“She?” Bertha asked.
“The shoe,” I said.
“Oh,” she said. “You’re taking too much for granted, Donald. I still think it’s Lamont Hawley.”
“I’m beginning to think it may be a woman in Salt Lake,” I said. “Anyway Hawley should know about what’s happening now.”
Bertha said, “Dammit, I was just getting comfortable! I got that damn girdle off and now I’ve got to struggle into it again. I wish to hell you could work cases the way other people do. There’s no reason on earth why we couldn’t build up a respectable, decent agency with the right kind of clients and—”
“You’ve got the right kind of a client now,” I told her. “That is, you told me he was the right kind when you closed with him.”
“Well, I’m not nearly as sure now as I was a couple of days ago,” Bertha said. “If he’s hiring one detective agency and then hiring another — fry me for an oyster, I’ll fix that bird!”
“All right,” I told her. “He’s all yours. Fix him.”
I crossed over to Bertha’s telephone, dialed information and said, “I want the number of Lorraine Robbins of Colinda, please.”
Information said, “Just a moment,” and a short time later gave me the number. “It’s three-two-four, nine-two-four-three. You can dial it from your phone.”
“Thanks,” I said. I dialed the number and after a moment heard Lorraine Robbins’ voice, calmly efficient, saying, “Yes?”
“Lorraine,” I said, “this is Donald Lam.”
“Oh, yes, Donald.”
I said, “I have to see you tonight on a matter of the greatest importance.”
“Oh, now really, Donald,” she said, “when I handed you that line this afternoon I was kidding.”
“What line?” I asked innocently.
“I told you that I might give you a lot... Look, Donald, it’s late and I’m going to bed and... I don’t like men who have to take half the night getting their nerve up to—”
“This is business,” I said. “This is something that’s tremendously important to you and to your employers.”
“Can’t it keep until office hours?”
“It can’t keep.”
“What do you want?”
“I want to talk with you.”
“All right,” she said, “I’ll fall for the gag. But now look, Donald, I’m going to tell you something straight from the shoulder. If this is a gag you’re using as a build-up, you’re going to be wasting an awful lot of time.
“I don’t want to have someone ring me up at this hour of the night and tell me it’s an emergency business matter and then use the contact as an excuse to start making passes. You’re four hours late for passes; no cocktails, no dinner... If you’re intending to make passes, say so right now and—”
“It’s business, Lorraine,” I told her. “I wouldn’t have bothered you otherwise.”
“I don’t know that that’s so flattering.”
“At this hour, I meant. I’d have called you earlier.”
“Well, why didn’t you?”
“I was busy.”
“You’re doing better all the time, Donald,” she said. “I was just going to bed. I’ll be waiting up. Do you have the address?”
“No.”
“It’s the Miramar Apartments. Two-twelve.”
“I’ll be there.”
“How long?”
“It’ll take me a little over half an hour. I’m calling from the city.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
I hung up and saw Bertha’s speculative eyes surveying me. “Who was that?”
“Lorraine Robbins,” I said. “She’s secretary to Holgate and Maxton, the subdividers.”
Bertha shook her head. “You sure as hell cover ground,” she said.
“That’s what I’m paid for,” I told her virtuously.
“With women,” Bertha added dryly.
There was no use trying to answer that so I walked out and pulled the apartment door shut behind me.
Chapter Seven
Lorraine Robbins answered my ring almost at once. She was dressed in a neat suit and was all business.
“Hello, Donald. Come in. What gives?”
I said, “This Miramar Apartments. Does everyone in Colinda live here.”
“No, why?”
“I know some other people who live here.”
“Who?”
“Oh, it isn’t that important,” I said smiling, “but I just wondered why everyone seemed to have this address.”
“It’s the town’s swankiest working girl’s apartment house,” she said. “It’s new, modern and the service is fine. They really keep it warm in the winter and they have air-conditioning in the summer. Yet the rates aren’t up in high C. It’s quite a job getting in here. They have a waiting list as long as your arm.
“Now, what’s bothering you, Donald? Do you want to sit down?”
I seated myself and she went over and sat in a chair across the room and kept her knees together and her skirt down.
I said, “I have to see Mr. Holgate tonight and I want you to be there.”
“You want me to be there!” she said indignantly. “If Mr. Holgate wants me to—”
“Take it easy,” I told her. “This is a matter of considerable importance.”
“To whom? To you or to us?”
“To all of us.”
“What’s it about?”
I said, “That automobile accident. Do you think there’s any possibility Mr. Holgate could have been lying about it?”
She said, “In the first place Mr. Holgate doesn’t lie. And in the second place there was nothing for him to lie about. He admits liability and his story of the accident coincides with yours.”
“Well,” I said, “I have reason to believe there’s a detective agency working on the thing.”
She laughed and said, “Of course there is, silly. There’s an insurance company involved and they’re trying to find out the nature and the extent of the injuries of this girl that was hit. Oh, that’s the one you were thinking about! Her address is here in the Miramar Apartments, too. That is, it was. I don’t think she’s here any more.”
“Well,” I told her, “I think there’s something very much out of the ordinary going on and I’m somewhat alarmed.”
“Just what gives you that idea and why are you coming to me with it?”
I reached in my pocket, took out an extra clipping I had cut from the newspaper and said, “I suppose you folks are responsible for this.”
“For what?”
“Offering to pay two hundred and fifty dollars for persons who had seen the accident.”
She came across the room to take the clipping out of my hand almost before I had a chance to start over toward her. She grabbed the clipping, looked at it, then looked at me.
“We didn’t put that ad in, Donald. We don’t know anything about it.”
I said, “My car’s down here. Let’s go talk to Holgate.”
“I’ll have to try and locate him,” she said. “I’ve got a couple of night numbers.”
I said, “He’s out at the subdivision.”
“How do you know?”
“I drove past on my way in. The place was all lit up. I thought for a minute of going in and telling him to wait there, that we were coming out as soon as I could pick you up. Then I felt that it wouldn’t be but ten or fifteen minutes longer to pick you up and—”