side of the heavy doors noted nothing unusual. The suite by its location in the most desirable corner of an upper floor of one of Chicago's newest and tallest buildings, was removed almost entirely from the noises of the street. Heavy rugs stifled all sound of footsteps; the furniture, of massive design and deeply upholstered in leather, received or parted with a burden without a sound. Nothing in these rooms or in Hereford himself—imperturbable, carefully dressed, a little over thirty and member of all the city's best clubs—denoted how frequently, though at irregular and unforseen intervals, complications had been projected there from the furthest corners of the world to disturb the serenity of the office and of Hereford alike.
Wade Hereford—early in the thirty months since Matthew Regan, the packer,
