"
"See!" McKenna pounced. "Look; suppose you had a lot of hot stuff, in a
place like this. You might take a chance on selling something that had
gotten mixed in with your legitimate stuff, but would you want to sell
it right back to where it had been stolen from?"
"No, I wouldn't. And if I were a butler who'd been robbing a valuable
collection, and an agency man moved in and started poking around, I might
get in a panic and do something extreme. That all hangs together, too."
While Rand was talking to McKenna, Private Jameson wandered back through
the shop.
"Hey, Sarge, is there any way into the house from here?" he asked. "The
outside doors are all locked, and I can't raise anybody."
Rand pointed out the flight of steps beside the fireplace. "I saw Rivers
come out of the house that way, yesterday," he said.
The State Policeman went up the steps and tried the door; it opened, and
he went through.
"Chances are Mrs. Rivers is away," McKenna said. "She's away a lot. They
have a colored girl who comes in by the day, but she doesn't generally
get here before noon. And the clerk doesn't get here till about the same
time."
"You seem to know a lot about this household," Rand said.
"Yeah. We have this place marked up as a bad burglary- and stick-up
hazard; we keep an eye on it.
Pages:
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149