“Wait a minute. What did she say on the telephone?”
“Nothing,” answered Cort. “I couldn’t get what it was about. She said, ‘Yes. Yes. Oh, God!’ hung up and was out of here before anybody knew what had happened.”
De Medici dropped the man’s arm and hurried from the theater. In the dark alley he paused and stared nervously about him. The darkness frightened him. Strange glints were in his eyes. He ran his long fingers over his forehead and shuddered. Something had happened!
He sat thinking as the cab hurried him to the Ballau apartment.... “She was crying this morning after our ride ... there was something curious about Ballau ... he wanted to get rid of me....”
A sense of relief came to him when the cab drew up before the ornate apartment building in Park Avenue. As he stepped out he noticed quickly that the scene was calm, that inside the marble lobby the stiff figure of the doorman stood—a symbol of quietude and elegance.
Entering the building, he nodded to the man at the door and walked quickly to the elevator at the rear of the vestibule. As he approached, the filigreed door of the self-operating elevator cage clicked and was thrown open.
Florence Ballau, her eyes wide with horror, staggered out. She stood looking wildly till her eyes encountered De Medici. She stumbled toward him with a shriek.
“Father ... father,” her voice filled the marble interior. “Murdered!”
De Medici held the girl in his arms. An inexplicable calm had taken possession of him. He regarded the scene aloofly—the hysterical girl, the suddenly galvanized doorman, the ornamental brass work of the marble vestibule.
“Something has happened,” he said quietly to the man as he came running forward. “Call the police. Send them up to Mr. Ballau’s apartment.”