It was a cheap but respectable boarding house, suited to the means of a girl who was compelled to make her living standing behind the counter of a large dry-goods store.
The landlady presently entered, beaming all over.
Seeing in the stranger a prospective new boarder she greeted him with her very sweetest smile of welcome.
Nick Carter did not mean to leave her under the impression that he was seeking board.
Quickly disabusing her mind of this idea, he said:
“I came to see Miss Doane on a matter of business, but am informed that she is not in.”
This was the case, although not so reported by the servant.
He went on:
“I asked to see you, judging that perhaps you could tell me what I want to know and thus save me a second visit here.”
Like most landladies, this one had a weakness for talking, and the detective had taken her on a weak point. To be able to give some information, and be of importance in somebody’s eyes, if even for a few minutes, was sufficient to mollify the woman in face of the disappearance of prospective profits and less troublesome butchers and bakers.