"You see, sir, what you are doing!" Judge Marshall stormed.
"I am truly sorry if I have distressed you, Mrs. Marshall," Dundee protested sincerely. "But—" He shrugged and turned again to the husband. "I understand you were Mrs. Selim's landlord.... May I ask how much rent she paid?"
"The house rents for one hundred dollars a month—furnished."
"And did Mrs. Selim pay her rent promptly?" Dundee persisted.
"Since this is the 24th of May, sir, Mrs. Selim's rent for June was not yet due."
Not before poor little Karen could Dundee force himself to ask what, inevitably, would have been his next question—one which could not have been evaded, as the ex-judge had evaded the other two questions: "Is it not true, Judge Marshal, that Nita Leigh Selim paid you no rent at all?" But there were other ways to find out....
"Look here, Dundee!" a brusque voice challenged, and the detective whirled to face Polly Beale. It was like her, he thought with a slight grin, to address him as one man to another....
"Yes, Miss Beale?"
"I'm no fool, and I don't think any of my friends here are either—though two or three of them have acted like it today," the masculine-looking girl stated flatly. "You've made it very plain that any one of us here, except the Sprague man, could have stolen Hugo's gun and silencer.... Has the gun been found?"
"It has not, Miss Beale."