Pride whistled. Then he got up. “I’ll go now and see who’s in the house still. I may be able to find out something.” And he hurried out of the room.
“Don’t run into a trap there,” I called after him. And then I turned away and fell to pacing the floor, back and forth, back and forth, to get a grip on myself. But it was a long time before I could even make an attempt to think clearly and plan ahead.
It was a weary wait. I had lunch in my room and in the afternoon tried to sleep a little. But it was no go; and the afternoon was the longest I have ever spent. It was well after dark when Pride came back. He stood in the doorway for a moment, staring at me.
“They got them,” he said bluntly, “both of them.” He came over and laid his hand on my shoulder. “The house is empty and Mrs. Fawcette appears to have skipped. She has told the papers that she is ‘out of town.’ I traced the taxi and found that it must have been in the hire of the gang. Probably one of their men driving it. For a cop on night duty reported a disturbance and several shots in the Park last night, between one and two o’clock. And afterwards a taxi shot past him, going like the wind. He got the number, traced it and found that no such license had been issued. It was a black car with an unusually long body.”
“That’s the one,” I answered wearily. I stared at him. “What on earth shall we do now?”
He swung a chair briskly into place in front of my table and sat down. “Draw up a chair, light a smoke and I’ll tell you,” he answered. “For there’s only one thing, that I can see, left to do.” He held out his hand. “And cheer up, old man. This is the darkest hour. And that always comes before the dawn, you know.”
Chapter XVI.
The Final Attempt
I fumbled for a cigar, keeping my head down so that he would not see my face, for I was pretty close to the breaking-point. I sat down opposite him and waited, shading my face with my hand and trying to fix my thoughts on what he was about to say. It was hard to do even that.
“Listen, Clayton,” he said, after a moment or two. “I went to see what I could find about Miss Van Cleef this afternoon, because you were so vitally interested. But I had little hope of learning anything. This gang is much too cute to leave any traces behind them.
“But in the meantime I have other news for you. I have received powers from Washington that no police officer, whatever his other affiliations or sympathies, would dare ignore or disobey.