The large surgical scar was in the form of a perfect reversed letter S.
IV
So much had happened to Carlson that night that his mental receiving instrument was somewhat dulled, and did not immediately register the momentous significance of what his eyes now saw. That curious scar—that reversed S—symbol of the great Senn. Great God! Now he remembered. The only case on record in which that Senn S-incision had been made for appendicitis was the case of Ina Holden.
He heard the masked man muttering in angry impatience, and then his brain began to work again. The Holden child. Edwards had spoken of her as “little Ina.”
Though the papers had been full of accounts of the Holden kidnapping case for the last five days, he, Carlson, had read nothing but the headings, and his impression from them and from Edwards’ talk was that Ina was a small girl, quite a child. And yet this was a woman, or a well-grown girl of 16 or 17 at the least. He looked up at her bandaged face.
“How long ago did you have this operation?”
“I—when I was a child.”
“How long ago was that?”
“About eight or nine years ago.”