"It saves planning some roundabout way of meeting her
and comes directly to the point."
The elevator whisked us up directly to the eighth floor and we
stepped out into the heavily carpeted hallway, passing down to
Room 810, which was the number of her suite. Further on, in 825,
was Whitney's.
Alfonso was not there. Evidently he had not ridden up with his
mother, after all, but had gone out through another entrance on
the ground floor. The Senora was alone.
"I hope that you will pardon me for intruding," began Craig, with
as plausible an explanation as he could muster, "but I have become
interested in an opportunity to invest in a Peruvian venture, and
I have heard that you are a Peruvian. Your son, Alfonso, I have
already met, once. I thought that perhaps you might be able to
give me some advice." She looked at us keenly, but said nothing. I
fancied that she detected the subterfuge. Yet she had not tried,
and did not try now to avoid us. Either she had no connection with
the case we were investigating or she was an adept actress.
On closer view, her eyes were really even more remarkable than I
had imagined at a distance. They were those of a woman endowed
with an abundance of health and energy, eyes that were full of
what the old character readers used to call "amativeness,"
denoting a nature capable of intense passion, whether of love or
hate.
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