Before Midnight

"You know quite well what I think." Buff was grim. "It was strictly in character. At the age of thirty-two Louis Dahlmann was a great creative genius, and in another ten years he would have been a dominant figure in American advertising, another Lasker. That's what we all thought, didn't we? But he had that lunatic streak in him. Of course that paper was the answers; there's not the slightest doubt. After you phoned me last night, Pat, I would have gone down to his place myself, but what was the use? Even if he had destroyed the paper to humor me, after I left he could have sat down and written another one just like it, and he probably would have. But now I wish I had. Right now the future of LBA is in more danger than at any time in the thirty-eight years I've been with it. On account of him! If he were here now, alive, I tell you it would be hard for me to--" He tightened his lips and let the sentence hang.

Wolfe went to the lawyer. "Are you also convinced, Mr. Hansen, that it was no hoax?"

"I am."

"Then I'll proceed on that assumption until it is disproved. I must first see the five contestants, preferably not together, even though time is pressing." He glanced up at the wall clock. "They may already be engaged with the police, but we'll try. One of you will phone and arrange for one of them to be here at twelve-thirty, and arrange also for the others-one at three, one at six, one at--"

"Why six?" Assa demanded. "Good God, you won't need three hours!"

"I hope not. One should be plenty. But from four to six I'll be occupied with other matters, and--"

"There are no other matters! That's preposterous!"

Wolfe eyed him. "Your firm hasn't hired me by the hour, Mr. Assa. My schedule isn't subject to direction. I work as I work. One of them at three o'clock, one at six, one at seven, and one at eight. You can tell them that their detention in the city has created certain problems in connection with the contest and that you would like them to confer with me as your firm's representative. You will of course not mention the paper Mr. Dahlmann displayed last evening. I'll have dinner at nine o'clock, and any time after ten-thirty you may call on me for a report."

"I'd like to be present at the interviews," Hansen said. "But I can't at twelve-thirty."

"You can't at all, sir. They're going to be ticklish enough as it is, and I may even banish Mr. Goodwin. He will have an errand, by the way. Where is the safe deposit vault in which the answers were placed?"