“Well,” Bertha Cool said at length, heaving herself up out of the chair, “I didn’t sleep a damn wink last night. I was just too mad. I never regretted taking off weight as much in my life as I did last night.”
“Why?” Elsie asked.
“Why!” Bertha exclaimed. “I’ll tell you why. There was a damn snooty matron who kept calling me dearie. She was a husky, broad-shouldered biddy, but before I took off my weight, I could have thrown her down and sat on her. And that’s exactly what I’d have done. I’d have sat on her and stayed there the whole blessed night. I’m in a jam, Elsie. I’ve got to get out of the office and lay low until the thing blows over. They’ve got that blind man, and he’ll tell them the whole business. Sergeant Sellers was right. I should have kept on doing business in the routine way. But Donald is such a reckless little runt, and he did such daring damn things, he got me into bad habits. I got to thinking, Elsie, I’m going out of here and get a drink of whisky — and then I’m going to Redlands.”
Chapter XXIX
Hot, dry sunlight beat down on Redlands. The dark green of orange groves laid out in neat checkerboards contrast, with the deep blue of the clear sky and the towering pea which rose more than ten thousand feet above sea level the background. There was a clean, washed freshness about the dry air which should have been invigorating, but Bertha worry and preoccupation made her entirely oblivious of the beauty of the scenery and the freshness of the air.
Bertha dragged herself out of the automobile, plough across the sidewalk, head down, arms swinging, climbed the steps of the sanitarium, entered the lobby, and said in a flat dejected voice to the girl at the information desk, “Do you by any chance, have a Josephine Dell here?”
“Just a moment.” The girl thumbed through a card index said, “Yes. She has a private room, two-o-seven.”
“A nurse there?” Bertha asked.
“No. Apparently she’s just here for a complete rest.”
Bertha said, “Thank you,” and went pounding her weary way down the long corridor. She found the elevator, went the second floor, found room 207, knocked gently on the swinging door, and pushed it open.