I frowned at her. I was beginning to suspect she was something we couldn’t use, like for instance a female writer getting material for a magazine piece on a famous detective’s home, but even so she was not the kind to be led out by the ear and rolled off the stoop down the steps to the sidewalk. There was no good reason, considering the eyes, why she shouldn’t be humored up to a point.
“No,” I said. “Why, do you think it needs one?”
“Maybe not,” she conceded, “but I thought I’d feel better if it had. You see, that’s where I want to sleep.”
“Oh? You do? For about how long?”
“For a week. Possibly a day or two more, but certainly for a week. I would rather have the south room than the one on the second floor because it has its own bath. I know how Nero Wolfe feels about women, so I knew I’d have to see you first.”
“That was sensible,” I agreed. “I like gags, and I’ll bet this is a pip. How does it go?”
“It is not a gag.” She wasn’t heated, but she was earnest. “For a certain reason I had to be — I had to go away. I had to go somewhere and stay there until June thirtieth — some place where no one would know and no one could possibly find me. I didn’t think a hotel would do, and I didn’t think — anyhow, I thought it over and decided the best place would be Nero Wolfe’s house. Nobody knows I came; nobody followed me here, I’m sure of that.”
She got up and went to the red leather chair for her bag, which she had left there with her jacket. Back in her seat, she opened the bag and took out a purse and let me have the eyes again. “One thing you can tell me,” she said, as if I not only could but naturally would, “—about paying. I know how he charges just for wiggling his finger. Would it be better for me to offer to pay him or to go ahead and pay you now? Would fifty dollars a day be enough? Whatever you say. I’ll give you cash instead of a check, because that way he won’t have to pay income tax on it, and also because a check would have my name on it, and I don’t want you to know my name. I’ll give it to you now if you’ll tell me how much.”
“That won’t do,” I objected. “Hotels and rooming houses have to know names. We can make one up for you. How would Lizzie Borden do?”
She reacted to that crack as she had to the Coke and rum — she flushed a little. “You think it’s funny?” she inquired.