Washington Whispers Murder. Leslie Ford

voice was abruptly serious then, which is unusual for Archie. “Have you seen Marge any place, Mrs. Latham?”

      “She’s coming here this evening. Why?”

      “She left me a note asking if I know anybody named Forbes Allerdyce. Who is he, do you know?”

      “He’s a friend of the Brents,” I said.

      “Oh. I wish she’d quit stewing about those people. Tell your dreamboat I’ll be right over.”

      Whoever had taught Ginny Dolan her manners had said you pretended not to hear what anybody said on the telephone. She turned to me with innocent wide-open eyes.

      “Where’s your television set?”

      “I don’t have one.”

      “Oh,” she said. “Everybody in Taber City has one. We have three.”

      “Well,” I said, “in Washington, we have Archie Seaton. He’s coming over. You’d probably like to go to your room now. You can leave the big bag. I’ll have that carried up for you later.”

      She went blithely ahead of me toward the stairs. “Oh, I’ll just leave this down here.” She went back and put the Taber City Gazette on the coffee table, smiling at me with a sort of demure but happy pride. “It’s got my picture in it. I thought you’d like to look at it maybe.”

      “I’d love to,” I said. “Thanks.”

      She went along into the hall. “How many other roomers do you have right now?”

      “None,” I said.

      “Well, I can probably find somebody for you. There’ll probably be some other girls in Hamilton Vair’s office.”

      She stopped on the second step and turned back to me, smiling that shy, delighted smile. “You didn’t know it was Hamilton Vair I was coming to work for, did you? It’s his staff I’m on.”

      For the second time she misinterpreted the I dare say stunned look on my unfortunate face.

      “You know who he is, don’t you?”

      “Oh yes.” I said it quickly.

      She laughed then. “I don’t wonder you’re surprised,” she said kindly. “But Ham Vair isn’t as terribly important out in Taber as he is in Washington. Anyway, he has to do anything Daddy says. Daddy’s the best friend he’s got out there. He wouldn’t have got to first base without Daddy. That’s why I didn’t have to worry about getting the job in Washington. I’m going to be his receptionist. I thought I’d meet more people, that way.”

      Of course, I should have guessed. Who else would have a talent contest to pick his best friend’s daughter for a job in Washington?

      She started on up the stairs. “Mother says Daddy and Ham Vair are hand in glove.” The musical rippling laughter came down toward me. “Daddy’s the hand, Ham’s the glove. I guess people in Washington would be surprised if they knew that. So I just laughed when that boy asked me if I wasn’t scared coming to the Capital.”

      The idea was so deliciously preposterous to Ginny Dolan that she laughed all the rest of the way up stairs. It was such complacent laughter, so full of confident assurance, so empty of any possible idea of moral compunction or just plain ordinary everyday ethics, that I was really shocked.

      She stopped at the top of the stairs. “You didn’t know—” she began, and I stopped involuntarily, waiting to hear what I didn’t know this time.

      “You didn’t know I went to a charm school, did you? They teach you poise, and things like that. It was a wonderful place. I was only there two months, but the lady said I didn’t have to stay any longer. I was ready for anything, she said. I could hold my own anywhere. That’s when I first decided to come to Washington.”

      By golly, the lady was right, I thought. Or at least I hoped she was . . . for as I turned on the light in my front guest room and opened the bathroom door, I had a curious little catch in my throat suddenly. Her confident figure in the mirror on the back of the door seemed to me infinitely pathetic. Her slender body was as fragile as if her bones were made of spun glass. I remembered that look on Ham Vair’s face as he turned back on his way out at the garden party.