"You understand what I mean?
I wonder if you could give me a notion where he's gone to ?" Mrs Verloc shook her head.
"Can't say." She turned away to range some boxes on the shelves behind the counter.
Chief Inspector Heat looked at her thoughtfully for a time.
"I suppose you know who I am ?" he said.
Mrs Verloc glanced over her shoulder.

Chief Inspector Heat was amazed at her coolness.
"Come! You know I am in the police," he said sharply.
"I don't trouble my head much about it," Mrs Verloc remarked, returning to the ranging of her boxes.
"My name is Heat.

Chief Inspector Heat of the Special Crimes section." Mrs Verloc adjusted nicely in its place a small cardboard box, and turning round, faced him again, heavy-eyed, with idle hands hanging down.
A silence reigned for a time.
"So your husband went out a quarter of an hour ago! And he didn't say when he would be back ?" "He didn't go out alone," Mrs Verloc let fall negligently.
"A friend ?" Mrs Verloc touched the back of her hair.

It was in perfect order.
"A stranger who called." "I see.

What sort of man was that stranger?
Would you mind telling me ?" Mrs Verloc did not mind.