Brainard took Peters to one side, and said to him in a low voice:
“You remember that noise you heard up there in the office? It came from the girl—the stenographer. She got fresh while you were out, and I had to lock her up in the safe to keep her quiet. I think there is enough air to last her some time yet; but her last squeal was rather faint. Suppose you run up and let her out!”
Peters, with a scared look on his face, made one bound for the stairs.
“Hold on, man!” Brainard shouted after him. “You don’t know the combination. Here it is!”
He searched in his pockets for the slip of paper on which he had copied the figures, but in the dark he could not find it.
“This ain’t any automobile,” the reporter suggested. “You’d better put off your good-bys until the next time!”
“Try to remember what I say,” Brainard said to the frightened Peters, and began repeating the combination from memory. “I’m pretty sure that’s right. Say it over! There, again!”
The shaking man repeated the figures three or four times.
“Good! Keep saying it over to yourself as you go upstairs, and I’ll telephone the office from the ferry and see if you’ve got her out.”