Death of a Demon

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The red leather chair was four feet away from the end of Nero Wolfe’s desk, so when she got the gun from her handbag she had to get up and take a step to put it on the desk. Then she returned to the chair, closed the bag, and told Wolfe, “That’s the gun I’m not going to shoot my husband with.”

Sitting facing her with my back to my desk, which was at right angles to Wolfe’s, I raised my brows. I hadn’t expected her to put on an act. When she had phoned the previous afternoon to ask for an appointment she had of course sounded a little jumpy, as most people do when they call the office of a private detective, but she had been quite matter-of-fact in giving the details. Her name was Lucy Hazen, Mrs. Barry Hazen. She gave her address, on East 37th Street between Park and Lexington. All she wanted was thirty minutes with Nero Wolfe, to tell him something confidential. She didn’t want him to do anything, not even give her advice; she merely wanted to tell him something; and she would pay one hundred dollars for the half-hour. She could and would pay more if she had to, but she hoped the hundred would be enough.

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