Dolly sat down across from him and obediently pulled the top of the kimono closed. But she crossed her legs and it fell away from them, quite a lot of Dolly still showed. She said, "No, I wasn't going to get dressed again. I just—well, I just had a sudden hunch, right after he left and just before I called you, and I looked around to see if anything was gone. I looked in my purse first; there wasn't much money in it but it was still there, and then I looked in the jewelry box and it was empty and I knew my hunch had been right.
"You see, Mack, he was in an awful hurry and kind of—well, furtive is the word, I guess, when he left. Almost like he was scared. And besides that, he's in some kind of a jam over money. What he really came here for was to try to borrow some from me."
Mack Irby laughed shortly. "He sure didn't know you, Doll. What kind of money did he want? Did he mention an amount?"
"Five hundred. He offered to pay six back in a week or two. That would have been fair enough, if I knew him. But I probably don't even know his right name—and if Ray Fletcher is his right name he could still be planning to blow town for all I know."
"You played it smart, I'd say. Offering that much interest is suspicious, and besides, the fact that he swiped your jewelry shows he ain't very honest. If you'd of lent him the money you'd never of got it back. Now you said the jewelry wasn't worth much. How much is not much?"
"Well, it was mostly costume stuff. Some of the things maybe cost up to twenty bucks apiece, but they wouldn't have any resale value. The wedding ring, worth ten or fifteen—I mean, that's what it would have cost new, not what he could get for it. And that diamond ring, the one with the flaw. You remember it."
Mack Irby remembered the ring. One of Dolly's "friends" had given it to her about a year ago. She'd turned it over to Mack to have appraised and maybe to sell it for her. It had looked like a good stone and as though it might weigh almost a carat; they'd thought it might be worth several hundred dollars. But the appraisal had been disappointing. Mack's jeweler friend had told him its diameter was deceptive; it was too shallow, cut too thin. And it had a bad flaw, one you could see with the naked eye if you looked at just the right angle. Seventy-five was all he offered for it. And at that price, since it looked to be worth much more, Dolly had decided to keep it.
Dolly seldom wore rings, but once in a while someone wanted to take her out of town for a weekend, and if the someone was a free enough spender she sometimes went. Since they'd be registering as man and wife she kept a plain wedding ring to wear on such occasions. And she thought that a diamond ring worn with it would look good and add verisimilitude.
Mack said, "If that's the lot, he won't get more than fifty bucks from a fence—if a fence would be willing to bother with the stuff at all. If he needs five hundred, he's in for a disappointment. All right, so much for the stuff. And now about Fletcher. I think we can take it for granted the name's a phony, or he wouldn't of risked robbing you."
He thought a moment. "But there's still a possibility. If the jam he's in is so bad he's figuring on blowing town anyway, the name business might not worry him. Let's check something."