“If you must write a story, mind you keep the facts straight. Mr. Rhett hasn’t been seen in nine days and that’s all I know. He may return tomorrow. He may never appear.”
“Then you believe he’s been kidnapped?” Penny asked.
“I don’t know. There’s been no ransom demand.”
“Perhaps he absconded with the $250,000 in bonds.”
“Don’t quote me as making such a statement even if it should prove true! Mr. Rhett is a wealthy man—or rather, he acquired a fortune when he married a rich widow who set him up here as bank president. But don’t quote me on that either!” he exclaimed as Penny jotted down a few notes. “Leave my name out of it entirely!”
“Let’s have a look at Mr. Rhett’s office,” proposed Sergeant Gray.
“Follow me, please.”
His poise regained, Albert Potts led the way down the gallery to a large, spacious office room. On the polished mahogany desk rested a picture of an attractive woman in her early forties whom Penny guessed to be Mrs. Rhett. A door opened from the office into a directors’ room, and another onto a narrow outdoor balcony overlooking Front Street.
Sergeant Gray and the patrolman made a thorough inspection of the two rooms and Mr. Rhett’s desk.
“When last I saw the bonds, Mr. Rhett had them in the top drawer,” the secretary volunteered eagerly. “He should have returned them to the vault, but he failed to do so. Now they’re gone.”