“I have an idea that’s going to be the best way to handle him,” Bertha went on. “If he didn’t need the money damn badly, he’d have told me to go to hell long ago. This way, he’ll start sweating, and a little sweat will crack that hard-boiled exterior. I’m going to do some work, and I don’t want to be disturbed.”
Bertha returned to her office, locked the door, cleared her desk, took out the letter Belder had given her and went to work on it, studying each separate character with a magnifying glass, making notes of various characteristics, breaking off from time to time to consult a chart showing the different type faces of all makes and models of typewriters.
It took Bertha something over an hour to decide that the message had been written on an early model Remington portable typewriter. It had taken her only a few minutes to convince herself that the memo she had found attached to the letters in Belder’s office had been written on the same typewriter that wrote the letter.
Bertha went down to the lunch counter on the ground floor of the building for a quick cup of coffee and a sandwich, was back within a matter of ten minutes.
“Anything new, Elsie”
“Mr. Nunnely called up.”
An expression of serene satisfaction settled on Bertha’s countenance. “What did you tell him?”
“Exactly what you told me to.”
“Did you tell him I was out?”
“No. Just told him that you had left word you were busy and didn’t want to talk with anyone. He said he thought you’d want to make an exception in his case. I asked him if he was the Mr. Nunnely who had hung up on you earlier in the day.”