I said, “I’m going to tell you something. I want you to remember it. Think it over tonight and remember it tomorrow. You were tired and nervous. You canceled a date. You went to a movie, but couldn’t stick it out. You came back home. You haven’t been anywhere else. You understand?”
She said, “I came down here because I want to make a good job of having this over with once and for all. I hate snoops and spies. I suppose my stepmother employed you to find out just how I felt... Well, she’s found out. I could just as well have told her to her face, but as far as you’re concerned, I think you’re beneath contempt. I—”
I said, “Come down to earth. I’m a detective. I was hired to protect you.”
“To protect me?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t need any protection.”
“That’s what you think. Remember what I told you. You were tired and nervous. You canceled a date. You went to a movie but couldn’t stick it out. You came back home. You haven’t been anywhere else.”
She stared at me.
I took the cheque from my pocket. “I don’t suppose,” I said, “that you bother to keep stubs of such minor cash outlays as ten-thousand-dollar checks, do you?”
Her face went white as she sat staring at that cheque, her eyes riveted on it.