“Did my man go out?” I asked the boy. “There does not seem to be any one there.”
“No, sir, not that I know of. Haven’t you got your key?”
“Yes, I just found it,” I told him. “Has any one been here for me?”
“No, sir.”
“Have you been running the elevator all morning?”
“Yes, sir.”
“All right. Sorry to have bothered you.”
“That’s all right, sir.” The door slammed and the elevator went down again.
I turned back to my front door and fitted the key in the lock.
I was vaguely uneasy, and it was that, perhaps, that caused me to open the door very softly, close it again as softly and stand listening a moment. There was no sound in the place, but after a moment or two I became aware of the fact that there were faint traces of a lingering perfume in the air, a scent highly feminine and vaguely familiar. What on earth could it mean? I wondered. For, so far as I knew, no woman had crossed my threshold since I took the apartment. Perhaps Larry——