“Was there any reason for his leaving?” asked the detective.[{45}]
“None that I’m sure of. There was a young lady boarding here at the same time, and we thought they were rather sweet on each other. She left, too, a few days after him, and I haven’t heard a word of either since.”
“What was the young woman’s name?”
“Let’s see: she was a typewriter, and her name was—was—was Langdon—Estelle Langdon.”
Though Nick had not discovered Gay’s address by his trip to Brooklyn, he had obtained information that was almost equally as valuable, and he went back to New York very much elated.
He returned to his house to meet with a surprise, which was almost dumfounding.
As he entered, his servant said a lady was waiting to see him in the library.
He proceeded straightway to receive his visitor.
She sat in the gloom as Nick entered, and it was not till he had turned up the light that the surprise came.
Even then it required ten or fifteen seconds for him to arrive at his startling discovery.