"Has no one been here this morning?" he demanded, glaring at the closed desks.
"If you don't count me I should answer no," replied Griswold quietly.
"Oh!"
The two gentlemen regarded each other for a moment, contemptuous dislike clearly written on the smaller man's face, Griswold half-smiling and indifferent.
"I am waiting for the governor," remarked Griswold, thinking to gain information.
"Then you're likely to wait some time," jerked the other. "The whole place seems to be abandoned. I never saw such a lot of people."
"Not having seen them myself, I must reserve judgment," Griswold remarked, and the blue serge suit flung out of the room.
Presently another figure darkened the entrance, and the colored servant whom Griswold had seen attending Miss Osborne on the train from Atlanta swept into the reception-room and, grandly ignoring his presence, sat down in a chair nearest the closed door of the inner chamber. Griswold felt that this was encouraging, as implying some link between the governor and his domestic household and he was about to ask the colored woman if she knew the business hours of the office when the closed door opened and Miss Osborne appeared on the threshold. The colored woman rose, and Griswold, who happened to be facing the door when it swung open with such startling suddenness, stared an instant and bowed profoundly.
"I beg your pardon, but I wish very much to see Governor Osborne or his secretary."
Miss Osborne, in white, trailing a white parasol in her hand, and with white roses in her belt, still stood half withdrawn inside the private office.