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, it’s a D. I haven’t 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 o’clock 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 Wolfe’s residence, Archie Goodwin speaking.” Up to six o’clock I say “Nero Wolfe’s office.” After six I say “residence.”

A tired baritone said, “I’d like to speak to Mr Wolfe. This is Philip Harvey.”

“He’ll want to know what about. If you please?”

“I’ll tell him. I’m a writer. I’m 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 here’s your chance. The guy who wrote it wants to speak to you.”