“Then you examined the desk?”
“Oh, yes, I considered it my duty.”
While Penny remained in the background, Sergeant Gray asked Mr. Potts a number of questions about the bank president’s habits, and particularly his recent visitors. The secretary, whose fund of information seemed inexhaustible, had ready answers at the tip of his tongue. He even produced a memo pad upon which the names of several persons had been written.
“These were Mr. Rhett’s visitors on his last day here,” he explained. “So far as I know, all were business acquaintances.”
Writing down the names for future checking, Sergeant Gray inquired if Mr. Rhett had disagreed with any of the callers.
“A quarrel, you mean?” Mr. Potts hesitated, then answered with reluctance. “Only with his wife.”
“Mrs. Rhett came to the bank the day your employer last was seen?”
“Yes, they were to have had lunch together. She came late and they quarreled about Mr. Rhett’s work here in the bank. Finally she went away alone.”
“You heard the conversation between them?”
“Well, no,” Albert Potts said quickly. “Naturally I tried not to listen, but I did hear some of it.”