“That is precisely what I shall do.”
“Go ahead, then. It’s up to you. Go where you please—I’m going to bed.[Pg 24]”
CHAPTER VI.
BIRDS OF A FEATHER.
Nick Carter had an object in not revealing his suspicions to Kate Crandall and attempting to force a different story from her. He had seen plainly that such an attempt would be useless, that the woman felt secure in the position she had taken and was prepared to stick to her statements.
Nick believed very few of them, however. He keenly realized, nevertheless, that they ordinarily would appear perfectly plausible, that a woman is always given the benefit of a doubt in such cases, and that her story would be very generally accepted unless he could find positive evidence with which to refute it.
“There is only one way it can be done. That’s by producing the supposed suicide himself,” Nick decided, a bit grimly, after leaving her. “She was expecting my visit and had prepared herself for it. That was as plain as twice two. I scored one point on her, nevertheless, that she was not expecting, and which may prove to be her undoing.
“She certainly was rattled for a moment when she learned that I knew of Dacey’s doings. It forced her to come across with a plausible explanation. Not having anticipated that contingency, however, there may be a weak spot in her arrangements with Sheldon, or Floyd. I’ll try to find it. I’ll hunt up Sheldon before she can communicate with him and put him on his guard. I’ll see whether he will tell precisely the same story. Rear corridor, suite number ninety-four, eh? This must be the way.”
Hastening through several diverging corridors, Nick had entered one leading to the rear of the house. He would not delay to hunt up Chick and Patsy, being anxious to find the subject as quickly as possible, and it was less than five minutes after his parting from Kate Crandall, when Nick arrived at the door of Ralph Sheldon’s apartments. He listened vainly, then knocked. It brought an immediate response.
“Come in!”
Nick entered the parlor of an attractively furnished suite. A table covered with books and newspapers occupied the middle of the room. Amid them stood a library lamp with a large, drooping silk shade of nile-green color, which deflected the light upon, and immediately around the table, leaving other parts of the room in semi-obscurity, causing Nick to think at first sight that it was only dimly lighted.