Before Midnight (1955)

Before Midnight is a novel by American author Rex Stout, published in 1955 by Viking Press. It is the 18th detective novel featuring curmudgeonly New York sleuth Nero Wolfe, as narrated by sidekick Archie Goodwin. The story was also collected in the omnibus volume Three Trumps (Viking 1973).

The story concerns Wolfe being hired to investigate documents missing from a million-dollar prize contest for a perfume company, with the title a reference to the deadline for winning entries: postmarked before midnight on the specified date. The investigation leads to murder and more. Numerous major works of literature are mentioned as part of the contest. Four poetic riddles describing real and fictional women are given, and three of them are solved, two by Archie, and one by Wolfe. The fourth is never solved within the text. The story includes an unusual feature as the denouement takes place in the company offices, not in Wolfe’s own office in his brownstone.

Plot summary

Nero Wolfe is approached by corporate attorney Rudolf Hansen and his clients Oliver Buff, Vernon Assa and Patrick O'Garro, the chief executives of Manhattan advertising agency Lippert Buff Assa (LBA). They want Wolfe to save them from embarrassment and ruin following the murder of Louis Dahlmann, an up-and-coming advertising executive with the firm. Dahlmann's wallet was stolen, and inside were the answers for a final series of poetic riddles run as part of a promotional competition for Pour Amour, a brand of perfume. The first prize of the competition is $500,000. In a meeting with the final five contestants the night of his death, Dahlmann had revealed that he kept the answers in his wallet, which lead the police to suspect one of the contestants. The executives want Wolfe to find out who stole the wallet before the contest deadline — midnight of April 19, one week later, to ensure the integrity of proceedings and restore their reputation. Despite tension between the advertising agency and Talbott Heery, owner of the company that produces Pour Amour, Wolfe agrees to their terms.

Wolfe dispatches Archie Goodwin to copy the final riddles and their answers for Wolfe's reference. He gives cash to Saul. Wolfe interviews each of the contestants: Gertrude Frazee, the leader of an anti-cosmetics women's group who has been using her members to find the answers for the riddles to embarrass the cosmetics industry; Carol Wheelock, a housewife who wants the prize money to secure a better life for her family; Harold Rollins, a condescending academic who entered the competition as part of an intellectual exercise; Susan Tescher, a magazine editor who wants to do a profile on Wolfe himself; and Philip Younger, a retiree seeking to recover a fortune he lost during the Great Depression. Although skeptical that Wolfe is only investigating the theft and not the murder, Inspector Cramer shares what the police have learned about the case so far. Other than the financial motive, none of the contestants appears to have had any serious reason or opportunity to either murder Dahlmann or steal the answers. Archie fears that Wolfe's investigation is losing energy and focus.

As the deadline nears, the LBA executives panic and lash out, resulting in a contradictory sequence where Wolfe is fired and then rehired within a span of minutes. When all seems lost, however, an anonymous source sends copies of the answers to each of the contestants, thus voiding the contest and saving LBA. Although Archie, the LBA executives and the police suspect Wolfe of doing so, he insists that he was not responsible. He suspects one of the advertising executives of stealing the wallet, if not murdering Dahlmann. Vernon Assa approaches Wolfe and attempts to unilaterally dismiss him from the case, but Wolfe refuses. Wolfe summons the major players to his office and claims he will reveal the identity of the thief, and provide the police with vital information to identify the murderer. Before he can do so, however, Vernon Assa is poisoned with cyanide slipped into his drink and dies on the floor of Wolfe's office. Dahlmann's wallet is found in his pocket, suggesting that he is the thief and murderer.

Infuriated at the murder of someone who was enjoying his hospitality and skeptical of Assa's guilt, Wolfe moves to name the true culprit. Wolfe, Archie and four operatives travel to the offices of LBA. They inspect a display of products from their clients, discovering the bottle of cyanide used to murder Assa. This confirms the guilt of one of the executives.

Confronting Buff, O'Garro and Hansen in their conference room, Wolfe lays out the facts of the case and accuses Buff of murdering both Dahlmann and Assa. Buff is the man who had clear means and opportunity, and motive. He was driven to murder Dahlmann out of jealousy over Dahlmann's skills threatening his position. Assa discovered the wallet that Buff stole from Dahlmann, and Buff murdered Assa to silence him. When Buff tries to throw suspicion on O'Garro, O'Garro says that Wolfe is correct. They call the police to take the source of the cyanide. Buff is convicted of murder.

The remaining LBA executives ask Wolfe to continue managing the contest. Wolfe refuses this task. One executive praises the action of mailing the answers to the five contestants as a brilliant act to end a problem, unaware who mailed them. Wolfe states that he will be adding onto his bill the price of a used typewriter that has been disposed of in the East River, as a person in his employ mailed the correct answers to the five contestants, allowing a new set of verses to settle the winners. He is finished with that contest.

Characters

Nero Wolfe – sedentary Manhattan private detective, orchid fancier, gourmet/gourmand, and self-educated man, with an extensive personal library/office where he conducts nearly all business

Archie Goodwin – Wolfe's live-in right-hand man (assistant), agent provocateur, man of action

Fritz Brenner – the Wolfe household's live-in world-class Swiss French chef