"Then Barker came in afterward?"
"Yes, just before I left. And he and she went into the private office."
I turned in my chair and looked through the open doorway into the third room of the suite.
"Is that the private office?" I asked.
"Yes," says Iola with a giggle, "that's its society name, but Mr. Ford calls it the Surgery."
Before I could ask her why Mr. Ford called it that, the bell rang and she jumped up, squashing the orange peel and bits of paper back in the box.
"Here, you go and answer it," I said, "I'll hide this." She went into the front office and as I pushed the box out of sight on a shelf I could hear her talking to a man at the door. The conversation made me stand still listening.
The man's voice asked for Miss Whitehall, Iola answering that she wasn't there.
"Where is she?" said the man, gruff and abrupt it seemed to me.
"In her own home—she hasn't come down today at all."