Rex Stout Read Online Free

connection. I do make quick decisions about things, you know I do. Up till Saturday afternoon I had no idea whether I would ever be married or not; I hadn’t thought about it much. Then quite suddenly I decided I would marry him. That’s why I say it’s settled for me, but it hasn’t been settled for him yet.”
    “Has he mentioned the subject?”
    “Certainly not. He’s only seen me four times.”
    Miss Delaney sat motionless, with pursed lips, staring with concentrated speculation at her partner’s face. Finally, she declared with emphasis, “I don’t believe it. You’re rolling me. You’re fairly well educated, and you have a good sense of humour, and there you sit talking like a paleolithic cave girl on leap-year day. Unless you’re really deep and devious, which I’ve never suspected,and you’ve decided in cold blood to freeze on to that twenty million or whatever it is.”
    Jean was laughing. “I don’t care whether he has twenty million or twenty cents! I can always make money, with you to help.” She sobered. “But it’s settled. Really, Eileen. And don’t you dare mention it to
anybody,
because I don’t know, it may take years—Well! Come in!”
    The knock had been at the door in the partition behind her, across the room from the one by which Miss Delaney had entered. It opened, and the chunky little woman from the ante-room appeared, carrying a large flat box of green and yellow cardboard secured with wide yellow tape. She advanced to the table.
    “From Krone.”
    Jean Farris had bounded from the stool and was exclaiming. “Thank heaven! I was afraid it wouldn’t get here in time. I’ll be late as it is. No, wait, Cora, don’t go, I want to see how you like it. You too, Eileen, of course.” She had the lid off and the top garment unfolded and was holding it up for inspection. “Oh, my God! He ended that stripe at the wrong—no, he didn’t. Look! See how the line of the stripe in the jacket will meet it? Hey, what’s that? Oh—snip that thread, will you, Cora? Isn’t it pretty fine? Would you think that stripe could be so quiet? That’s because the dark blend of the tabby absorbs it—just a trick! Everything is just a trick.” She laughed. With the smock off and likewise the dress that had been under it, the pink silk hanging from the shoulder straps left almost as much bare skin displayed as if it had been a fashionable swimming suit. The skin was nicely tanned. She touched the pink silk. “Have you seen these, Eileen? Bretton’s are featuring them—they call them Shapesheers! Isn’t that terrible? Sheepshears, Shakespeares—it will haunt you. Cora, please dear, thebrown pumps from that cupboard—no, over there—I’m glad it isn’t sweltering, because I do want to show this sort of casually—and oh, I forgot to phone Roberts & Creel to send samples of that two-sixteens mixture—”
    Miss Delaney was emptying a drawer, trying to find stockings to go with the brown pumps.

Chapter 2
    I nspector Cramer removed a shred of cigar from his tongue with his finger and thumb and deposited it in an ash tray on the police commissioner’s desk. “I’m not exactly kicking,” he declared, “I’m only remarking. I only say, it’s not our cat and why should we apologise if we don’t skin it? I take a man’s-size vacation for the first time in fifteen years, and to get called back like this for something that happened at the North Pole—”
    District Attorney Skinner gestured impatiently. “Swallow it, Cramer. You’re sore because the fishing wasn’t good and the flies bit you. Mount Kisco isn’t the North Pole. It’s out of our jurisdiction, but District Attorney Anderson of Westchester has asked for help, and the press and the public know we’re working on it anyhow, and we’re taking it on the chin. Anyway, here you are. Do you mean to say you haven’t read about it?”
    “I do.” The inspector sounded bitter. “I’ve been up in Canada branding moose, and as for