As he made the discovery, Lynne turned to address some remark to her, to which she replied, and evidently made some further remark in return, for he arose, and Chick saw them leave the box together.
For a moment he was in doubt what to do, and then he remembered two things: One was that Nick Carter was somewhere up there near them, and the other was that neither of them had their street apparel with them. Hence they could not be leaving the opera house.
So he stood where he was, watching, and awaiting their return.
“Something is about to develop at last,� was his thought, for the ten days he had passed in trailing Carleton Lynne had been weary ones to him. It was the one element of detective work that he disliked.
In the meantime Nick Carter had gone directly to the Lynne box, had passed inside, and had made the same discovery that Chick did—that there was no one there.
Instead of stepping to the front of it, or withdrawing at once when he found that no one was there, he remained in the background and began to study the other boxes in search of Lynne, just as Chick was doing at that same moment from near the proscenium on the parquet floor.
Lynne was seated in that other box, so that Nick very quickly discovered him, although he could not see the Babbington woman when she stepped partly forward, at the time Chick discovered her.
He did see Lynne half turn to address somebody behind him, saw him leave his seat, and therefore assumed that he was about to leave the box altogether—and then he made two discoveries:
One was like Chick’s—that he did not know who any of the people were who were in the box where he had discovered Lynne; the other, and the more important one, was that in the box adjoining the one he was then in, on the right, were four persons whom he did know very well, indeed.
The discovery of friends so near at hand decided him on a course that had not occurred to him till that instant.