A sidelong glance discovered the fact that Marian's car had disappeared. Doubtless she had gone in ignorance of this outrage, perhaps thinking him accosted by a chance acquaintance. At all events, she was gone, and there was now nothing to be gained from an attempt to bluster the detective down, but deeper shame and the scorn of all beholders.
"What do you want?" the little man asked in a more pacific tone.
"We can talk better inside, unless"—the detective grinned sardonically—"you want to get out hand-bills about this matter."
"Let me go, then," said P. Sybarite. "I'll follow you."
"You've got a better guess than that: you'll go ahead of me," retorted the other. "And while you're doing it, remember that there's a cop at the Fifth Avenue door, and I've got a handy little emergency ration in my pocket—with my hand on the butt of it."
"Very well," said P. Sybarite, boiling with rage beneath thin ice of submission.
His shoulder free, he moved forward with a high chin and a challenge in his eye for any that dared question his burning face—marched up the steps through ranks that receded as if to escape pollution, and so re-entered the lobby.
"Straight ahead," admonished his captor, falling in at his side. "First door to the right of the elevators."
Shoulder to shoulder, the target for two-score grinning or surprised stares, they strode across the lobby and through the designated door.
It was immediately closed; and the key, turned in the lock, was removed and pocketed by the detective.