II
THE NET
"You made no plan what to do if your friend didn't turn up?" Roger enquired. "Have you any other friends in Chicago?"
"Not one."
"Have you ever lived here, or stayed here?"
"No."
If he had now been capable of suspecting her, all his first suspicions of Miss Beverley White would have marshalled themselves in his brain. Nothing had happened during the whole journey to justify her fantastic story of mysterious danger. As for the wonderful envelope, who could tell that it didn't contain blank paper? But Sands had got beyond this stage. If he were a fool, he asked to be nothing better.
"Is that friend you talk of more than a friend?"
"No, only a person I trusted for reasons I can't tell you."
"I see. And you don't know what will become of you since he's failed you, and you're turned adrift in a strange town?"