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as loud as the bang of a twelve-bore shot-gun, and if you weren't watching for it, you jumped out of your skin when she let it off. A woman I wouldn't want to live with, but a good-hearted soul, generous with her money, and a lot more interested in nervous, frail little blondes than a big husky like me.

    The timid bunny-faced girl who showed me into Mrs. Bendix's cream and green office edged away from me as if I were full of bad intentions, and gave Mrs. Bendix a coy little smile that could have meant something or nothing depending on the state of your mind.

    "Come on in, Vic," Mrs. Bendix boomed from across a paper-littered desk. "Sit down. Haven't seen you in days. What have you been doing with yourself?"

    I sat down and grinned at her.

    "This and that," I told her. "Keeping the wolf from the door. I've looked in for a little help, Martha. Done any business with the Crosbys?"

    "Not for a long time." She leaned down and hoisted up a bottle of Scotch, two glasses and half a dozen coffee beans. "Make it snappy," she went on. "I don't want to shock Mary. She doesn't approve of drinking in office hours."

    "That Mary with the rabbit teeth?"

    "Never mind about her teeth. She's not going to bite you with them." She handed me a glass half full of Scotch and three of the coffee beans. "You mean the Crosbys on Foothill Boulevard?"

    I said I meant the Crosbys on Foothill Boulevard.

    "I did a job for them once, but not since. That was about six years ago. I fixed the whole of their staff then. Since Janet Crosby died they cleared out the old crowd and put in a new lot. They didn't come to me for the new lot."

    I sampled the Scotch. It was smooth and silky, and had plenty of authority.
    "You mean they sacked everybody?"

    "That's what I'm telling you."

    "What happened to them?"

    "I fixed them up elsewhere."

    I chewed this over.

    "Look, Martha, between you and me and the coffee beans, I'm trying to get the low-down on Janet's death. I've had a tip, and it might or might not be worth working on. I'm not entirely sold on the idea she died of heart failure. I'd like to talk it over with some of the old staff. They may have seen something. The butler, for instance. Who was he?"

    "John Stevens," Mrs. Bendix said after a moment's thought. She finished her drink, tossed three beans into her mouth, put her glass and the Scotch out of sight and dug her thumb into a bell-push on her desk. The bunny-faced girl crept in.

    "Where's John Stevens working now, honey?"

    The bunny-faced girl said she would find out. After a couple of minutes she came back and said Stevens worked for Gregory Wainwright, Hillside, Jefferson Avenue.

    "How about Janet's personal maid? Where's she now?" I asked.

    Mrs. Bendix waved the bunny-faced girl away. When she had gone, she said, "That bitch? She's not working any more, and I wouldn't give her a job if she came to me on bended knees."

    "What's the matter with her?" I asked, hopefully pushing my empty glass forward. "Let's be matey, Martha. One drink is no use to big, strong boys like you and me."

    Mrs. Bendix sniggered, hoisted up the bottle again and poured.

    "What's the matter with her?" I repeated, when we had saluted each other.

    "She's no good," Mrs. Bendix said, and scowled. "Just a goddamn lazy bum."

    "We haven't got our lines crossed, have we? I'm talking about Janet Crosby's personal maid."

    "So am I," Mrs. Bendix said, and fed three more coffee beans into her mouth. "Eudora Drew. That's her name. She's gone haywire. I wanted a good personal maid for Mrs. Randolph Playfair. I took the trouble to contact Drew to tell her I could fix her up. She told me to jump in a cesspit. That's a nice way to talk, isn't it? She said she wasn't ever going to do any more work, and if one cesspit wouldn't hold me anyone would dig me another if I told them what it was for." Mrs. Bendix brooded darkly at the insult. "At one time I thought she was a good, smart girl. Just shows you can't trust them further