The Missing Chapter

“She either was crazy about the guy or desperate that her child have a two-parent home — or some of each. When it became obvious to her that Childress was never going to marry her, did she kill him? I wouldn’t rule it out, although somehow, I don’t see it. If it’s odds you want, make it no more than two in five that Clarice squeezed the trigger.”

That brought a scowl. “Meaning there’s a sixty-percent chance someone other than Miss Wingfield is the murderer.”

“Yeah, although I haven’t gotten down to handicapping the others. Do you want me to give you my—”

“No,” he snapped. “I will not be able to think clearly until those people are gone for good.” He inclined his head a quarter-inch in the direction of the elevator shaft.

“Relax, they won’t be back until Monday. I understand you were a little cross with them this afternoon.” Archie Goodwin, master of understatement. Maybe Ott was right and I really am urbane.

“The clangor was intolerable.”

“Maybe, but it’s either that or no vertical transportation for you. They’re working as fast as they can, and if you’ll just hang on for a few more days...”

But I had lost the audience for my sermon. Wolfe ducked behind his current book, causing me to do a double take. I had seen a copy before, in Childress’s apartment. A splashy painting on the cover showed a man in coveralls sprawled on his stomach in a field of what appeared to be wheat. A butcher knife was sticking out of his back and very red blood stained his shirt and denims. Looming above the art, menacing crimson letters spelled out Death in the North Meadow, and below, in slightly smaller red type, An Orville Barnstable Mystery by Charles Childress.

“Good reading?” I inquired.

“Pfui. Tolstoy’s niche in the pantheon remains secure.”

“Thank heavens. When did you get it?”

“In yesterday’s delivery from Masterson’s. This is not worth a tithe of what I paid.”

“How can you judge? You almost never read fiction, or so you have told me more than thrice.”

He leaned back in his reinforced chair. “In earlier years, long before I came to appreciate fully the value of each hour of one’s existence, I indeed read fiction — on rare occasions even detective fiction. I state that with neither apology nor regret, although my time of course would have been more wisely spent rereading Aristotle and Montaigne. But by any standard, this” — he held up Childress’s book and shook it — “is abysmal. As much as it pains me to say so, I must agree with Mr. Hobbs’s acerbic assessment. The characterizations are nugatory, the writing sophomoric, the plotting transparent, the outcome already predictable.”

“Try not to bottle up your feelings,” I said.

“Bah. I am two-thirds through this, and I have no interest whatever in any of its characters, including the fatuous detective, who, the promotional lines on the cover bleat, is ‘charmingly eccentric.’ ”

“Some might term you eccentric as well,” I said unwisely.

He grunted. “You already know my feelings about the indiscriminate employment of that word; a moratorium should be placed upon its use. Is Mr. Vinson still in his office?”

“There’s one way to find out,” I said, reaching for my phone. “Do you want to talk to him?”

“Not particularly. He told us that he was in possession of a disk containing Mr. Childress’s final novel. Find out if it has been transcribed. If so, have him send us a copy, preferably by messenger.”

“Your capacity for self-flagellation knows no limit,” I told him, punching out Vinson’s private number. The editor-in-chief himself answered before the first ring had stopped.

“Archie Goodwin here. Mr. Wolfe would like to see a copy of Childress’s final manuscript, assuming it has been put on paper.”

“Yes, it’s been printed out. Is he onto something here that I am missing?”

“If so, I’m missing it, too. Would it be possible to messenger a copy over here tonight?”

“Tonight? Ye gods, I don’t even think there’s — wait a minute... Yes, yes, there is an extra copy, a second one I had made for our editors. By the way, I have just finished reading it, and it is far and away the best work Charles ever did. He finally overcame his problem with plots. God, what a shame it’s the last thing we’ll ever read by him... I’ll get it run over to you as soon as I can find somebody around here to make the delivery. Can we have it back when he’s through? I hate having copies of manuscripts floating around unaccounted for prepub.”

“Yes. And thanks.”

“Actually, I was going to call you before I left,” Vinson said. “Have you heard about the set-to last night between Frank Ott and Keith Billings?”

“No, but you’ve got my attention.”