He looked at her from under his bushy brows, a kind, fatherly glance: "I was very sorry to hear, Miss Whitehall, that you were one of the sufferers in this double disaster we are trying to settle." "Oh, I!" she gave a slight shrug of her shoulders. "I’m wiped out." "Tch!" he shook his head frowning and resentful. "These men can knife each other—pirates in a buccaneer warfare—but when it comes to dragging down women I’d like to see them all strung up." Her eyes gave a flash. It was like a spark struck from a flint, there and then gone. As if it had surprised her, and she was determined to guard against its return, the calm of her face intensified into an almost mask-like quiet. She answered softly: "I can’t go so far as that, Mr. Whitney. I’m sure there’s some explanation—as to Mr. Barker, I mean." "I hope so," said the chief, "for your sake if for no other. I hope he’ll come back and make the restitution he owes his associates and discharge that obligation about the house and lot." He looked at her smiling, a rallying smile that said as plain as words, he knew such hopes to be groundless. She did not smile back, simply raised her eyebrows and gave a slight nod. George, who was facing her, leaned forward and said as if he had just met her at a pink tea and was being gallantly sympathetic: "It was rather hard on you, Miss Whitehall, having those two men in your place that day. The press must have made your life a burden." "It wasn’t so bad. Some reporters called me up but when they found how little I knew they left me alone. I hadn’t anything exciting to say. Both interviews were nothing but business." "But let me ask you a question—not for publication this time, just as a thing I’m curious about. It was only a few hours after you saw him that Harland killed himself. Wasn’t there anything unusual in his manner, anything to suggest that he was not himself?" She looked down at the purse she was holding in her lap, and said slowly, clasping and unclasping the catch: "I didn’t notice anything—unless perhaps he was a little irritable and nervous. I certainly never would have thought he was in the state of a man contemplating suicide." "And you would have known," said the chief. He turned to George in explanation. "As Harland’s partner, Miss Whitehall would have known him well enough to notice any marked change in him." I was watching her closely and as the glances of the two men met I saw uneasiness well up through the quietude of her face. Then for the first time I suspected that she was not as composed as she seemed. Her words confirmed the suspicion, they came quickly in hurried denial: "No—I didn’t know him well. I saw him very seldom. We were not in the least—what—what you’d call friends or even close acquaintances. It was all purely business." The chief nodded, a slight, Mandarin-like teetering of his head, which gave the impression of a polite agreement in a matter that didn’t interest him.