“What is your partner going to do about that cheque I gave you?”

“Probably take it out of your hide.”

“Donald, I’ve explained now. You can see it isn’t my fault.”

I said, “If you could find any possible explanation that would talk Bertha Cool out of two hundred bucks you’d be able to talk the explosion of an atomic bomb into a hiccup.”

And having left that thought in her mind I went out to wrestle with troubles of my own.

Thirteen

I had one more lead.

Bob Elgin had called Waverly 9-8765. The address on the registration certificate of the car that had followed me the night before had been Sam Lowry, 968 Rippling Avenue.

It was about a hundred to one shot, but it paid off.

I looked Lowry up in the phone book. He didn’t have a phone. I checked on Waverly 9-8765. It was a public telephone in an apartment house, and the address was 968 Rippling Avenue.