“I think Aussie sized up the situation pretty well,” she said. “Aussie was a shrewd judge of character. He’d done quite a bit of traveling and... well, he knew women.”
“Meaning that he knew you?”
“He knew women, yes.”
“Go ahead.”
“Aussie,” she said, “approached me with a proposition. He had some gems which he wanted to sell through a commission man. Aussie was a gem collector. Aussie explained it was like selling second-hand automobiles through classified ads. People sometimes hesitate to buy through a dealer, but if they think they can buy through a private party, they’ll show more interest, so auto dealers would arrange with people to stay home Sundays and exhibit second-hand automobiles as private cars and...”
“I know,” Mason interrupted, “and Aussie’s proposition was that you were to pose as the owner of certain gems?”
“Yes.”
“What were you to get out of it?”
“A salary and bonus,” she said, “and I was to be put up in style in an apartment. I was to be a sophisticated, dashing divorcee, a woman of the world who was young, attractive, and had outgrown the conventions.”
“Why the outgrown conventions?” Mason asked.