“I heard Mrs. Salzer tried to kidnap her from her apartment. The girl fell down the fire escape and broke her neck. Mrs. S. planted her somewhere in the desert, probably near the sanatorium.”
“Who told you?”
“An old lady fooling around with a crystal ball.”
He scratched the side of his jaw with the end of his pipe and stared blankly at me.
“Better tell Brandon. That’s a Homicide job.”
“This is a tip, brother, not evidence. Brandon likes facts, and I mightn’t be ready to give them to him. I’m telling you because you may or may not steer the information into the proper channels and leave me out of it.”
Bradley sighed, realized his pipe had gone out and groped for matches.
“You young fellas are too tricky,” he said. “All right, I’ll give it to my carrier pigeon. How much of it is true?”
“All of it. Why do you think Mrs. S. took poison?”
The clerk came in and laid the folder on the desk. He went away still at the slow deliberate pace. Probably his brain worked as fast as his legs.