“We are never harsh, Senator. If she speaks the truth, and all the truth, she need not fear.”
In the hall Clancy met the valet, carrying a laden tray.
“Do you make good coffee, Phillips?” he inquired.
“I try to,” smiled the other.
“Ah, that’s modest—that’s the way real genius speaks. Sorry I can’t sample your brew to-day. So few Englishmen know the first thing about coffee.”
“Nice, friendly little chap,” was Phillips’s opinion of the detective. Senator Meiklejohn’s description of the same person was widely different. When Clancy went out, he, too, rose and stretched his stiff limbs.
“I got rid of that little rat more easily than I expected,” he mused—that is to say, the Senator’s thoughts may be estimated in some such phrase. But he was grievously mistaken in his belief. Clancy was no rat, but a most stubborn terrier when there were rats around.
While Meiklejohn was drinking his coffee the telephone rang. It was Mrs. Tower. She was heartbroken, or professed to be, since no more selfish woman existed in New York.
“Are you coming to see me?” she wailed.