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Title: Prisoner’s Base
Series: Nero Wolfe #21
Author: Rex Stout
Rating: 4 of 5 Stars
Genre: Mystery
Pages: 164
Words: 61K
Ooph, this was a kick in the pants. Two women are killed and while both Wolfe and Archie deny it, they bear some responsibility for the murders being able to happen at all. It wasn’t a big happy fun time to read about.
And yet, the mystery of what happened was fantastic to read about. Money, greed, people’s egos, big business, murder and false identities. This story had it all and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Of course, I’ve enjoyed every Nero Wolfe set of stories I’ve read so far, so I guess I kind of expect a good story by now. Rex Stout has not let me down.
Do you know how many other authors I can say that about? NONE. Nobody. Brandon Sanderson has mired himself in worldbuilding, unnecessary complicatedness and moral ambiguity. Adrian Tchaikovsky has let his politics not just creep into his stories but roll on through like tanks through Tienanmen Square. Edith Pargeter ended up boring the living daylights out of me by the end of the Brother Cadfael books. Alan Dean Foster lost me when the Pip and Flinx stories kept on going beyond all reasonableness and plot plausibility. Rex Stout is a rock in the turbulent sea of authors who have disappointed me and let me down. A veritable stony island that resists all attempts at disappointment.
★★★✬☆
From Wikipedia:
After an argument between Archie and Wolfe over Archie’s weekly paycheck, a young woman arrives at the brownstone with an unusual request. She wants to rent a room until June 30, one week away, without revealing her identity or presence to anyone. Wolfe rejects the idea, but before he and Archie can send her away, a lawyer named Perry Helmar arrives. He is the legal guardian of Priscilla Eads, a young woman who has gone missing, and he wants to hire Wolfe to find her before June 30. The photographs he has brought with him convince Archie that Priscilla is the house guest.
The terms of her father’s will state that Priscilla is to inherit 90% of the stock in Softdown, a major towel manufacturer, when she reaches her 25th birthday on June 30. However, her ex-husband, Eric Hagh – currently living in South America – claims that she signed a document giving him half of her property. In addition, several Softdown officers are concerned about Priscilla suddenly becoming a majority stockholder.
Wolfe sends Helmar away without an immediate decision, then offers Priscilla a choice. She can either pay the same fee Helmar offered and stay at the brownstone incognito, or she can leave and Wolfe will accept Helmar’s terms and begin tracking her down the following morning. She chooses to leave, but before Wolfe can call Helmar the next day, Inspector Cramer brings news that both Priscilla and her maid, Margaret Fomos, have been strangled to death. Margaret had keys to Priscilla’s apartment, but they were not found on her body, leading the police to conclude that the murderer targeted her first in order to gain access to Priscilla.
While Archie feels guilt at his involvement in the events that led to Priscilla’s death, Wolfe takes no interest in the case, having no client and no prospect of a fee. Infuriated, Archie storms out to begin investigating on his own. He barges into a meeting of Softdown personnel, four of whom are officers who will inherit Priscilla’s stock in her place, and learns from them that Helmar will receive shares as well. Before he can learn much more, Lieutenant Rowcliff arrives and arrests him, based on claims that he had impersonated a police officer to get into the building.
While being questioned, Archie learns that thanks to Rowcliff’s pettiness and overeagerness, Wolfe has been taken into custody as a material witness. Outraged, Wolfe states that he does now have a client – Archie – and the two are released. From Lon Cohen, Archie learns about Priscilla’s background, her marriage and time spent living in South America, and her best friend Sarah Jaffee, who owns the remaining 10% of the Softdown stock. Sarah tells Archie that Priscilla had planned to oust the company’s board of directors and replace them all with women, including herself, Sarah, and Margaret. Archie urges her to file an injunction blocking the four Softdown officers from exercising the voting rights on the stock they hold until the murders have been solved, but she turns down the idea. He also tries to question Margaret’s husband Andy, but without success.
Shortly after Archie returns to the brownstone, a lawyer named Albert M. Irby arrives and asks to see Wolfe. He represents Hagh, who is due to arrive in New York the following afternoon. That next morning, Sarah decides to act on Archie’s suggestion of legal action; Wolfe arranges representation for her by Nathaniel Parker, his lawyer. He uses the decision as leverage to bring all of the involved parties – the four Softdown officers, Helmar, Sarah, Parker, Andy, Hagh, and Irby – to his office for a meeting that night.
The meeting yields little of use, but after everyone has left, Sarah calls Archie from her apartment to report that her keys are missing. Suspecting that the murderer may have stolen them and is lying in wait, he instructs her to leave the phone off the hook and exit so that he can clearly hear her; when the line goes silent, he rushes to her building and finds her strangled to death in the apartment.
After being questioned and released from custody, Archie discovers that Wolfe has brought Saul Panzer in on the case and provided him with expense money. He observes the interrogation of several people who were at the meeting, with Cramer’s permission, then relays a suggestion to re-enact the night’s events at the office. To his surprise, Wolfe accepts.
The gathering takes place at noon that same day, with Saul present as well. Wolfe dismisses the police’s initial theory that Margaret was killed only to get her keys and/or because she recognized her attacker. Saul had traveled to South America, carrying a photograph of Hagh that Sarah had given to Archie, and learned that he had died three months earlier. The man claiming to be Hagh is in fact Siegfried Muecke, an associate who left South America shortly after Hagh’s death. Muecke had learned of the document Hagh and Priscilla signed, witnessed by Margaret, and traveled to New York to collect half her property. He killed all three women because they had seen the real Hagh, either in person or through photographs, and could expose his deception.
Archie vents his frustration by punching Andy when he lunges at Muecke, who is quickly arrested.
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