The Secret in the Old Attic by Carolyn Keene Page B

man,” Bess pleaded.
    Determined not to go home without finding out something, Nancy paused again. Then she walked down the corridor where she suspected Mr. Jenner’s private office was located. Through an open transom came voices.
    “Ben, we’re in a tight spot,” they heard the music publisher say. “That Drew girl has just left here. Maybe she has found some proof.”
    “Impossible!” replied the other voice.
    “Just the same, it may be well to call off your scheduled public appearances and lie low for a while. We can’t take chances.”
    Nancy and her friends strained to hear more. The voices dropped, however, and the girls could not make out another word.
    “Mr. Jenner must be talking to Ben Banks!” Nancy whispered excitedly. “Oh, I wish we could learn more about that fellow!”
    “Maybe we can,” George said in her friend’s ear. “Why not stay around here until he comes out of the office?”
    “And then follow him!” Nancy added. “You girls wait outside the building. I’ll watch this door.”
    Bess and George immediately tiptoed down the hallway and vanished. Nancy looked about for a hiding place. The best one she could find was a little niche near the stairway.
    Twenty minutes elapsed. At the end of that time the door of Mr. Jenner’s office opened. Out stepped a lean, long-haired man of early middle age. He had a roll of music under his arm. Nancy was convinced that he must be Ben Banks.
    Waiting until he had rounded the corner, she followed him. At the street entrance she spotted Bess and George standing in a shadowy doorway. With a nod of her head she signaled to them.
    The cousins immediately started off in pursuit of Ben Banks. Nancy waited until she was certain her movements would not arouse the songwriter’s suspicions. Then she hastened after her friends and caught up with them.
    The man walked rapidly. Of one thing Nancy was certain: this thin man was not the strange intruder at the March homestead. The prowler was heavy-set.
    Without once glancing back, Banks walked on until he came to a small hotel, the Millette. Entering, he went directly to the desk.
    Nancy, Bess, and George stood in the lobby. They heard the man say to the desk clerk:
    “My key, please.”
    “Yes, Mr. Dight,” the other replied, handing it to him.
    “Dight!” Nancy almost exclaimed aloud.

CHAPTER XVI
    Poetic Hint
     
     
     
    NANCY and her friends wondered if they had heard correctly. The name of the man they thought was Ben Banks was Dight! To make sure of this, the girls waited until the man had gone up in the elevator. Then they went to the desk.
    “Is Mr. Banks registered here?” Nancy asked, smiling at the clerk.
    “You mean the composer? Yes, but he uses his own name of Horace Dight. I’m sorry, but Mr. Dight can’t see you now. He left word that he didn’t want to be disturbed.”
    The girls left the hotel. On the way back to River Heights, they discussed the new developments in the mystery.
    “Do you suppose Mr. Dight is related to Diane’s family?” Bess asked.
    “This so-called Ben Banks may very well be a relative,” Nancy agreed. “I’ll make it my business to find out. If he is, what a tangle this mystery is becoming!”
    In the light of the day’s discovery, Mr. Drew’s case took on new significance. Nancy was eager to get home and talk to her father. She had been in the house only fifteen minutes before he came in.
    Nancy asked, “How are things going in the Dight case?”
    “Not good for him. Mr. Booker has just informed me that his chemist has analyzed the bottles of fluid you obtained from the Dight factory.”
    “With what result, Dad?”
    “The solutions are the same as those used in the Booker plant to toughen the spider thread.”
    “Then Lawrence Dight did steal the formula —or rather, hired Bushy Trott to do it!”
    “It appears that way. I’ve decided to prosecute Dight as soon as I can prepare my case.”
    Nancy then told her father what she had learned