"And don't _you_ dare leave the
room when you become dummy, if you have the nerve to play again!
Remember, that gun and silencer are still missing!"
"What do you mean?.... You don't think there'll be more----?"
Dundee became instantly contrite before her terror. "I didn't mean it,
honey," he said gently. "I think it is more than likely that the gun is
at the bottom of Mirror Lake. But do take care of yourself, and by that
I mean don't work yourself to death.... Any messages for anyone in New
York?"
Penny's pale face quivered. "If you--happen to run across my father,
which of course you won't, tell him that--Mother would like him to come
home."
At intervals during the sixteen-hour run to New York, Penny's faltering
words returned to haunt the district attorney's special investigator,
although he would have preferred to devote his entire attention to
mapping out the program he intended to follow when he reached the city
which, he fully believed, had been the scene of the first act of the
tragic drama he was bent upon bringing to an equally tragic conclusion.
As soon as he had registered at a hotel near the Pennsylvania Station,
and had shaved and breakfasted, he took from his bag a large envelope
containing the photographs Carraway had made of Penny alive and of Nita
dead, both clad in the royal blue velvet dress.
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