Helga Lund had mysteriously disappeared.
CHAPTER XXIX.
HELGA IS AMONG THE MISSING.
Doctor Lightfoot, the actress’ physician, was greatly excited and had just telephoned to Nick’s house, after the detective had left for the hotel.
The doctor had arrived there about half an hour before, for his regular morning visit. To his consternation he had found the night nurse stretched out on Helga Lund’s bed, unconscious, and clad only in her undergarments.
The actress was nowhere to be found.
The anxious Lightfoot was of very different caliber from the prison physician at Sing Sing. He had recognized the nurse’s symptoms at once, and knew that she had been hypnotized.
He set to work at once to revive her and succeeded in doing so, after some little delay. As soon as she was in a condition to question, he pressed her for all the details she could give.
They were meager enough, but sufficiently disquieting. According to her story, a man whom she had supposed to be Lightfoot himself had gained entrance to the suite between nine and ten o’clock at night.
He had sent up Doctor Lightfoot’s name, and his appearance, when she saw him, had coincided with that of the attending physician. He had acted rather strangely, to be sure, and the nurse had been surprised at his presence at that hour, owing to the fact that Lightfoot had already made his two regular calls that day.
Before her surprise had had time to become full-fledged suspicion, however, the intruder had fixed her commandingly with his eyes, and she had found herself powerless to resist the weakness of will which had frightened her.