Bertha Cool said, “Hell, no!”
She scrambled out of the car as though it had been on fire. The driver of her car unwrapped himself from behind the steering-wheel and stood holding the door open for her. She gave me one last appealing look, then climbed into the closed car. She sank back against the cushions, and for the moment she didn’t look big and hard and competent. She looked like a fat woman in the fifties who was tired out.
I drove around the block, parked the agency car across the street from Dr. Alftmont’s office, and went up. He was waiting for me.
I said, “You know too much, and we know too much. Bertha talked too much. I want to talk with you, and. I don’t want to talk with you here. Let’s take a little ride in your car.”
Without a word he switched out the lights, locked up his office, and rode down in the elevator with me. His car was parked at the kerb in front of the building entrance. “Just where do we go?” he asked in that precise voice of his.
“Some place where we can talk, and where we won’t be seen,” I said.
He was nervous. “They have a police radio car that investigates parked automobiles.”
“Don’t park then.”
“I can’t talk when I’m driving.”
“How about your house?” I asked.