From the corner in which we were sitting we could see through an open window the porte-cochère beside the hotel at which guests were arriving and departing.
“Look!” pointed out Riley. “There’s Shelby Maddox now.”
His motor had purred up silently around the corner of the road that led about the shore, and as he pulled up before the door the omnipresent Mito appeared from nowhere. Shelby crawled out from under the steering-wheel and turned the car over to Mito to run around to the hotel garage. For a moment he stood talking to the Jap, giving him some parting instructions, when another car tooted its horn and came up to the steps. It was the Walcott car. Evidently they had not come directly from the station, but had taken a little ride along the shore to get the stuffy air of the railroad train out of Johnson Walcott’s lungs.
It was just the opportunity Shelby wanted. He quickly waved to Mito to pull away and turned to the new arrival, opening the rear door before the officious starter could get to it, and handing out Winifred Walcott most attentively—so much so that he forgot all about his own sister and Johnson Walcott.
He and Winifred stood talking, evidently about Shelby’s own departing roadster, for they were looking after Mito as he shot up the road to the garage.
“Do you guess what they are talking about?” queried Kennedy to me. “I would be willing to wager that I can reproduce at least a part of the conversation. As they watched the speedster get away she spoke first, and he nodded his head in the negative as he replied. She spoke again, and he nodded in the affirmative—and smiled.”
“What was it?” I asked.
“Remember Paquita? So does Winifred. First she asked Shelby if his roadster was hard to drive—or something of the sort. He said it was not. Then she asked whether he would show her some of the fine points of driving it—I am sure that Winifred Walcott can drive, for she looks like that sort of a girl. Shelby fairly leaped ahead like his motor does when he feeds it gas. That was easy long-distance eavesdropping.”
“What are they talking about now?” I demanded, rather spoofing him than serious, for Shelby was standing on the steps yet, quite oblivious to everything about him except Winifred.
“I don’t know,” he confessed, “but I can predict that something will happen in thirty seconds. Look up the road.”