Rex Stout - Plot It Yourself

Rex Stout

Plot It Yourself

Chapter 1

I divide the books Nero Wolfe reads into four grades: A, B, C, and D. If, when he comes down to the office from the plant rooms at six oclock, he picks up his current book and opens to his place before he rings for beer, and if his place was marked with a thin strip of gold, five inches long and an inch wide, which was presented to him some years ago by a grateful client, the book is an A. If he picks up the book before he rings, but his place was marked with a piece of paper, it is a B. If he rings and then picks up the book, and he had dog-eared a page to mark his place, it is a C. If he waits until Fritz has brought the beer and he has poured to pick up the book, and his place was dogeared, its a D. I havent kept score, but I would say that of the two hundred or so books he reads in a year not more than five or six get an A.

At six oclock that Monday afternoon in May I was at my desk, checking the itemisation of expenses that was to accompany the bill going to the Spooner Corporation for a job we had just finished, when the sound came of his elevator jolting to a stop and his footsteps in the hall. He entered, crossed to the oversized made-to-order chair behind his desk, sat, picked up Why the Gods Laugh , by Philip Harvey, opened to the page marked with the strip of gold, read a paragraph, and reached to the button at the edge of his desk without taking his eyes from the page. As he did so, the phone rang.

I got it. Nero Wolfes residence, Archie Goodwin speaking. Up to six oclock I say Nero Wolfes office. After six I say residence.

A tired baritone said, Id like to speak to Mr Wolfe. This is Philip Harvey.

Hell want to know what about. If you please?

Ill tell him. Im a writer. Im acting on behalf of the National Association of Authors and Dramatists.

Did you write a book called Why the Gods Laugh ?

I did.

Hold the wire. I covered the transmitter and turned. If that book has any weak spots heres your chance. The guy who wrote it wants to speak to you.

He looked up. Philip Harvey?

Right.

What does he want?

He says hell tell you. Probably to ask you what page youre on.

He closed the book on a finger to keep his place and took his phone. Yes, Mr Harvey?

Is this Nero Wolfe?

Yes.

You may possibly have heard my name.

Yes.

I want to make an appointment to consult you. I am chairman of the Joint Committee on Plagiarism of the National Association of Authors and Dramatists and the Book Publishers of America. How about tomorrow morning?

I know nothing about plagiarism, Mr Harvey.

Well tell you about it. We have a problem we want you to handle. Therell be six or seven of us, members of the committee. How about tomorrow morning?

Im not a lawyer. Im a detective.

I know you are. How about ten oclock?

Of course that wouldnt do, since it would take more than an author, even of a book that rated an A, to break into Wolfes two morning hours with the orchids, from nine to eleven. Harvey finally settled for a quarter past eleven. When we hung up I asked Wolfe if I should check, and he nodded and went back to his book. I rang Lon Cohen at the Gazette and learned that the National Association of Authors and Dramatists was it. All the dramatists anyone had ever heard of were members, and most of the authors, the chief exceptions being some scattered specimens who hadnt decided if they cared to associate with the human race-or had decided that they didnt. The Book Publishers of America was also it, a national organization of all the major firms and many of the minor ones. I passed the information along to Wolfe, but I wasnt sure he listened. He was reading.

That evening around midnight, when I got home after taking a friend to a show, A Barrel of Love , by Mortimer Oshin, Wolfe had just finished his book and was making room for it on one of the shelves over by the big globe. As I tried the door of the safe I spoke.

Why not leave it on your desk?

He grunted. Mr Harveys self-esteem needs no sop. If he were not so skillful a writer he would be insufferable. Why curry him?

Before I went up two flights to my room I looked up curry in the dictionary. Check. I wont live long enough to see the day when Wolfe curries anybody including me.

Chapter 2

At eleven-twenty the next morning, Tuesday, Wolfe, seated at his desk, sent his eyes from left to right and back again, rested them on Philip Harvey, and inquired, Youre the spokesman, Mr Harvey?

Since Harvey had made the appointment and was chairman of the committee, I had put him in the red leather chair near the end of Wolfes desk. He was a middle-aged shorty with a round face, round shoulders, and a round belly. The other five were in an arc on yellow chairs that I had had ready for them. Their names, supplied by Harvey, were in my notebook. The one nearest me, the big blond guy in a brown suit with tan stripes, was Gerald Knapp, president of Knapp and Bowen. The one next to him, the wiry-looking bantam with big ears and slick black hair, was Reuben Imhof of the Victory Press. The female about my age who might have been easy to look at if her nose would stop twitching was Amy Wynn. I had seen a couple of reviews of her novel. Knock at My Door , but it wasnt on Wolfes shelves. The tall gray-haired one with a long bony face was Thomas Dexter of Title House. The one at the far end of the arc, with thick lips and deep-set dark eyes, slouching in his chair with his left ankle on his right knee, was Mortimer Oshin. He had written the play, A Barrel of Love , which I had seen last evening. He had lit three cigarettes in eight minutes, and with two of the matches he had missed the ashtray on a stand at his elbow and they had landed on the rug.

Philip Harvey cleared his throat. Youll need all the details, he said, but first Ill outline it. You said you know nothing about plagiarism, but I assume you know what it is. Of course a charge of plagiarism against a book or a play is dealt with by the author and publisher, or the playwright and producer, but a situation has developed that needs something more than defending individual cases. Thats why the NAAD and the BPA have set up this joint committee. I may say that we, the NAAD, appreciate the co-operation of the BPA. In a plagiarism suit its the author that gets stuck, not the publisher. In all book contracts the author agrees to indemnify the publisher for any liabilities, losses, damages, expenses-

Reuben Imhof cut in. Now wait a minute. What is agreed and what actually happens are two different things. Actually, in a majority of cases, the publisher suffers-

The suffering publisher! Amy Wynn cried, her nose twitching. Mortimer Oshin had a comment too, and four of them were speaking at once. I didnt try to sort it out for my notebook.

Wolfe raised his voice. If you pleasel You started it, Mr Harvey. If the interests of author and publisher are in conflict, why a joint committee?

Oh, theyre not always in conflict. Harvey was smiling, not apologetically. The interests of slave and master often jibe; they do in this situation. I merely mentioned en passant that the author gets stuck. We deeply appreciate the co-operation of the BPA. Its damned generous of them.

You were going to outline the situation.

Yes. In the past four years there have been five major charges of plagiarism. Harvey took papers from his pocket, unfolded them, and glanced at the top sheet. In February 1955, McMurray and Company published The Colour of Passion , a novel by Ellen Sturdevant. By the middle of April it was at the top of the fiction best-seller list. In June the publishers received a letter from a woman named Alice Porter, claiming that the novels plot and characters, and all important details of the plot development, with only the setting and names changed, had been stolen from a story written by her, never published, entitled There Is Only Love. She said she had sent the story, twenty-four typewritten pages, to Ellen Sturdevant in November 1952, with a note asking for suggestions for its improvement. It had never been acknowledged or returned. Ellen Sturdevant denied that she had ever seen any such story. One day in August, when she was at her summer home in Vermont, a local woman in her employ came to her with something she said she had found in a bureau drawer. It was twenty-four typewritten sheets, and the top one was headed, There Is Only Love, by Alice Porter. Its plot and characters and many details were the same as those of Ellen Sturdevants novel, though in much shorter form. The woman, named Billings, admitted that she had been persuaded by Alice Porter to search the house for the typescript-persuaded by the offer of a hundred dollars if she found it. But, having found it, she had a pang of conscience and brought it to her employer. Mrs Sturdevant has told me that her first impulse was to bum it, but on second thought she realized that that wouldnt do, since Mrs Billings couldnt be expected to perjure herself on a witness stand, and she phoned her attorney in New York.