Mrs. Cornish’s silence showed her complete lack of interest.
Bertha said, “I suppose the idea germinated in the master mind of that bright clerk downstairs, but you shouldn’t have moved out of your apartment, dearie. That puts you in a bad light. You can imagine how your picture will look in the newspapers with some stuff under it like this: Mrs. Dolly Cornish, who, police claim, surreptitiously vacated her apartment and took another under an assumed name, following news of Mrs. Belder’s death. Mrs. Cornish was quite friendly with Everett Belder before his marriage.”
Bertha dropped ashes from her cigarette in the ash-tray.
Mrs. Cornish suddenly looked as if she were going to cry. “What — what do you want to know?”
“What have you got to tell?”
“Nothing.”
“Good stuff,” Bertha agreed enthusiastically. “The newspapers will eat that up. Keep that expression of near-tears on your face, and say nothing, and they’ll put a caption under that, ‘ Nothing,’ sobs woman who sent Mrs. Belder to her death.”
Dolly Cornish straightened suddenly. “What are you talking about. I didn’t send Mrs. Belder to her death.”
Bertha sucked in a deep drag from the cigarette, said nothing.
“Mrs. Belder threatened to kill me,” Dolly Cornish went on, sudden indignation wiping the self-pity from her face.