The Case of the Smoking Chimney

Chapter 5

Sophie Pressman, a woman some twenty years younger than her husband, ran up the front steps of the ornately expensive Pressman residence and fitted a latchkey to the front door. She was in high spirits. For no good reason at all, a little quip flashed through her mind: “Some women,” she thought, “feel more secure with a second string to their bow. I like it when I have a second beau on my string.”

She laughed, glanced mechanically at her wristwatch so that she could, if necessary, tell a convincing story.

It was early. The time was only eleven-fifteen.

It was as she was fitting the key to the lock that she heard the grind of the starting mechanism on a car parked almost directly across the street.

She watched the lights flash on, heard the rhythm of the purring motor, watched the car drive away.

Her high spirits oozed out through her quivering legs, as though a leak in her toes had let all the vitality drain from her body. Several things registered now in a crashing crescendo of dismayed realization — little isolated things which at the time hadn’t meant a thing: the lone man who had been seated at the next table; the car that had locked bumpers with hers; the man in the grey overcoat—

She felt suddenly cold. She turned back toward the door. The icy tips of her fingers fumbled with the latchkey.