"Surely. You wouldn't see them together. Trust Zona. She's too clever for that."
Again I glanced at Kennedy without getting anything from the expression of his face. Was it a clue? Did it mean anything, this immediate appeal by Vina for help from the Freudian interpreter of the Village?
We chatted a few minutes longer, as Kennedy turned away further inquisitorial shafts of the clever reporter. However, somehow I felt that Belle still had something on her mind.
"Then you aren't going to write it, after all?" she asked, eagerly, of me, as Kennedy showed signs of leaving.
"Of course not," I assured. "It wouldn't look right—at this stage of the case—for me to write, do you think? However, that's no reason why The Star shouldn't have the story."
She beamed.
"Very well, then. I'll try to get it," she replied, rather relieved at the thought that whatever clever work she had done to get the tip that had located Vina would not go for naught and would be credited to her.
We bowed ourselves away, leaving Belle the difficult and unenviable job of getting at Mrs. Lathrop again, something I should not have wanted to do, judging by the fiery glance that had been shot at us from behind the slammed door.
"That will be a last straw to Vina Lathrop—when she knows the newspapers have found her out here," I remarked, as we turned toward the street entrance.
Kennedy drew me back and we sidled into the protection of the fronds of a thick clump of palms.