“I don’t know,” he said. “I had never heard anything about them, had never seen anything. The chief of police had us try to find any checks he may have issued to her before yesterday, but we found nothing. Nobody could remember ever having seen any.”

“Who was her last customer, so far as you know?”

“Lately I’ve seen her around town quite often with a chap named Thaler⁠—he runs a couple of gambling houses here. They call him Whisper. You’ve probably heard of him.”

At eight-thirty I left young Albury and set out for the Miner’s Hotel in Forest Street. Half a block from the hotel I met Bill Quint.

“Hello!” I hailed him. “I was on my way down to see you.”

He stopped in front of me, looked me up and down, growled:

“So you’re a gumshoe.”