"Of course Mr. Privet knows where Godfrey was up to Thursday morning. He stayed where he always does stay when in London, at the Hungerford Hotel, in Trafalgar Square. He's always stayed there—they know him, and make him very comfortable. But Mr. Privet telephoned through there yesterday—as a matter of fact I've only just heard this—and they told him that Godfrey had left the hotel on Thursday morning. But the extraordinary thing is," and now Laura really did look somewhat troubled—"that they were expecting him back there to pack, to leave for here—at least so the manager understood him to say. He went out in the morning, and then he didn't come back, as they thought he would do, to luncheon. All his things are still at the Hungerford Hotel."
Katty began to feel a little uneasy. "Perhaps he's had an accident," she said. "After all, accidents do happen. Have you done anything, Laura?"
Laura shook her head. "What seems to make the theory of an accident unlikely is that telephone message. You see, he telephoned quite late on Thursday saying that he would stay in town over the night. But he didn't send a similar message to the Bank, as any one knowing Godfrey would certainly have expected him to do, and he didn't let them know at the Hungerford Hotel that he would be away for the night. It's all rather mysterious."
"Yes, it is," said Katty.
"I wonder—" Laura grew a little pink—"I wonder," she said again, "if you know on what business Godfrey went up to town? Mr. Privet would rather like to know that."
And then Katty grew a little pink, too. She hesitated. "No, I don't know what business took him away. You forget that I myself have been away for quite a long time—I only came back on Thursday afternoon."
"Why, of course!" exclaimed Laura. "I forgot that. You've been away nearly a fortnight, haven't you?"
"Yes. First I went right down to the south, and then up to Yorkshire."
Somehow she felt impelled to say this.
But Katty's visits were of no interest to Laura at any time, least of all just now. "Well, I thought I'd come and just ask you on the chance," she said.