Payoff for the Banker Read Online Free Page B

Hunter,” he said. “I’m not trying to trap you. I’m not trying to do anything but find out the facts. If you didn’t kill Merle, don’t make me drag facts out of you. If you did—well, if you did, there’s the telephone. Call a lawyer.”
    He waited as if he expected her to cross the room to the telephone. She did not move.
    â€œAll right,” she said. “It was at the bank. Mr. Merle’s bank. Right after Rick went away I—I had to find something to do. Everybody was working at something. It wasn’t much of a job, because I couldn’t do anything.” She paused. “But I can now,” she said. “I’m a secretary now. I went to school.”
    â€œRight,” Weigand said. “Go on.”
    â€œMr. Murdock worked there,” she said. “He was sort of an assistant to Mr. Merle. Like a—like a secretary, but not a stenographic secretary. That was—oh, a year and a half ago. Right after Rick went. When I—heard about Rick I didn’t go back. I didn’t want to go anywhere.”
    She paused, as if waiting. Nobody said anything.
    â€œI don’t have to work,” she said. “For the money, that is. Father left me some money.”
    There was another pause and she did not go on.
    â€œRight,” Weigand said, after they had waited. “Now about the apartment. You had kept in touch with this—Murdock, did you say? And you asked him if he knew anybody who had an apartment to rent?”
    The girl shook her head. She said it hadn’t been that way, exactly. She had run into Murdock quite by accident and he had asked what she was doing and she had said she had a new job, beginning Monday.
    â€œThat was last week,” she said. “Yesterday was the Monday I meant. And he said, ‘You don’t want a new apartment to go with it, do you?’ And I said I might, and did he know of one. He said he was just moving and wanted to sublet his and that I could have it Sunday if I wanted it. And I went and looked at it and it was all right, because of the way I wanted to live for a while. And so—this is it.” She paused and half smiled.
    â€œOnly,” she said, “it isn’t the way I planned.”
    Under other circumstances, Pam thought, Mary Hunter would be gay. As she must have been gay with Rick, from the way her voice changed when she spoke of him. Not, Pam decided, that she wasn’t getting over that, in a way.
    Bill Weigand did not appear to notice Mary’s last remark.
    â€œSo until day before yesterday, this apartment belonged to a man named Murdock,” he said. “Any first name?”
    â€œOscar,” Mary said. “Mr. Merle called him Ozzie, but his name was Oscar. On the roster. Oh!”
    â€œYes, Mrs. Hunter?” Bill Weigand said.
    The girl’s eyes seemed brighter, more animated. She leaned forward a little and spoke eagerly, in a very young voice.
    â€œCouldn’t Mr. Merle have come to see Mr. Murdock?” she said. “Couldn’t that be it? Perhaps not knowing Mr. Murdock had moved? I mean—isn’t that the real connection, somehow? Mr. Murdock did all sorts of things for Mr. Merle—confidential things.”
    Jerry North, half leaning by the door, nodded slowly. The girl saw his nod. Her eyes appreciated it. Jerry discovered that his eyes were appreciating her.
    â€œIt could be,” Bill Weigand told her. “Obviously. We’ll have to see Mr. Murdock. We’ll have to see lots of people, Mrs. Hunter.”
    She was confident again, Weigand noticed, or at least not frightened. She had hold of herself. So there was to be no quick break, which would annoy Deputy Chief Inspector Artemus O’Malley, a man easy to annoy. And a man who would not approve of this—this social method of investigation.
    â€œAt the moment,” Weigand said, “there are too many people right here. I’ll want to have