Page 96 - Labelle Gramercy, Detective

Cat’s Paw

condition of such manifest slobbery? Nothing for it but to go home
and change into my other shirt. It wasn’t much out of the way, but I
cursed nonstop at the car radio and at any driver ahead of me going
less than double the speed limit.

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I parked sketchily in a red zone in front of my apartment building
and double-timed it up the stairs to the second floor, almost colliding
with a woman coming down. It was Hope Lesley.
“Oops!”
“Oh! Mr. O’Bleakley. You—you are here. I was just upstairs
knocking on your door.”
The poor kid looked really distraught. My heart went out to her.
“Why, what’s wrong, Hope?” I was holding her in a clumsy embrace.
Her entire body was trembling, and her hands were grasping at my
jacket. I let her get her footing, but didn’t let go.
“It’s nothing, really. Well, to be honest, it’s that woman again. She
just won’t let me get into the house. And it’s like a fortress. You can’t
get in there without a key.”
Something in her voice told me it was time to stop hugging her; I
did and she edged past me on the staircase. “Didn’t your brother ever
give you a key? You are a fairly close relative, you know.”
She laughed nervously. “Me? What makes you think he would trust
me with a key?”
I shrugged. “Since your brother really wanted you to have
everything, it seemed like a possibility—that’s all.”
“Oh.” Her eyes were darting about like minnows in a tank.
“Anyway,” I said in the calmest voice I could imagine, the one
used by TV commercial proctologists, “since you came all this way,
what can I do for you?”
“I lost your phone number and I wondered if you had found my
brother’s will.
“No, I’m sorry, I haven’t. But I’m still looking.” She had me so
befuddled it never occurred to me that I hadn’t given her my
number—much less my address.
“I see. Then I’ll be going. Bye.”

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