WOMAN SOUGHT IN BEINER MYSTERY
Her eyes closed. She leaned back in her chair. The full meaning of the head-line, its terrific import, seeped slowly into her consciousness. She knew that any scandal involving a woman is, from a newspaper standpoint, worth treble one without her. One needs to be no analyst to discover this—the fact presents itself too patently in every page of every newspaper. She knew, too, that newspapers relinquish spicy stories regretfully.
Her eyes opened slowly. It was with a physical effort that she lifted the paper in order that she might read. The story was brief. It merely stated that the Courier had learned, through authentic sources, that the district attorney's office suspected that a woman had killed Beiner, and that it was running down the clues that had aroused its suspicions.
But it was a bold-face paragraph, set to the left of the main article, that drove the color from her cheeks. It was an editorial, transplanted, for greater effect, to the first page. Clancy read it through.
FIND THE WOMAN
Another murder engages the attention of police, the press, and the public. The Courier, as set forth in another column, has learned that the authorities possess evidence justifying the arrest of a woman as the Beiner murderess. How long must the people of the greatest city in the world feel that their Police Department is incompetent? It has been New York's proudest boast that its police are the most efficient in the world. That boast is flat and stale now. Too many crimes of violence have been unsolved during the past six months. Too many criminals wander at large. How long must this continue?
It was, quite obviously, a partisan political appeal to the prejudices of the Courier's readers. But Clancy did not care about that. The fact of publication, not its reason, interested her. She looked dully up at the judge.
"How did they find out?" she asked.
The judge shrugged.
"That's what Vandervent is trying to find out now. He's quizzing his staff this minute. He meant to be up here this evening. He was to dine with us. He just telephoned. Some one will be 'broken' for giving the paper the tip. But—that doesn't help us, does it?"