“Last night. Last night I stayed behind to see if I could find out anything about Mr. Phillips’s paycheck, you know, like you asked me to. I thought about it, and I thought, really, now, if Mr. Warshawski was killed like you say he was, and if this will help, I ought to find out. But Lois came in to see what I was doing. I guess she was all set to spy on me if I stayed late or stayed after lunch, and then she called Mr. Phillips at home. Well, he wasn’t home yet, of course. But she kept calling him, and about ten o’clock last night he called and told me they don’t need me to come in anymore and he’ll send me two weeks’ salary instead of notice. And, like I said, it just doesn’t seem fair.”

“No, it doesn’t,” I agreed warmly. “What did you tell her you were doing?”

“Who?”

“Lois,” I said patiently. “When she came in and asked you what you were doing, what did you tell her?”

“Oh! I said I’d written a personal letter and I couldn’t find it so I was looking to see if it got thrown out.”

I thought that was pretty fast thinking and said so.

She laughed a little, pleased with the compliment, but added despondently, “She didn’t believe me, because there wasn’t any reason for it to be in Mr. Phillips’s wastebasket.”

“Well, Janet, I don’t know what to say. You certainly tried your hardest. I’m extremely sorry you lost your job, and all for nothing, but if—”

“It wasn’t all for nothing,” she interrupted. “I did find his pay stub just as you thought I might.”

“Oh!” I stared at the receiver in disbelief. For once something in this cockeyed investigation had worked out the way I thought it should. “How much does he make?”

“He gets thirty-five hundred forty-six dollars and fifteen cents every two weeks.”

I tried multiplying in my head but I was still too groggy.

“I figured it out on my calculator last night. That’s ninety-two thousand a year.” She paused, wistfully. “That’s a lot of money. I was only making seven-two hundred. And now I don’t have that.”

“Look, Janet. Would you be willing to work downtown? I can get you some interviews—at the Ajax Insurance Company and a couple of other places.”

She told me she’d think about it: she’d rather find something in her neighborhood. If that didn’t work out, she’d give me a call back and ask me to set up an interview for her. I thanked her profusely and we hung up.