“There’s four dollars and thirty cents.” She stayed on her feet. “He made it himself, it’s his money that he kept in a tobacco can. That was the last thing he said, telling me to give you his money in the can; after that he was unconscious again, and he died before they could do anything at the hospital. I came away and came home to get his money and come and tell you. Now I’ll go back.” She turned, took a couple of steps, and turned again. “Did you understand what I told you?”
“Yes, I understand.”
“Do you want me to do anything?”
“No, I think not. Archie?”
I was already there beside her. She seemed a little steadier on her feet than she had coming in, but I kept her arm anyway, on out to the stoop and down the seven steps to the sidewalk. She didn’t thank me, but since she may not even have known I was there I didn’t hold it against her.
Purley was in the hall when I re-entered, with his hat on. I asked him, “Did you shut the panel?”
“Taking candy from a kid I might expect,” he said offensively. “But taking candy from a dead kid, by God!”
He was leaving, and I sidestepped to block him. “Oaf. Meaning you. If we had insisted on her taking it back she would have—”
I chopped it off at his grin of triumph. “Got you that time!” he croaked, and brushed past me and went.
So as I stepped into the office I was biting a nail. It is not often that Purley Stebbins can string me, but that day he had caught me off balance because my sentiments had been involved. Naturally I reacted by trying to take it out on Wolfe. I went to his desk for the little packet, unfolded the paper, and arranged the contents neatly in front of him: two dollar bills, four quarters, nine dimes, and eight nickels.