“No,” she said, “never before.” And her eyes dropped down to rest on the caged canary.
“But you knew it, of course,” Mason went on.
“Well, not exactly,” she said in a low voice. “I knew that I liked him and I hoped he liked me. But it came as a surprise.”
“And how,” Mason asked, “did it happen that Jimmy Driscoll came over to Rosalind’s house?”
She lifted her eyes to his, then, and said, “He went to my apartment first. The clerk at the desk over there thinks Jimmy is just about right. Jimmy was able to make him a little money once, so the clerk told him that my sister had called and seemed very much excited and that I’d dashed over to her house in a hurry.”
“He’d been listening in on the wire?” Mason asked.
“No, I don’t think so. He knows Rossy’s voice, so he knew she’d called, and then when I left I told him where I was going.”
“So Jimmy went over to Rosalind’s house?”
“Yes. You see, it’s only a couple of blocks.”
“And found you there?”