Before Midnight

When she spoke her lips wanted to move perpendicular to the slant, but her jaw preferred straight up and down. You might have thought that after so many years, at least sixty, they would have come to an understanding, but nothing doing.

Wolfe was taking her in. "Certainly, madam, the rules did not contemplate sudden and violent death, and made no provision for it. The contest is affected, not by the death itself, but by the action of the police in asking the contestants not to leave the city until further--"

"They didn't ask me! They told me! They said if I left I would be brought back and arrested for murder!"

I shook my head. So she was that kind. No homicide cop and no assistant DA could possibly have said anything of the sort.

"They are sometimes ebullient," Wolfe told her. "Anyhow, I wanted to discuss not only the contest, but also you. After the prizes are awarded there will be great demand for information about the winners, and my clients want to be able to supply it. The enforced delay gives us this opportunity. My assistant, Mr. Goodwin, will take notes. I assume that you have never married, Miss Frazee?"

"I have not. And I won't." Her eyes took in my notebook. "I want to see anything that's going to be printed about me."

"You will. Have you ever won a prize in a contest?"

"I have never entered a contest. I despise contests."

"Indeed. Didn't you enter this one?"

"Of course I did. That's a stupid question."

"No doubt." Wolfe was polite. "But surely that's an interesting paradox--you despise contests, but you entered one. There must have been a compelluig motive?"

"I fail to see that my motive is anybody's business, but I certainly am not ashamed of it. Ten years ago I founded the Women's Nature League of America. We have many thousand members, too many to count. What is your opinion of women who smear themselves with grease and soot and paint and stink themselves up with stuff made from black tar and decayed vegetable matter and tumors from male deer?"

"I haven't formulated one, madam."

"Of course you have. You're a male." Her eyes darted to me. "What's yours, young man?"

"It depends," I told her. "The tumor part sounds bad."