I had just found them when the front door opened and a stout, middle-aged woman in a gingham house-dress came out. She looked at me a bit curiously, so I asked:
“Do you know where I can find the manager?”
“I’m the manager,” she said.
I handed her a card and stepped indoors with her.
“I’m from the bonding department of the North American Casualty Company”—a repetition of the lie that was printed on the card I had given her—“and a bond for Mr. Offord has been applied for. Is he all right so far as you know?” With the slightly apologetic air of one going through with a necessary but not too important formality.
She frowned.
“A bond? That’s funny! He is going away tomorrow.”
“Well, I can’t say what the bond is for,” I said lightly. “We investigators just get the names and addresses. It may be for his present employer, or perhaps the man he is going to work for wherever he’s going has applied for it. Or some firms have us look up prospective employees before they hire them, just to be safe.”
“ Mr. Offord, so far as I know, is a very nice young man,” she said, “but he has been here only a week.”
“Not staying long, then?”