JOHN DARRELL SALLUST
PAULA SALLUST
had been typewritten in bright-blue ink.
He rang the bell under the label and after a minute the lock of the outside door buzzed; he went in and climbed two flights of narrow stairs to Apartment B5. The door was ajar; he knocked and a man’s high-pitched voice called:
“Come in.”
Green went into a very large and bare studio, dimly lighted by two floor-lamps in opposite corners and a small but very bright desk lamp on a wide central table.
The high-pitched voice: “Well, Mister Green — this is an unexpected pleasure.”
Green took off his hat and went to the wide table. He bowed slightly.
“Might you, by any chance,” he inquired blandly, “have been out this evening — since, say eleven o’clock?”
John Sallust was a thin, consumptive-looking Englishman with a high bulging forehead, stringy mouse-colored hair, and cold gray eyes, so light in color that they appeared almost white. He sat straddling a chair, his chin resting on his clasped hands on the back of the chair.