  Henry Beechtree, when he left the Assembly Hall, had, for his part, fish to fry in the Secretariat, and thither he made his rapid way. He had arranged to meet Miss Doris Wembley, the secretary of Charles Wilbraham, that morning in her chief's room, and then to lunch with her. Henry was getting to know Miss Wembley very well. It seemed to him as if he had always known her, as, indeed, he had. He knew the things she would say before she said them. He knew which were the subjects she would expand on, and which would land her, puzzled and uninterested, in inward non-comprehension and verbal assent. She was a nice girl, a jolly girl, an efficient girl, and a very pretty girl. She liked Henry, whom she thought amusing, shabby, and queer. They began, of course, by talking of the fresh disappearances. “We've got bets in the Secretariat on who will be the next,” she told him. “I've put my money on Branting. I don't know why, but I somehow feel he'll go soon. But some people say it'll be the S.G. himself.... Isn't it too awful for their wives, poor things? Poor little Madame Chang! They say she's being simply wonderful.” “Wonderful,” repeated Henry. “That's what widows are, isn't it? But is it, I wonder, enough to make one wonderful that one's husband should disappear alive? You see, they may not be dead, these poor delegates; they may exist, hidden away somewhere.” “Oh, dear, yes, I hope so. Isn't it all too weird? Have you any theories, Mr. Beechtree?” Henry looked non-committal and said that doubtless every one in Geneva had their private suspicions (often, for that matter, made public), and that he was no exception. He then turned the conversation on to Wilbraham's father-in-law, who was staying |
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