“All regularly and in order, honey,” he said, and kissed her hand. She had hardly heard. She was staring ahead, not thinking, not listening, not seeing, fighting down a growing fear of the man before her, of his sheer physical proximity, of his increasing exuberance.
“I'm mad about you, girl,” he said. “Mad. And now you are going to be mine, until death do us part.”
She shivered and drew away, and he laughed a little. Girls were like that, at such times. They always took a step back for every two steps forward. He let her hand go, and took a careful survey of his face in the mirror of the cab. The swelling had gone down, but that bruise below his eye would last for days. He cursed under his breath.
It was after nine o'clock when one of the Cardew cars stopped not far from the Benedict Apartments, and Willy Cameron got out.
He was quite certain that Louis Akers would know where Lily was, and he anticipated the interview with a sort of grim humor. There might be another fight; certainly Akers would try to get back at him for the night before. But he set his jaw. He would learn where Lily was if he had to choke the knowledge out of that leering devil's thick white throat. His arrival in the foyer of the Benedict Apartments caused more than a ripple of excitement.
“Well, look who's here!” muttered the telephone girl, and watched his approach, with its faint limp, over the top of her desk. Behind, from his cage, the elevator man was staring with avid interest.
“I suppose Mr. Akers is in?” said Willy Cameron, politely. The girl smiled up at him.
“I'll say he ought to be, after last night! What're you going to do now? Kill him?”
In spite of his anxiety there was a faint twinkle in Willy Cameron's eyes.
“No,” he said slowly. “No. I think not. I want to talk to him.”