A smart youth interposed a printed formula between the visitor and a door marked “Private.” Furneaux wrote his name, and put “Steynholme” in the space reserved for “business.” He was admitted at once. Mr. Ingerman, apparently, was immersed in a pile of letters, but he swept them all aside, and greeted the caller affably.
“Glad to see you, Mr. Furneaux,” he said. “I missed you on the train yesterday. Did you—”
“Nice quiet place you’ve got here, Mr. Ingerman,” interrupted the detective.
“Yes. But, as I was about to—”
“Artistically furnished, too,” went on Furneaux dreamily. “Oak, self-toned carpets and rugs, restful decorations. Those etchings, also, show taste in the selection. ‘The Embankment—by Night.’ Fitting sequel to ‘The City—by Day.’ I’m a child in such matters, but, ’pon my honor, if tempted to pour out my hard-earned savings into the lap of a City magnate, I would disgorge here more readily than in some saloon-bar of finance, where the new mahogany glistens, and the typewriters click like machine-guns.”
Ingerman was nettled. He glanced at his correspondence.
“You have a somewhat far-fetched notion of my position,” he said, with a staccato quality in his velvet voice. “I am not a magnate, and I toil here to make, not to lose, money for my clients.”
“A noble ideal. Forgive me if my rhapsody took the wrong line.”
“And I’m sure you will forgive me if I now put the question which leads to the probable cause of your visit. Did you travel by the two o’clock train yesterday?”
“Yes. I avoided you purposely.”