Grace glanced in the direction indicated. A somewhat dingy-looking apartment house stood upon the corner; its lower floor occupied by a florist's shop. The entrance was on 96th Street. Leaving Leary on the opposite corner, she crossed the street and entered the vestibule of the building.
The mail boxes on either side contained five names each, indicating that there were ten apartments in the building. Grace looked over the addresses in them carefully, but none of them meant anything to her. None was at all familiar. The name on the torn card had been Ford, but there was no such name among those before her. How was she to tell to which apartment the woman had gone? The situation presented an interesting problem.
Making a list of the names upon a visiting card, Grace determined to try them each in turn. She had observed that the building contained no elevator. She rang one of the bells, and almost at once the clicking of the catch told her that the front door was unlocked. She turned the knob and entered.
The occupants of the two ground floor apartments were named Weinberg and Scully, respectively. Grace tried both doors in succession, asking for Mrs. Weinberg at the one, and for Mrs. Scully at the other. In each case the woman who appeared bore no resemblance to the one she sought, and she was obliged to pretend that she had made a mistake. The doors were at once closed in her face.
It was not until she reached the fourth floor that success rewarded her efforts. The left-hand apartment on this floor had as its tenant a Miss Norman. To Grace's delight, she had scarcely rung the bell, when the woman she had been following appeared, wearing a flowered kimono.
She looked at Grace keenly, suspiciously, but with no sign of recognition. Whether she did not know her, or merely pretended not to do so, Grace was unable to say. After all, it made little difference. Having now located the woman, it was only necessary to get away, upon some pretense or other, and telephone to Richard. She felt highly elated.
"What do you want?" the woman asked, quickly.
"Are you Miss Norman?"
"I am."
"Miss Norman, I have come to try to interest you in the work we are doing on behalf of the suffering people of Poland. The war, as you know——" Grace reeled off this appeal, feeling quite certain that the woman would reject it at once, and thus leave her free to go. But as it turned out, Miss Norman did nothing of the sort.