Then she turned and hurried across the room, with every movement of her lithe and supple figure as quick and graceful as those of a leopard. With a quick sweep of her arm, she threw aside the curtain of a door of a small closet, into which she entered, to seize the receiver from a telephone attached to the wall.
“Give me 22 ring 2, Brookline!” she commanded.
It was the number of the telephone in the house of Mr. Amos Badger.
CHAPTER VIII.
UNDER THE SURFACE.
As Nick Carter had rightly conjectured, when weighing the mystifying knowledge displayed by Madame Victoria, there was something under the surface.
What the something was, moreover, plainly appeared in what followed the visit of Nick to the suburban house of Mr. Amos Badger.
The moment the detective departed, in company with Grady, there came over both Badger and his wife a very decided change.
With an ugly gleam in his dark eyes, which were still following the runabout as it sped down the long driveway, Badger ripped off the red flannel bandages from around his neck, exclaiming vehemently: