If Death Ever Slept

The hole, ten inches square, was at eye level in the wall twelve feet to the right of Wolfe’s desk. On the office side it was covered by what appeared to be just a pretty picture of a waterfall. On the other side, in a wing of the hall across from the kitchen, it was covered by nothing, and you could not only see through but also hear through. My longest stretch there was one night when we had four people in the front room waiting for Wolfe to show up (he was in the kitchen chinning with Fritz), and we were expecting and hoping that one of them would sneak into the office to get something from a drawer of Wolfe’s desk, and we wanted to know which one. That time I stood there at that hole more than three hours, and the door from the front room never opened.

This time it was much less than three hours. Orrie waited to open the door to the office until I was around the corner to the wing, so I saw his performance when they went in. As Goodwin he was barely adequate introducing Wolfe to her, hamming it, I thought; and crossing to my desk and sitting, he was entirely out of character, no grace or flair at all. I would have to rehearse him before six o’clock came. I had a good view of him and Nora, but could get Wolfe, in profile, only by sticking my nose into the hole and pressing my forehead against the upper edge.

WOLFE: I’m sorry you had to wait, Miss Kent. It is Miss Kent?

NORA: Yes. I am employed by Mr. Otis Jarrell. His stenographer. I believe you know him.

WOLFE: There is no taboo on beliefs, or shouldn’t be. The right to believe will be the last to go. Proceed.

NORA: You do know Mr. Jarrell?

WOLFE: My dear madam. I have rights too-for instance, the right to decline inquisition by a stranger. You are not here by appointment.

(That was meant to cut. If it did, no blood showed.)

NORA: There wasn’t time to make one. I had to see you at once. I had to ask you why you sent your confidential assistant, Archie Goodwin, to take a job with Mr. Jarrell as his secretary.

WOLFE: I wasn’t aware that I had done so. Archie, did I send you to take a job as Mr. Jarrell’s secretary?

ORRIE: No, sir, not that I remember.