"Good Lord," says he laughing, "everybody's under surveillance. There's not one of the suspects but knows he's expected to stay put and is doing it. But who's getting anywhere? There's no reason why we shouldn't go out that way, call on Mrs. Cresset, and take a look in at the Wayside Arbor ourselves."
"I'm game," I said, "though I can't see what good it's going to do."
"It'll give us a half-day together," said he. "I don't know how you feel about it but that looks worth while to me."
We made a date for the following Monday, my holiday, just eight weeks from the murder.
The next morning I had a surprise—a kind that hasn't often come my way. It was a letter directed in typewriting with a half-sheet of paper inside it inclosing a fifty-dollar bill. On the paper, also typed, was written:
For Miss Morganthau—A small return for her recent good work in the Hesketh Murder Case.
That was all—no name, no date, no handwriting. I don't know what made me think right off of Mr. Whitney, unless it was because there was no one else who knew of what I'd done and could have afforded to send that much. The only other person it could have been was Jack Reddy, and somehow or other, after he'd asked me to be his friend, I felt certain he wouldn't send me money, no matter what I'd done for him. Friends don't pay each other.
I guess there wasn't a more elated person in Longwood that morning than yours truly. I'd had that much before—saved it—but I'd never had it fall out of the sky that way in one beautiful, crisp, new bill.
The Jew and the Irish in me had some tussle, one wanting to salt it down in the bank and the other to blow it in. But that time the Irish had a walk-over, probably because I was limp and weary with all the excitement of the last two months and felt the need of doing something foolish to tone me up. When I thought of the clothes I could buy with it, the Jew just lay down without a murmur and you'd have supposed I was all County Galway if you'd seen me writing a list of things on the back of the envelope. If it'll make you think better of me I'll confess that I wanted to look nice on that trip with Babbitts, the first real jaunt we'd ever taken, for I didn't count those times in New York when we were sleuthing after Cokesbury. Just once in my life I was going to have a real blowout, and I wanted the chap who was taking me to feel he'd some lady with him.
With three of us in the office I fixed things so I got Saturday afternoon and I hiked over to town with that bill burning in my purse like a live coal. And, my it was great spending it! I was cool on the outside, looking haughty at the goods and casting them aside contemptuous on chairs, but inside I was drunk with the feeling of riches.