Nero Wolfe on Page and (Small U.S.) Screen:
“Murder Is Corny”
by Matthew R. Bradley

   

   Rex Stout’s 13th Nero Wolfe collection, Trio for Blunt Instruments (1964), contains the previously unpublished novella “Murder Is Corny”; both were the last to appear during his lifetime. “Kill Now—Pay Later” had been serialized in The Saturday Evening Post (December 9-23, 1961), while “Blood Will Tell” was first published in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine (December 1963). In “Kill,” Wolfe must clear the name of his Greek immigrant bootblack, Pete Vassos — not to be confused with Pete Drossos of The Golden Spiders (1953) — who was found at the bottom of a cliff, an apparent suicide, after being implicated by circumstantial evidence when Dennis Ashby plunged from a high window.

   Like “Eeny Meeny Murder Mo” (1962), “Blood” involves a necktie, if neither the murder weapon nor owned by Wolfe; it was mailed to Archie with the stationery of musicologist James Neville Vance, who ostensibly calls later asking him to burn it, yet when visited by Archie, he denies any knowledge of the incident, although confirming that the tie was his. It bears a stain that may be human blood, and when Vance’s tenant, Bonny Kirk, is found bludgeoned to death, Archie gets confirmation from Hirsh Laboratories, also seen in The Mother Hunt (1963). Her estranged husband, architect Martin Kirk, is the prime suspect, but Wolfe accepts him as his client: “That wasn’t only unheard of, it was unbelievable.”

   “Corny” opens with the arrival of Cramer, unexpectedly bearing the weekly carton of 16 ears from Putnam County farmer Duncan McLeod; freelance cartoonist and delivery man Kenneth Faber was found bludgeoned in the alley behind Rusterman’s restaurant, where Wolfe’s trusteeship under Marko Vukcic’s will ends the next year. In his notebook were the names of Archie, Carl Heydt (a couturier to Lily Rowan), fashion photographer Max Maslow, and ad man Peter Jay. All three were rivals with Ken for McLeod’s daughter, Susan — who’d gotten him the job, while Lily, in turn, got her one modeling for Heydt —  giving them a motive, but Cramer arrests Archie, believing that Ken had supplanted him.

   After being gone over by Cramer, Lieut. Rowcliff, and A.D.A. Mandel, and bailed out by Nathaniel Parker for $20,000, Archie learns why: Sue, who’d arranged to meet Ken there and found him dead, explained her presence by stating they were to be joined by Archie, confident that he could prove he was elsewhere. She believes Ken told all four men that she thought she was pregnant by him, so she wanted to kill him herself, stating that she is a virgin and regrets agreeing to marry him in a few years if he could support a family. To clear her and Archie, Wolfe must identify the perp, but before he can see the three suitors he gets a pre-emptive visit from McLeod, asserting that Ken picked the substandard corn.

   Convened at Sue’s request, the suitors say they have no desire to help identify the killer, although Wolfe warns that, if need be, he will focus suspicion on her to help Archie, and has Lila Pinelli notarize an affidavit of their conversation with her, which he must give to Cramer to forestall Archie’s re-arrest. Refused entry by Wolfe when they return, the trio agrees to Archie’s questioning at Jay’s apartment, but all they can agree on is a dislike for him, so he foils their joint attack and leaves. Predictably, the corn turns out to be pivotal, and after Delbert Palmer brings a new batch, picked and packed by McLeod, Wolfe asks Cramer to send the bomb squad — which confirms that it is booby-trapped with dynamite.

   Wolfe reveals having sent Saul to McLeod’s with a list of questions to which he should have acceptable answers ready, based on the “reasoned conclusion” that, also told Ken’s lies, he had killed him and was seen leaving the alley by Sue, who thus was certain that none of the suitors did it, but unwilling to name him. “It must have been something more urgent than [purportedly dynamiting] stumps and rocks that led him to risk losing such desirable customers” as Wolfe and Rusterman’s by having Faber pick the corn. Cramer asks Sgt. Purley Stebbins to have the Carmel sheriff’s office pick up McLeod, then learns that he “sat or stood or lay on a pile of dynamite and it went off,” blowing him to pieces.

   As with “Poison à la Carte” (5/26/02) — another second-season episode of A Nero Wolfe Mystery — “Murder Is Corny” (5/5/02) was directed by George Bloomfield and adapted by the team of William Rabkin & Lee Goldberg, with repertory player George Plimpton in his second of two appearances as Parker. The tone is admirably set with the petulance of Wolfe (Maury Chaykin) at the overdue corn, forcing Fritz Brenner (Colin Fox) to stuff some eggplant instead, and his lecture to Cramer (Bill Smitrovich) about how it should be roasted in the husk, not boiled. Sometimes seen as Lily, Kari Matchett essays Susan with her usual aplomb, explaining to Archie (Timothy Hutton) why she’s put him on the hook.

   Flashbacks show Faber (Troy Skog) pestering Sue with his attentions, the real reason he wanted the job with McLeod (Bruce McFee, briefly seen in “The Silent Speaker” [7/14 & 21/02]), his lies an attempt to force the wedding. Sharing McLeod’s disinclination to nail his killer, Heydt (David Calderisi), Maslow (Robert Bockstael), and Jay (Julian Richings) resort to fisticuffs both among themselves and against Archie — who fends them off in the hall while still holding his coffee cup. The Bomb Squad Leader (Marvin Hinz) examines the carton brought by Palmer (Angelo Tsarouchas) in Wolfe’s office, rather than taking it away, and the scenarists omit a coda between Archie and Sue at a dancing party at Lily’s.

            — Copyright © 2024 by Matthew R. Bradley.
   

Up next: The Doorbell Rang

Edition cited:

      Trio for Blunt Instruments: Bantam (1974)

Online source: