Joe went back to his room and read some more and then he packed his suitcase. He was going to get out any way it went.

At nine o’clock he knocked gently on Kate’s door and pushed it open. Her bed had not been slept in. He set down the tray and went to the door of the lean-to and knocked and knocked again and then called. Finally he opened the door.

The cone of light fell on the reading stand. Kate’s head was deeply cushioned in the pillow.

“You must have slept all night here,” Joe said. He walked around in front of her, saw bloodless lips and eyes shining dully between half-closed lids, and he knew she was dead.

He moved his head from side to side and went quickly into the other room to make sure that the door to the hall was closed. With great speed he went through the dresser, drawer by drawer, opened her purses, the little box by her bed—and he stood still. She didn’t have a goddam thing—not even a silver-backed hairbrush.

He crept to the lean-to and stood in front of her—not a ring, not a pin. Then he saw the little chain around her neck and lifted it clear and unsnapped the clasp—a small gold watch, a little tube, and two safe-deposit keys, numbers 27 and 29.

“So that’s where you got it, you bitch,” he said.

He slipped the watch off the thin chain and put it in his pocket. He wanted to punch her in the nose. Then he thought of her desk.

The two-line holograph will attracted him. Somebody might pay for that. He put it in his pocket. He took a handful of papers from a pigeonhole—bills and receipts; next hole, insurance; next, a small book with records of every girl. He put that in his pocket too. He took the rubber band from a packet of brown envelopes, opened one, and pulled out a photograph. On the back of the picture, in Kate’s neat, sharp handwriting, a name and address and a title.

Joe laughed aloud. This was the real breaks. He tried another envelope and another. A gold mine—guy could live for years on these. Look at that fat-ass councilman! He put the band back. In the top drawer eight ten-dollar bills and a bunch of keys. He pocketed the money too. As he opened the second drawer enough to see that it held writing paper and sealing wax and ink there was a knock on the door. He walked to it and opened it a crack.

The cook said, “Fella out here wants to see ya.”

“Who is he?”

“How the hell do I know?”

Joe looked back at the room and then stepped out, took the key from the inside, locked the door, and put the key in his pocket. He might have overlooked something.

Oscar Noble was standing in the big front room, his gray hat on his head and his red mackinaw buttoned up tight around his throat. His eyes were pale gray—the same color as his stubble whiskers. The room was in semidarkness. No one had raised the shades yet.