"Every man who cuts grass isn't a gardener, Miss Innes, and just now it is our policy to believe every person around here a rascal until he proves to be the other thing."
Warner came up with the car then, and the conversation stopped.
As he helped me in, however, the detective said something further.
"Not a word or sign to Alex, if he comes back," he said cautiously.
I went first to Doctor Walker's.
I was tired of beating about the bush, and I felt that the key to Halsey's disappearance was here at Casanova, in spite of Mr. Jamieson's theories.
The doctor was in.
He came at once to the door of his consulting-room, and there was no mask of cordiality in his manner.
"Please come in," he said curtly.
"I shall stay here, I think, doctor."
I did not like his face or his manner; there was a subtle change in both.
He had thrown off the air of friendliness, and I thought, too, that he looked anxious and haggard.
"Doctor Walker," I said,
"I have come to you to ask some questions. I hope you will answer them.
As you know, my nephew has not yet been found."
"So I understand," stiffly.
"I believe, if you would, you could help us, and that leads to one of my questions.
Will you tell me what was the nature of the conversation you held with him the night he was attacked and carried off?"
"Attacked!
Carried off!" he said, with pretended surprise.
"Really, Miss Innes, don't you think you exaggerate?
I understand it is not the first time Mr. Innes has—disappeared."
"You are quibbling, doctor.
This is a matter of life and death.
Will you answer my question?"
"Certainly.
He said his nerves were bad, and I gave him a prescription for them.
I am violating professional ethics when I tell you even as much as that."
I could not tell him he lied.
I think I looked it.
But I hazarded a random shot.
"I thought perhaps," I said, watching him narrowly, "that it might be about—Nina Carrington."
For a moment I thought he was going to strike me.
He grew livid, and a small crooked blood-vessel in his temple swelled and throbbed curiously.
Then he forced a short laugh.
"Who is Nina Carrington?" he asked.
"I am about to discover that," I replied, and he was quiet at once.
It was not difficult to divine that he feared Nina Carrington a good deal more than he did the devil.
Our leave-taking was brief; in fact, we merely stared at each other over the waiting-room table, with its litter of year-old magazines. Then I turned and went out.
"To Richfield," I told Warner, and on the way I thought, and thought hard.
"Nina Carrington, Nina Carrington," the roar and rush of the wheels seemed to sing the words.
"Nina Carrington, N. C."
And I then knew, knew as surely as if I had seen the whole thing.
There had been an N.
C. on the suit-case belonging to the woman with the pitted face.
How simple it all seemed.
Mattie Bliss had been Nina Carrington.
It was she Warner had heard in the library.
It was something she had told Halsey that had taken him frantically to Doctor Walker's office, and from there perhaps to his death.
If we could find the woman, we might find what had become of Halsey.