“You think I’m crazy, don’t you?” The girl’s voice was almost out of control.

“We’re all slightly haywire at times.”

“I don’t mean that way. I mean really crazy. Oh, I know I am. I can feel it. It gets worse every day.”

Shayne nodded agreement, and mashed out his cigarette in a tray on the small table between them. “Haven’t you come to the wrong place? Sounds to me as though you need an alienist instead of a detective.”

“No, no!” She placed the palms of her hands flat on the table and leaned sharply forward. Full red lips were drawn away from white teeth, and her eyes were clouded with fear. “They tell me I’m going crazy. Sometimes I think they’re trying to drive me crazy. They say I may try to kill Mother. They’re making me believe it. I won’t let myself believe it but then I do. With Mother coming this afternoon-” Her voice trailed off to silence.

Shayne lit another cigarette and pushed his pack toward her. She didn’t see it. She was staring upward into his face.

“You got to help me. You’ve got to.”

“All right,” agreed Shayne soothingly. “I’ll help you. But I’m no good at guessing games.”

She said, “It’s-it’s-I can’t bear to talk about it. It’s too awful. I just can’t.”

Michael Shayne slowly unlimbered himself and stood up. He had a tall angular body that concealed a lot of solid weight, and his freckled cheeks were thin to gauntness. His rumpled hair was violently red, giving him a little-boy look curiously in contrast with the harshness of his features. When he smiled, the harshness went out of his face and he didn’t look at all like a hard-boiled private detective who had come to the top the tough way.

He smiled down at Phyllis Brighton, turned away from her, and crossed the living-room of his apartment to an open east window which let in the afternoon breeze from Biscayne Bay. Better, he figured, to give her a chance to spill the whole thing. It didn’t look like a real case, but he wanted to give her a chance.