Joe Seagraves leaped out of his chair, an automatic in his experienced hand and menacing the mysterious woman steadily.
But already the allegorical vampire, which the detective had seen reflected in Olga’s piercing eyes and heard in her studied but crisp and stinging words, had spread its skinny wings and flown. Olga was laughing in such sincere, or well-feigned, mockery at his alarm that the dignified detective momentarily felt abashed.
He put his weapon away, nevertheless, only after a searching glance about the very ordinary little room in which the extraordinary woman had received him. He recalled that the last victim of Olga’s brother, mutilated, headless and repellent, had been found in this same neighborhood, if not in this same house.
“Please—please forgive me,” the strange girl was pleading. “You see, I forgot that you are not like—like Brandon. For him there is no forgiveness. He must perish. But we—you and I—why must we be enemies?”
“There’s but one reason, Olga,” replied Seagraves seriously, “and that is a strong one. It is simply the nature of our respective callings.”
“Then I can only be sorry,” she said in a low voice. “Still, my principles are more—what word?—more sacred than your friendship.”
As the woman paused, Seagraves could have taken an oath that he caught the sound of whispering voices through a door standing slightly ajar not three paces from his elbow. Of a sudden, he stepped forward and flung the door wide with a resounding bang.
A gray-walled room, quite empty, was all that rewarded his examination. He turned and found Olga smiling again.
“Did you surprise them?” she inquired sweetly.
“Surprise whom?” demanded the detective.