Rodgers followed her to the Dutch door, his face expressing both astonishment and deep attention.
“Have you no idea who the woman was?” he asked. “Hasn’t Oscar told you her name and why she was bribing him?”
“Oscar,” Kitty paused and looked carefully about the library. “Oscar, according to his wife, took the three o’clock train to Front Royal this afternoon.”
“He did what?” shouted Rodgers, then at her startled look, he added more quietly, “Do you mean that Oscar has left Washington?”
“So Mandy told me.”
Rodgers considered Kitty in silence.... Oscar a runaway—the red coat practically destroyed by fire—the I.O.U.—
Kitty was commencing to wonder at the prolonged silence when Rodgers spoke.
“At what hour did you overhear Oscar’s conversation with the unknown woman?” he asked.
“About five o’clock.”