Presently there was a ring. At a word from Loveman, the evilly handsome young man—“Slim” Harrison, Clifford knew him to be, a crack driver of racing-cars, and a proficient in all the evils of Broadway—rose and left the drawing-room and passed forward through the hallway. Clifford heard him open the front door, and remark courteously: “Come right in—Mr. Clifford is waiting for you.”
Footsteps—two pairs of them—returned down the hallway, and then Clifford saw Slim Harrison swing apart the other pair of tapestries, saying, “They’re waiting for you in here.” And then stepping into the brilliant light of the great dining-room he saw Mary Regan.
Two paces within the doorway she suddenly halted. “Where’s Mr. Clifford and Lieutenant Kelly?” she exclaimed. Clifford saw her stiffen and sharply eye the group at the table. Then her gaze fixed upon Jack, and she said quietly enough: “Jack—I’ve come to take you home.”
Jack swayed uncertainly to his feet, his face sagging with amazement. “Why—why—Mary—”
But Clifford heard nothing of the next few sentences. That instant he understood it all—or thought he did. He knew now the substance of Loveman’s telephone message. He saw now the magnitude of this present situation just before him. Loveman’s great scheme—the whole of it—had been planned and drawn together, and timed to take place within that hour. Clifford did not yet prevision the exact character of the further developments—but what better place for it than Le Bain’s house, from which no sound issued, which kept secret all it saw and heard?
Swiftly, silently, Clifford slipped out into the hallway, into the telephone closet, and closed the sound-proof door. He got the Knickerbocker Hotel on the wire, and a few minutes later he was snapping out sentences to Uncle George.
“What, Jimmie hasn’t showed up yet!... For God’s sake, get hold of him somehow—tell him to come right over to Le Bain’s house—you know the number—with three or four of his men. Something big is going to break!—big!—you get me? And tell him to round up Mr. Morton on the way and see that he comes here after his son. I’ll put the key under the doormat, so he can get in without disturbing any one. I want the thing to come to a head before we act.”
Noiselessly Clifford crept out and hid the key. Then noiselessly he slipped back to his post at the curtains in the drawing-room.
CHAPTER XXX
WHEN WOMEN NEVER TALK
Mary Regan had drawn nearer the table, and pale, her figure tense, she was gazing fixedly at Jack—waiting. Jack was gazing back sheepishly, stubbornly,—and Nina Cordova and Nan Burdette and Hilton were staring at Mary in insolent triumph. Little Loveman’s face was expressionless. Behind her, near the doorway, ready to move swiftly, if there was need, stood Slim Harrison.