Chapter Two

So the next morning I had Nero Wolf e braving the elements-the chief element for that day being bright warm March sunshine. I say I had him, because I had conceived the persuasion which was making him bust all precedents. What pulled him out of his front door, enraged and grim, with overcoat, scarf, gloves, stick, something he called gaiters, and a black felt pirate's hat size 8 pulled down to his ears, was the name of Winold Glueckner heading the signatures on that letter- Glueckner, who had recently received from an agent in Sarawak four bulbs of a pink Coelogyne pandurata, never seen before, and had scorned Wolfe's offer of three thousand bucks for two of them. Knowing what a tough old heinie

Glueckner was, I had my doubts whether he would turn loose of the bulbs no matter how many murders Wolfe solved at his request, but anyhow I had lit the fuse.

Driving from the house on 35th Street near the Hudson River-where Wolfe had lived for over twenty years and I had lived with him for nearly half of them-to the address on 52nd Street, I handled the sedan so as to keep it as smooth as a dip's fingers. Except for one I couldn't resist; on Fifth Avenue near

Forty-third there was an ideal little hole about two feet across where I suppose someone had been prospecting for the twenty-six dollars they paid the Indians, and I maneuvered to hit it square at a good clip. I glanced in the mirror for a glimpse of Wolfe in the back seat and saw he was looking bitter and infuriated.