“I’m checking out early this evening,” she heard him say tersely. “I left my baggage upstairs but I’ll not be using the room after six. Please charge me accordingly.”
He passed within a few feet of where Madge was standing, and walked out the front entrance.
“At least he’ll not be snooping around the mansion any more,” she told herself with satisfaction. “And judging from the crabby way he acts, he hasn’t been very successful in his mission—whatever it is.”
After the man’s back had vanished through the revolving doors, she moved over to the desk, asking to see the register. She glanced over the first page of names and turned back. At last she came to it: “John Swenster, Chicago.”
“Well, that proves I was right,” Madge commented inwardly. “And now the problem is whether or not to tell Miss Swenster.”
Emerging from the hotel she was astonished to see how dark it had grown. Consulting her watch, she realized it was too late to find Silas Davies at the Ruggles’. Regretfully, she decided that she must let the work on the sundial go for that night.
“It’s supper time now and Miss Swenster and Cara will be wondering what became of me,” she thought uncomfortably. “Aunt Maude will be in my wool too if I don’t scamper home.”
A few minutes later, breathless from hurrying so fast, she let herself in the front gate of the mansion and rushed up the walk. Cara, who had been watching at a window for the past half hour, flung open the door.
“Where have you been all this time?” she demanded. “Didn’t you bring the workman after all?”
“Sorry,” Madge apologized, flashing her a significant look which Cara did not understand. “Other matters came up. Anyway, Mr. Davies was working at the Ruggles’. I imagine we can get him tomorrow.”