“Good-bye, Ray,” she said. “Perhaps one day you will come back to us. Please God this madness will end soon. Oh, Ray, it isn’t true about the Frogs, is it? You aren’t with those people?”
His laugh reassured her for the moment.
“Of course I’m not—it’s about as true as the yarn that Lola is married! Gordon was trying to make a sensation; that’s the worst of these third-rate detectives, they live on sensation.”
She nodded to Lola as he escorted her to the lift. Lew Brady watched her with hungry eyes.
“What did he mean, Lola?” asked Brady as the door closed behind the two. “That fellow knows something! There’s a mark against my name in the Frog-book! That sounds bad to me. Lola, I’m finished with these Frogs! They’re getting on my nerves.”
“You’re a fool,” she said calmly. “Gordon has got just the effect he wanted—he has scared you!”
“Scared?” he answered savagely. “Nothing scares me. You’re not scared because you’ve no imagination. I’m . . . not scared, but worried, because I’m beginning to see that the Frogs are bigger than I dreamt. They killed that Scotsman Maclean the other day, and they’re not going to think twice about settling with me. I’ve talked to these Frogs, Lola—they’d do anything from murder upwards. They look on the Frog as a god—he’s a religion with them! A question-mark against my name! I believe it too—I’ve talked flip about ’em, and they won’t forgive that——”
“Hush!” she warned him in a low voice as the door handle turned and Ray came back.
“Phew!” he said. “Thank God she’s gone! What a morning! Frogs—Frogs—Frogs! The poor fool!”
Lola opened a small jewelled case and took out a cigarette and lit it, extinguishing the match with a snick of her fingers. Then she turned her beautiful eyes upon Ray.