Some Buried Caesar (Nero Wolfe Mysteries) by Rex Stout

Author:Rex Stout [Stout, Rex]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 9780307756190
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2010-09-08T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter 11

Osgood’s scowl had got adulterated by a touch of bewilderment. But he exploded again: “What the devil do I care about your bull?” He transferred to Pratt: “You get out of here. Get!”

He was turned, and so were the others, by Wolfe’s voice booming across the room. “Mr. Osgood! Please!”

Wolfe had left the comfortable chair and was approaching. I saw by the look on his face, knowing it as I did, that something had jolted and irritated him almost to the limit, and wondered what it could be. He joined the circle. “How do you do, gentlemen. Mr. Pratt, it is a poor return for your hospitality if I’ve offended you by renting my services to Mr. Osgood, and I hope you don’t feel that way about it. Mr. Osgood, this is your house, but however you may resent Mr. Pratt’s entering it, surely you can bottle your hostility for the present crisis. I assure you it’s highly desirable. He seems to have brought vital news, with Mr. McMillan—”

Osgood, glaring at Pratt, rumbled, “You dirty abominable mud lark!”

Pratt, returning the glare, growled, “You goddam stuffed shirt!”

Fair enough, I thought, for a duke and a millionaire. Wolfe said, “Pfui. What if you are both right?—Mr. McMillan, please. What’s this about the bull?”

“He’s dead.”

“What killed him?”

“Anthrax.”

“Indeed. That’s a disease, isn’t it?”

“No. It’s sudden and terrible death. Technically it’s a disease, of course, but it’s so swift and deadly that it’s more like a snake or a stroke of lightning.” The stockman snapped his fingers. “Like that.”

Wolfe nodded. “I knew of it, vaguely, in my boyhood in Europe. But wasn’t Caesar healthy this morning? When did you observe symptoms?”

“With anthrax you don’t observe symptoms. Not often. You go to the pasture in the morning and find dead cattle. That’s what happened at my place a month ago. It’s what happened with Caesar at 5 o’clock this afternoon. One of Sam Lake’s deputies went down to the far end of the pasture, where I had him tied behind a clump of birch, and found him keeled over dead. I had gone to Crowfield to see Lew Bennett. They phoned me and I came back out, and Pratt and I decided to come over here.”

Osgood’s scowl had got adulterated some more. I didn’t know then that the sound of the word “anthrax,” with the news that it had struck within a mile of his own herd, was enough to adulterate any man’s scowl, no matter what had happened to him. Wolfe turned and said brusquely:

“Mr. Pratt. I’d like to buy the bull’s carcass. What will you take for it?”

I stared at him, wondering if whatever had jolted him had thrown him off balance. Pratt stared too.

Osgood blurted, “You can’t buy an anthrax carcass. The state takes it.”

Pratt demanded, “What in the name of God do you want it for?”

McMillan said sourly, “They’re already there. A member of the State Board was at Crowfield, and he got there as soon as I did, with a dozen men.

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