“Hello there,” I said professionally. “What does this mean?”
The long home-grown lashes fluttered at me. “You,” she said.
“Yep. Your friend Archie Goodwin.” There was a chair there, the only one she wasn’t using, and I squeezed past Purley and sat, facing her and close. “How do you feel, terrible?”
“No, I don’t feel at all. I am past feeling.”
I reached for her wrist, got my fingers on the spot, and looked at my watch. In thirty seconds I said, “Your pump isn’t bad. May I inspect your head?”
“If you’re careful.”
“Groan if it hurts.” I used all fingers to part the fine brown hair, and gently but thoroughly investigated the scalp. She closed her eyes and flinched once, but there was no groan. “A lump to write home about,” I announced. “Doing your hair will be a problem. I’d like to give the guy that did it a piece of my mind before plugging him. Who was it?”
“Send them away, and I’ll tell you.”
I turned to the kibitzers. “Get out,” I said sternly. “If I had been here this would never have happened. Leave us.”
They went without a word. I sat listening to the sound of their retreating footsteps outside in the aisle, then thought I had better provide sound to cover in case they were careless tiptoeing back. They had their choice of posts, just outside the open entrance or in the adjoining booths. The partitions were only six feet high. “It was dastardly,” I said. “He might have killed you or disfigured you for life, and either one would have ruined your career. Thank God you’ve got a good strong thick skull.”