"Yes; that's all right," said the other voice. "But suppose that I tell 'em that you had a key to Morris Beiner's office, hey? Suppose I tell 'em that, hey?"
Something seemed to rise from Clancy's chest right up through her throat and into her mouth. Once again on tiptoe, wanting to scream, yet determined to keep silent, she edged her way to the dining-room door. Don Carey had made no answer to this last speech of his visitor. Peering through the door, Clancy knew why. He was lying back in a chair, his mouth wide open, his eyes equally wide with fright. And the man at whom he stared was the man who had been with Spofford yesterday, the elevator-man from the Heberworth Building!
[XXVI]
Hand pressed against her bosom, Clancy stared into the dining-room. She could not breathe as she waited for Carey's reply to his visitor's charge. So Don Carey had possessed a key to the office of Morris Beiner! The theatrical man had been locked in his office when Clancy had made her escape from the room by way of the window. The door had not been forced. And Don Carey had possessed a key!
For a moment, she thought, with pity, of the woman up-stairs, the woman who had befriended her, whose life had been shadowed by her husband. But only for a moment. She herself was wanted for this murder; her eyes were hard as she stared into the room.
Carey's fingers reached out aimlessly. They fastened finally upon a half-drained glass.
