Lucy looked at the older woman almost guiltily. “Maybe someday I’ll take a ride with you, Vicki,” was the most the girl would say.
Her employer sighed. “You girls probably think me very strict, but I’d like to remind you that I’m half ill, I have important work to do. You know very well, my dear,” she said to Lucy, “that I need you.”
The woman played on the girl’s pity, and Vicki saw that Lucy had not the heart to walk out openly. Also, as Lucy herself had pleaded last night, she obviously needed more time to think. There was nothing now Vicki could do except thank them both and climb into the plane.
Just before she slammed the door, Vicki called:
“I should be back in the San Francisco area by noon. Noon.”
Lucy nodded. She and Mrs. Heath walked a safe distance away from the plane, waving to her. In minutes Vicki took off.
From the air, the hidden house quickly sank out of sight. Oddly enough, she reached Novato Airport, outside San Francisco, precisely at noon.
Who was Mrs. Heath? This was what Vicki wanted to learn now. Who was this woman who had coincidentally appeared at the Hotel Alcott and out of the blue offered Lucy a job? Why was she detaining Lucy?
And who was the “Lucy Rowe” in New York? The girl who had flown into New York on Vicki’s plane, yet had not then worn the silver ring? Suddenly Vicki remembered an incident of that flight with its near-emergency landing—the lost gold charm inscribed Dorothy! It had fallen off someone’s bracelet or out of someone’s purse or pocket. Yet when the stewardess tried to return the valuable trinket, no one had claimed it. Why not? Did Dorothy not wish to identify herself?