” Her fingers pressed a little. “I would pay whatever you say. A thousand dollars?”
    Things were looking up, but it was getting a little complicated. At 4:30 yesterday afternoon we had had no client and no prospect of any. Then one had come but had turned out to be a phony. Then Mrs. Perez had dangled a hundred bucks and perhaps more. Now this customer was offering a grand. I was digging up clients all right, but too many clients can be worse than too few.
    I regarded her. “It might work,” I said. “It’s like this. Actually I can’t take a job; I’m employed by Nero Wolfe. He takes the jobs. I’m going to look this place over, and if I find your cigarette case, as I will if it’s here, I’ll take it. Give me your keys, to the door down below and the elevator.”
    Her fingers left my arm. “Give them to you?”
    “Right. You won’t need them any more.” I glanced at my wrist. “It’s ten-thirty-five. You have no matinee today. Come to Nero Wolfe’s office at half past two. Six-eighteen West Thirty-fifth Street. Your cigarette case will be there, and you can settle it with Mr. Wolfe.”
    “But why can’t you-“
    “No. That’s how it is, and I have things to do.” I put a hand out. “The keys.” “Why can’t I-“
    “I said no. There’s no argument and no time. Damn it, I’m giving you a break. The keys.”
    She opened her bag, fingered in it, took out a leather key fold, and handed it over. I unsnapped it, saw two Rabson keys, which are not like any others, displayed them to Perez, and asked if they were the keys to the door and the elevator. He took a look and said yes. Dropping them in a pocket, I pushed the button to open the elevator door and told Meg Duncan, “I’ll see you later. Half past two.”
    “Why can’t I stay until you find�”
    “Nothing doing. I’ll be too busy for company.”
    She stepped in, the door closed, the click came, and the faint sound. I turned to Perez.
    “You’ve seen her before.” “No. Never.”
    “Phooey. When you brought things up at midnight?” “I only saw him. She could have been in the bathroom.” “Where’s the bathroom?” He pointed. “At that end.”
    I went to his wife. “When she saw you she said, ‘Thank God it’s you.’”
    She nodded. “I heard her. She must see me some time when she came in, in the hall or a door was open. We don’t know her. We never saw her.”
    “The things you don’t know. All right now, you two. It will take hours and will have to wait because I have things to do, but one question now.” To him: “When you put the body in the hole why did you climb in and put the tarp over it?”
    He was surprised. “But he was dead! A man dead, you cover him! I knew that thing was in there, I had seen it.”
    That was the moment that I decided that Cesar Perez had not killed Thomas G. Yeager. Possibly his wife had, but not him. If you had been there looking at him as he said that, you would