Rand gave them a general good-afternoon, then turned to Gladys.  “I had a talk with Goode, yesterday afternoon,” he said.  “I have his authorization to handle all the details.  As soon as I get an itemized list, I’ll circularize dealers and other possible buyers and ask for offers.”

“Is that all?” Nelda demanded angrily of Gladys.  “Why Fred’s done all that already!”

“Is that correct, Mrs. Fleming?” Rand asked, for the record.

“I told you, yesterday, what’s been done,” Gladys replied.  “Fred has talked to one dealer, Arnold Rivers.  There has been no inventory of any sort made.”

“Mr. Rivers is offering us ten thousand dollars,” Nelda retorted.  “I don’t see why you had to bring this Colonel What’s-his-name into it, at all.  You think he can get us a better offer?  If you do, you’re crazy!”

“Ten thousand dollars, for a collection that ought to sell for five times that, in Macy’s basement!” Geraldine hooted.  “How much is Rivers slipping Fred, on the side?”

“Oh, go back to your bottle!” Nelda cried.  “You’re too drunk to know what you’re talking about!”

“They tell me Colonel Rand is a detective, too,” Geraldine continued.  “Maybe he can find out why Fred never talked to Stephen Gresham, or Carl Gwinnett, or anybody else except this Rivers.  How much is Fred getting out of Rivers, anyhow?”

“My God, Geraldine, shut up!” Nelda howled.  Then she decided to take direct notice of Rand’s presence.  “Colonel Rand, I’m sorry to say that, in her present condition, my sister doesn’t know what she’s saying.  It’s bad enough for my stepmother to bring an outsider into what’s obviously a family matter, but when my sister begins making these ridiculous accusations ...”

“What’s ridiculous about them?” Geraldine demanded, dumping another two ounces of whiskey into her glass and freshening it with the siphon.  “I think Rivers’s offering ten thousand dollars for the collection, and Fred’s thinking we’d accept it, are the only ridiculous things about it.”

“That’s rather what I told Rivers, this afternoon,” Rand put in.  “He seemed a bit upset about my being brought into this, too, but he finally admitted that he was willing to pay up to twenty-five thousand dollars for the collection, and if he buys it, that’s exactly what it’s going to cost him.”

“What?” Nelda fairly screamed.  Her hands opened and closed spasmodically:  she was using a dark-red nail-tint that made Rand think of blood-dripping talons.

“Mr. Arnold Rivers told me, this afternoon, and I quote:  I’m willing to pay up to twenty-five thousand dollars for that collection, unquote,” Rand said.  “And I can tell you now that twenty-five thousand dollars is just what he will pay for it, unless I can find somebody who’s willing to pay more, which is not at all improbable.”

“H’ray!” Geraldine waved her glass and toasted Rand with it.  “And twenty-five G ain’t hay, brother!”