So I got out the material.
Mary’s neatly typed pages, my own illegible jottings, and those ruled notebooks in which Mary had taken down my dictation.
Their queer symbols meant nothing to me; they were as unfathomable as the girl herself.
And it occurred to me, sitting there, that these books written in her hand, were all that remained to any of us of Mary Martin.
She had come, played her strange part, and departed.
A queer girl, with her poses, her defiant beauty, and her faculty of being around where there was trouble; or of carrying it with her. Who could say which?
I turned over the pages, but although here and there I found notes in longhand—“Send to Laura for daguerreotypes” I recall was one of them, and another
“Have Joseph find out about terrapin for dinner party”—there was nothing of any value until I reached what appeared to be the latest book.
Not on the pages, but inside the cover in ink, she had written:
“New number, East 16.”
Now I happen to have a peculiar faculty, one born of necessity, for I frequently forget my glasses. I have a flair for remembering telephone numbers.
And this number ran familiarly in my mind.
It did not come at once.
I sat back and closed my eyes, and at last it came.
I saw Dick Carter sitting at my desk, with Judy beside him, and he was calling East 16.
Then I knew.
Dick had called East 16 the night he was arranging for Judy and myself to visit Lily Sanderson.
New number, East 16.
That meant that there had been another number, an old one, and that Mary had known it.
But it seemed to me that it meant much more; that Mary had known some one in that house, possibly Florence Gunther herself.
What that would explain I did not trouble to contemplate.
It seemed to me that I must see Lily Sanderson again, see if she had met Mary about the house or with Florence, and that then we must find Mary herself.
Find her and make her talk.
When I called East 16, however, Miss Sanderson was at work.
And then that afternoon, as though she had caught my mental message, Lily Sanderson herself came to see me.
It was fortunate that Joseph was taking his afternoon out, or he might not have admitted her.
He had his own methods of discriminating between people making social calls and people who came for purposes of their own.
Indeed, I have seen him; the swift glance at car or taxicab, the rapid appraisal, gloves, shoes, garments.
And then the quick decision.
“Madam is not at home.”
Or a widening of the door, a bow; taking the cards, rather in the grand manner, and through it all a suggestion—merely a suggestion—of welcome.
But as it is Clara’s rule to admit all comers Lily Sanderson gained access without trouble, and I found her in the drawing room, rather stiff and formal.
“I hope you don’t mind my coming,” she said.
“I just had a feeling I had to see you.”
“I am glad you came.
Would you like a cup of tea?”
“If it isn’t too much trouble.
I came from the store, and I’ve had a hard day.
I didn’t take time to go home and change.”
She watched with interest while I rang for Clara and ordered tea, and the long drawing room seemed to fascinate her.
“Such a lovely place,” she said.
“I was looking at your bushes, as I came in.
And this room!
That’s a lovely cabinet over there.”
“It is lovely,” I agreed.
“It is very old.”
And as I sat there looking at this big blue-eyed woman with her faint limp, her almost childlike assumption of sophistication, her queer clothes, I felt that I liked her.
Liked her and trusted her.
She did not come immediately to the reason for her visit, and I did not urge her.
It was after the tea had come and Clara had gone that she finally brought up the subject.