Curtains For Three Read Online Free PDF Page B

want the sole responsibility.”
    “Rentner'Who was he?” Wolfe asked.
    “Dr. Abraham Rentner of Mount Sinai,” Lloyd replied, in the tone I would use if someone asked me who Jackie Robinson was. “I phoned him and made an appointment for the following morning.”
    “I insisted on it,” Rupert the Fat said importantly. “Mion had a right to collect not sometime in the distant future, but then and there. They wouldn’t pay unless a total was agreed on, and if we had to name a total I wanted to be damn sure it was enough. Don’t forget that that day Mion couldn’t sing a note.”
    “He wouldn’t have been able even to let out a pianissimo for at least two months,” Lloyd bore him out. “I gave that as the minimum.”
    “There seems,” Judge Arnold interposed, “to be an implication that we opposed the suggestion that a second professional opinion be secured. I must protest - “
    “You did!” Grove squeaked.
    “We did not!” Gifford James barked. “We merely - “
    The three of them went at it, snapping and snarling. It seemed to me that they might have saved their energy for the big issue, was anything coming to Mrs.
    Mion and if so how much, but not those babies. Their main concern was to avoid the slightest risk of agreeing on anything at all. Wolfe patiently let them get where they were headed for - nowhere - and then invited a new voice in. He turned to Adele and spoke. “Miss Bosley, we haven’t heard from you. Which side were you on?”
    IV Adele Bosley had been sitting taking it in, sipping occasionally at her rum Collins - now her second one - and looking, I thought, pretty damn intelligent.
    Though it was the middle of August, she was the only one of the six who had a really good tan. Her public relations with the sun were excellent.
    She shook her head. “I wasn’t on either side, Mr. Wolfe. My only interest was that of my employer, the Metropolitan Opera Association. Naturally we wanted it settled privately, without any scandal. I had no opinion whatever on whether -
    on the point at issue.”
    “And expressed none?”
    “No. I merely urged them to get it settled if possible.”
    “Fair enough!” Clara James blurted. It was a sneer. “You might have helped my father a little, since he got your job for you. Or had you - “
    “Be quiet, Clara!” James told her with authority.
    But she ignored him and finished it. “Or had you already paid in full for that?”
    I was shocked. Judge Arnold looked pained. Rupert the Fat giggled. Doc Lloyd took a gulp of bourbon and water.
    In view of the mildly friendly attitude I was developing toward Adele I sort of hoped she would throw something at the slim and glistening Miss James, but all she did was appeal to the father. “Can’t you handle the brat, Gif?”
    Then, without waiting for an answer, she turned to Wolfe. “Miss James likes to use her imagination. What she implied is not on the record. Not anybody’s record.”
    Wolfe nodded. “It wouldn’t belong on this one anyhow.” He made a face. “To go back to relevancies, what time did that conference break up?”
    “Why - Mr. James and Judge Arnold left first, around four-thirty. Then Dr.
    Lloyd, soon after. I stayed a few minutes with Mion and Mr. Grove, and then went.”
    “Where did you go?”
    “To my office, on Broadway.”
    “How long did you stay at your office?” She looked surprised. “I don’t know -
    yes, I do too, of course. Until a little after seven. I had things to do, and I typed a confidential report of the conference at Mion’s.”
    “Did you see Mion again before he died'Or phone him?”
    “See him?” She was more surprised. “How could I'Don’t you know he was found dead at seven o’clock'That was before I left the office.”
    “Did you phone him'Between four-thirty and seven?”
    “No.” Adele was puzzled and slightly exasperated. It struck me that Wolfe was recklessly getting onto thin ice, mighty close to the forbidden subject of murder. Adele