Episode of the Wandering Knife by Rinehart Mary Roberts;

Author:Rinehart, Mary Roberts;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: MysteriousPress.com/Open Road
Published: 2019-07-17T16:00:00+00:00

The Secret

I

Hilda Adams was indignant. She snapped her bag shut and got up.

“So that’s that,” she said. “I’m not young enough or strong enough to go abroad, but I can work my head off here. Maybe if I’d had a new permanent and a facial I’d have got by.”

The man behind the desk smiled at her.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “It looks as though this war is about over. Anyhow your heart—”

“What’s the matter with my heart?”

“It skips a beat now and then. Nothing serious. You’ll probably live to a ripe old age. But—”

“It skipped a beat because I was making up my mind to commit a murder,” she said coldly.

She put a hand on the desk. It was alarmingly near an inkwell, and the medical man looked slightly uneasy.

“Now look, Miss Adams,” he said. “I didn’t make these rules. We need nurses over there, all we can get. But suppose you had to fly at twenty thousand feet?”

“I’d like it.” However she had moved her hand, and he was relieved. “All right,” she said. “Maybe I did want to be useful, Dr. Forbes. And maybe I wanted some excitement too. At my age there isn’t a great deal. Well, I know when I’m licked.”

She did not say goodbye. She walked out, and Forbes looked after her thoughtfully. She was a small neat woman, with short graying hair and childlike blue eyes. Her black suit and white blouse showed a sturdy body, and he scowled as he pressed a button on his desk.

“Get me Inspector Fuller,” he said to the girl who came in. “Here’s the number.”

He shoved a piece of paper across the desk and sat back. Damn it all, they could have used the Adams woman abroad. She was capable. No nerves, he thought, and she was a motherly sort of woman, too old to upset the boys and not too old to take care of them. But the Board had ruled against her.

When the telephone rang he took it up sharply.

“Fuller here,” said a voice. “How about it, doctor?”

“I wish you fellows would keep out of my hair,” he said, disregarding the fact that he had little or none. “We had to turn her down, if that’s what you want to know.”

“Why? What reason?”

“She’s no chicken,” the doctor said sourly. “She has a heart too.”

Fuller’s voice was startled.

“Good God! What’s wrong with her heart?”

“Nothing that will kill her. Skips a beat now and then. She says it was because she was feeling like murdering someone. Maybe we can review the case. I’d be damned glad to use her over here anyhow.”

There was more than a hint of alarm in Fuller’s voice.

“Now look,” he said, “lay off that for a week or so, won’t you? I may need her.”

“She says there isn’t much excitement in her life at her age,” the doctor said drily. “I had an idea that wasn’t exactly true. However …”

Fuller was apparently stunned into silence. He grunted.

“Besides, as I’ve said, whether the war’s over or not we still need nurses, Inspector.

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