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Bookstooge’s Exalted Permission
Title: Some Buried Caesar
Series:
Nero Wolfe #6
Author: Rex Stout
Rating:
4.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: Mystery
Pages:
202
Words: 75.5K
From Wikipedia
While
on their way to a rural exposition in upstate New York to show
orchids, Nero Wolfe and Archie Goodwin are involved in a minor car
accident. On their way to a nearby house to phone for help, they are
threatened by a large bull but are eventually rescued by Caroline
Pratt, a local golf champion, and her acquaintance Lily Rowan. The
house and bull belong to Thomas Pratt, Caroline's uncle and the owner
of a large chain of successful fast food restaurants, and he has
purchased the bull—a champion Guernsey called Hickory Caesar
Grindon—in order to barbecue it as part of a publicity stunt.
While
Wolfe and Archie enjoy Pratt's hospitality, they meet several of
Pratt's family and neighbours—Jimmy Pratt, Pratt's indolent nephew;
Monte McMillan, the original owner of Caesar, who sold the bull to
Pratt after falling into financial difficulties; Clyde Osgood and his
sister Nancy, the children of Pratt's neighbour Frederick Osgood; and
a New Yorker named Howard Bronson, who is apparently a friend of
Clyde. There is tension between the Pratt and Osgood families due to
a bitter rivalry between Thomas Pratt and Frederick Osgood, and when
tempers flare Clyde makes a bet with Pratt that the latter will not
barbecue Caesar. As Pratt is already paranoid due to the hostility of
local farmers opposed to his plans to cook Caesar, Wolfe offers
Archie's services as a guard for Caesar in exchange for a comfortable
stay at Pratt's house. During his watch that night, Lily Rowan shows
up to keep Archie company, and together they discover Clyde's body,
gored to death in the pasture.
The
local authorities assume that Clyde was simply gored by Caesar during
an attempt to sabotage Pratt's plans, but Wolfe believes that Clyde
was murdered; the bull's face was cleaner than it would have been had
he fatally attacked Clyde. His suspicions are shared by Frederick
Osgood, who knows his son to be an experienced cattle-man who would
not have made the amateurish mistakes that would have caused his
death had the bull been responsible. The elder Osgood consequently
hires Wolfe to learn the identity of the murderer and agrees to house
him in comfort for the duration of the investigation. Archie is also
hired by Caroline Pratt to prevent what she believes to be Lily
Rowan's attempts to seduce her brother Jimmy.
In a
meeting with Waddell, the local district attorney, Wolfe proposes
that the murder weapon was in fact a digging pick that the murderer
used to fake the attack, having first knocked Clyde out and dragged
him into the paddock. Waddell, who has a petty rivalry with the elder
Osgood, is skeptical but is nevertheless convinced to reopen the
investigation. However, before the investigation can proceed far,
sudden news comes that Caesar has died suddenly of anthrax. In order
to prevent it spreading, this means that the bull will be
automatically cremated. Wolfe dispatches Archie to either delay the
cremation or take as many photos of the bull as possible before this,
but Archie arrives too late to do either.
After
interviewing Nancy Osgood, Wolfe learns that Bronson is in fact a New
York loan shark who has been shadowing Clyde in order to ensure he
receives $10,000 that Clyde borrowed to cover his gambling debts.
When confronted by Wolfe and Archie, Bronson confirms this, but is
vague and unhelpful when questioned regarding Clyde's death, leading
Wolfe to suspect that Bronson knows more than he is saying. Out of
respect for Nancy Osgood, Wolfe has Archie recover the promissory
note Bronson was holding over Clyde by force, but warns the loan
shark to be careful.
The
next day, Wolfe's orchids win numerous prizes at the exposition,
defeating a hated rival in the process. While following some of
Wolfe's instructions, Archie discovers Jimmy Pratt and Nancy Osgood
in a secret rendezvous; the two are lovers, but have kept their
relationship secret from their feuding parents. By chance, during
their confrontation Archie also stumbles upon the body of Howard
Bronson, gored with a pitchfork and hidden under straw. He manages to
conceal the body and returns to Wolfe with the news. But when the
body is discovered, Archie is detained by Captain Barrow, the
bullying local head of the state police, and is imprisoned by the
authorities as a material witness when he refuses to reveal what he
knows.
The
next day, Wolfe secures Archie's release with the promise to that he
knows who the murderer is and will soon expose him to the
authorities. To Archie, Wolfe admits that despite knowing the
murderer's identity, the evidence that will enable him to prove it
has been efficiently destroyed. Nevertheless, based on his memory and
official records from the local farming authorities, Wolfe draws some
sketches of the bull that he and Archie encountered and uses them to
confront Monte McMillan. Wolfe has deduced that the bull that Thomas
Pratt purchased and intended to barbecue was not, in fact, Caesar at
all. The champion bull was killed in an anthrax outbreak that
decimated almost all of McMillan's herd, and the bull that was passed
off as Caesar was in fact Hickory Buckingham Pell, a similar but
inferior twin. Facing financial ruin, McMillan sold Buckingham as
Caesar for an outrageous sum, but due to his experience with cattle
Clyde realised the deception and was planning to expose it to win his
bet. McMillan thus murdered Clyde to silence him, and later killed
Bronson when the loan shark, realising that McMillan was the
murderer, tried to blackmail him.
Although
Wolfe admits that McMillan has covered his tracks well and is
unlikely to be convicted of murder, the evidence Wolfe has
manufactured is sufficient to convict McMillan of fraud, which would
expose and ruin him nonetheless. Accepting defeat, McMillan reveals
that he has infected himself with anthrax and agrees to write a
confession out for Wolfe before dying. Months later, Archie records
the case, revealing in the process that Jimmy Pratt and Nancy Osgood
are engaged to be married and that he has begun a friendship with
Lily Rowan, who has returned to New York.
First off, I am giving this the Best Book of the Year tag. This is
the first time I felt a book was good enough to get that tag this
year. I haven't been paying that much attention to this kind of thing
and when I don't pay attention it tends to slip under the radar. With
the end of the year fast approaching, that is always a wake up call
for me.
Plus, I just had a rollicking good time for the entire book. Archie
particularly made me laugh and smile again and again. In one
instance, when he's thrown in jail more reasons of clashing of wills
between Wolfe and the police, he organizes a Union and elects a
president and treasurer, etc and writes up a bunch of rules that they
are going to submit to the Warden. It was pure cheek and was done
simply to annoy the Warden. It was done in Archie's easy going but
tough way that you just had to enjoy it!
There is also the confrontational frission between Wolfe and his
client. He warns the client to not hire him but that if he does X,Y
and Z will happen. Sure enough, they do and Wolfe lambastes the
client for complaining about them when he, Wolfe, had already warned
him. At first glance Wolfe appears to be an arrogant jackass but when
you take into account who we see him interacting with, it's no
surprise and the real wonder is that Wolfe hasn't become a complete
misanthrope to everybody he meets.
Finally, I enjoyed Archie's romantic sparring with Lily Rowan. They
both have no longterm use for the opposite sex or at least to push
the idea of marriage as far down the road as possible and as such
make great foils for each other. I don't expect them to get married
though and I even wonder if we'll see Lilly again in future books or
not. So far I don't remember any recurring young women. As long as
Archie doesn't turn into some sort of cad, I'll be ok with the trend
though.
Overall, I just have to sit back and marvel that Rex Stout is such a
wordsmith. To make characters like Wolfe and Archie, to craft scenes
like the one near the beginning when Wolfe is stuck on top of a
boulder while an angry bull stalks around the pasture, it just makes
me glad that I did decide to read this series. Good stuff.
★★★★✬
