"As you know, she did see him that afternoon and told him of my consent. He appeared overjoyed and said he would come, but first must go to Mr. Harland’s offices on the floor above to talk over a matter of great importance. This, he said, would probably occupy half to three-quarters of an hour, after which he would return to her. As they wished to avoid all possibility of gossip through her clerks or the people in the building, they decided not to meet in her offices, but in the church which is next door. From there they would take a cab and come to me. "The appointment was for a quarter-past six. Carol was ahead of time and waited for him over an hour, then came home, shattered, broken, almost unable to speak—for, as you know, he never came." She paused, her face tragic with the memory of that last, unexpected blow. No one spoke, and looking round at them, she threw out her hands with a gesture of pleading appeal: "What could I think? Was it unnatural for me to disbelieve him again? Hasn’t all that’s come out shown he was what I’d already found him—false to his word and his trust?" "Does your daughter think that, too?" asked the chief. "No. She believes in him, even now, with him in hiding and branded as a traitor. But that’s Carol—always ready to trust where her heart is. She says it’s all right, that he’ll come back and clear himself, but I can see how she’s suffering, how she’s struggling to keep her hopes alive." I burst out—wild horses couldn’t have kept me quiet any longer. Reaching a long arm across the table, without any consciousness that I was doing it, I laid my hand on Mrs. Whitehall’s: "How did she get out of the building that night?" She looked surprised, and strangely enough embarrassed. "Why—why—" she stammered, and then suddenly, "you seem to know so much here—do you know anything about Mr. Harland and Carol?" "Something," said the chief guardedly. "Everything," I shot out, not caring for her, or him, or the case, or anything but the answer to my question. "Then I don’t mind telling you, though Carol wouldn’t like it." She glanced tentatively at me. "Did you know he was in love with her?" "All about it. Yes. Go on—" "She went down by the stairs, all those flights, to avoid him. I guessed the way he felt about her. I knew it soon after the business was started and told her but she only laughed at me. That afternoon, when he came to her office, she saw I was right. Not that he said anything definite, but by his manner, the questions he asked her. He was wrought up and desperate, I suppose, and let her see that he was jealous of Mr. Barker, demanding the truth, whether she loved him, whether she intended marrying him. She was angry, but seeing that he had lost control of himself, told him that her feeling for Mr. Barker was that of a daughter to a father and never would be anything else. That seemed to quiet him and he went away.