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safe-deposit box under any name, Helm.”
    “Two bank employees in Las Vegas identified the renter as you. And in those days you weren’t a girl it was easy to mistake for anybody else, Mrs. E.”
    Then I was sorry I’d said it, in view of her present appearance. After a moment, she said in a subdued voice, “Those tellers were lying. I don’t know why they were, but they were!”
    “And then there’s clue number five,” I went on ruthlessly, “which you’ve neglected even to mention. The fact that your financial situation wasn’t quite as happy as you’ve tried to make me think. You glossed over all your debts, and your husband’s, very smoothly when you were talking earlier, but it wasn’t quite such a cheerful picture, was it? You’d gone on a spending spree like a couple of kids when you got married, and the payments on the cars and that fancy house and its fancy furnishings were bleeding you dry. You
needed
that fifty-five grand—”
    “We weren’t that much behind!” she protested. “If things got really critical I was going to ask my folks for help whether Roy liked it or not—he didn’t—but that bonus I got would have gone a long way towards satisfying our creditors.” She grimaced. “That’s why we had to celebrate! We were off the hook at last, and it was such a wonderful relief!”
    “But you didn’t know such a big bonus was coming until you got it,” I said. I shook my head. “No, Mrs. E, it was a pretty convincing case. As far as I could make out, the only thing that saved you from a much longer sentence was that you were obviously only a minor character in the spy drama concocted by your husband and this Kravecki woman. They’d used you and discarded you. So in the end the jury recommended a certain degree of clemency, whatever the legal terminology is, and you got off with eight years.”
    She said angrily, “You make professional ruin and being buried in a dungeon for most of a decade sound like a slap on the wrist! Where the hell is that dessert? Fuck it, I don’t want it, I’m all out of the mood. I’m going back to my room.”
    “Not alone,” I said. “Wait until I’ve signed the check, please.”
    Walking her back, I took her as far as the outside door to her unit, and stopped. I said, “Make sure this door is locked when you get inside. Do you have everything you need? What about something to read?”
    “Don’t
do
that!” The anger burst out of her stormily; she’d apparently spent the short walk reviewing her wrongs. “That phony considerateness is going to drive me right up into the rafters! You need me and I’m stuck with you unless… unless I want to be killed, and I guess I really don’t; but you don’t give a damn about my comfort, any more than they did in… in Fort Ames, so for God’s sake forget that greasy solicitous act. Just tell me which way you want me to jump and stand aside. I’m well trained; I’ll jump. Yes, Mr. Helm, I will lock my fucking door. No, Mr. Helm, I don’t need
The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
to entertain me.” She hesitated, and started to speak further, and checked herself.
    “What?” I asked.
    “All right, since you asked, if you’ve got a sleeping pill… It’s going to be a bit strange, in a real bed with a big room all to myself.”
    I said, “Well, I do have some sedatives, but why don’t you try without, first? If you really can’t sleep, knock on the connecting door and I’ll dig one out for you.”
    She said contemptuously, “Nobody’s going to catch you dispensing drugs without a license, huh? I’m sorry I asked. Good night.”
    “Leave the connecting door on your side unlocked, please.”
    She turned to look at me with cold and hopeless eyes. “God, do you think I dare risk it, a lovely desirable slim young thing like me? Good night again!”

5
    I read for a while, a hunting-and-fishing magazine I’d brought along, and wondered idly how the duck hunting had been down along the Rio