When he looked up and saw Vicki, he recognized her immediately. He clasped her hand, almost desperately, she thought.
“Miss Barr!” he whispered. “Do you remember me?”
“Why, certainly I do, Mr. Tytell.” Vicki said, trying to keep her voice calm and normal in tone. The unexpected sight of this old man who had been so much in her thoughts had sent her heart to pounding. So there was some connection between Tytell and Duke and the Granada Restaurant—and possibly with Duke’s talk with Joey, and—her imagination took a wild leap—maybe even with the stolen gold! But she said evenly:
“It’s nice to see you again. You look much better than you did the last time I saw you.” This was a fib—if anything the old violinist looked paler and more worried—but she felt that she had to say something to keep him here until she could put the mixed-up thoughts that were spinning around crazily in her head into some order. “A few days in Florida seem to have done you a lot of good.”
The old man still clung to her hand.
“Miss Barr—I want—I have to talk to you—”
At that moment a voice boomed from the open doorway.
“Old man! Get going!”
Raymond Duke stood in the entryway, glowering under dark eyebrows.
“Yes, sir,” the old man muttered, and he scurried away like a frightened rabbit.