Rex Stout_Tecumseh Fox 02 Read Online Free

hand. “Reasons. You were very nice not to run over me.” She looked at him, full face now, hesitated, and then went on. “I’ve just made a decision. I’m not usually so impulsive—” She stopped.
    “Go ahead.”
    “But I’m in a jam, and if by pure luck I find myself on speaking terms with Tecumseh Fox—of course I don’t know whether detectives exchange professional courtesies the way doctors do—you know a doctor never charges another doctor for treatment or advice—and you have a reputation for a heart as warm as your head is cool—”
    “And your fingers are short,” said Pokorny from the sidewalk.
    Fox was frowning at her. “Which do you need, treatment or advice?”
    “Advice. I’ll make it as brief as I can—but there’s no use sitting out here in the cold—”
    “All right, climb out.” Fox followed her to the sidewalk, and turned to Pokorny: “There’s a drugstore at the corner. Would you mind phoning Stratton we’ll be late and waiting here in the car?”
    “I would,” Pokorny declared. “I’m fairly cold myself.”
    “Then you can wait in the drugstore and drink chocolate. If you heard Miss Duncan’s story you’d base a new theory of human conduct on it, and you have too many already.”
    Pokorny took it with a cheerful nod and anotherwink at Amy, and they left him. She limped a little, but declined assistance mounting the stairs. In the living room of her apartment, Fox insisted that she should first go and take a look at herself, so she hobbled to the bedroom and made enough of an examination to establish that except for soiled clothing, ruined stockings, and a bruised knee, the damage was slight. Then she returned and sat on the sofa with him on a chair facing her, and told him:
    “The chief trouble is: I think I have to quit my job, and I can’t afford to and don’t want to.”
    “Who do you work for?”
    “Bonner & Raffray. They have an office on Madison Avenue—”
    Fox nodded. “I know. Run by Dol Bonner. Based on the fact that most men get careless sooner or later when they’re talking to a pretty woman, especially if the woman is also clever and can guide a conversation. But I should think your eyes would put a man on guard.”
    “What’s wrong with my eyes?”
    “Nothing. They’re very interesting. Excuse me. Go ahead.”
    “Well, I’ve been working there about a year. I lived in Nebraska with my parents, and five years ago, when I was twenty, my mother died, and soon afterwards I came to New York and my uncle gave me a job in his office. I didn’t like it much, mostly on account of my uncle, but I stayed nearly a year and then left and got a job in a law office.”
    “If your incompatibility with your uncle is important, tell me about it.”
    “I don’t know that it’s important, but it has a bearing—that’s why I mentioned it. He’s ill-mannered and quick-tempered and generally disagreeable, but thequarrel—what brought it to a head was his attitude about unmarried mothers.”
    “Oh.” Fox nodded.
    “Oh, no.” Amy shook her head. “Not me. It was a girl who worked in the canning department, but I learned that it had happened twice before in previous years. He simply fired her, and you should have heard him. I got mad and told him what I thought of him, and quit before he could fire me too. I had been working in the law office for three years, and was the secretary of a member of the firm, when I met Miss Bonner and she offered me a job and I took it. Do you know her?”
    “Never met her.”
    “Well—talk about clever women.” Amy, without thinking, started to cross her knees, grimaced, and forbore. “You ought to hear her coaching me on a job. I’m the youngest of the four women on what she calls her siren squad. When I’m on a case I’m not allowed to go to the office and if I meet her accidentally I’m not supposed to speak to her. Last spring I got evidence for—but I guess I shouldn’t tell you that.”
    “Are you on a case