“That she wasn’t real, I guess. I’m beginning to be afraid of it myself,” Flo admitted. “The doorman said nobody left the show early, and nobody left by the stage entrance except a few people who were in the cast.”
“Francine Dow was one of them, wasn’t she? What about her aunt?” asked Judy. “You said she left with her.”
“That’s right. I forgot about her,” Irene admitted. “She left by the stage entrance, too. I know what you’re thinking, Judy, but she was an old lady. Well, anyway, middle-aged. She was a plump, motherly looking woman with gray hair. I noticed her earlier in the studio audience.”
“When Clarissa was still there?”
“Yes, it was before the show went on the air. I guess Francine had planned to meet her aunt afterwards and go home with her. They probably left in a hurry because Francine wasn’t feeling well and wanted to avoid meeting people. I heard her aunt say something about a week end in the country. We could find out where they went and question them, I suppose, but I’m sure it wouldn’t do any good.”
“It might,” Judy said hopefully. “They might have seen Clarissa.”
“I doubt it,” Pauline replied. “If she deliberately ran off with the money we lent her, she would have made sure she wasn’t seen. Obviously, that’s what happened.”
It did seem obvious.
“We never should have trusted her in the first place,” Pauline went on. “That story she told must have been part of her plan to trick us and make us sorry for her. It isn’t possible for a girl to look in a mirror and see no reflection. Things like that only happen in ghost stories.”
“This is a ghost story,” Flo said in an awed tone, “only it’s happening to us. Maybe she wasn’t real. She didn’t show—”