Brennan puffed at his inevitable cigarette as they headed for Gibson's office.
"She said she had no idea where he is and what he is doing, did she?" said Brennan. "How come you thought of asking her about it?"
"She mentioned it to me," evaded John, reluctant to relate the details of his conversation with Consuello. There appeared no reason, he thought, to bring her into the situation precipitated by Gibson's disappearance.
They went over the ground they had covered the week before in searching for Gibson, but were unable to uncover a single piece of information concerning the commissioner's whereabouts. At his office his secretary told them that he had not seen nor heard from him since the day he disappeared.
"Aren't you a bit concerned about his unusual absence?" asked Brennan.
"No, you see he told me he would be back sometime this week and cautioned me not to seek to locate him," the secretary answered.
"Wherever he is, he's certainly covered up his tracks well," commented Brennan as they left.
"What about Sweeney—is he square?" John asked.
"I don't know anything against the chief," Brennan said. "It seems to me he has the town as clean as it has ever been. I think he's straight. I think most of the men in the department are straight. Some of them are grafting—there are always a few crooks in any large body of men—and the chief has always fired them as fast as he found them.