He stopped just across the threshold.

To his surprise the room was already tenanted.
Grumbach and a police officer! "Why, Grumbach, what are you doing here ?" cried Carmichael.
"Waiting for his excellency.

We have been here something past an hour." "What's the trouble ?" Carmichael inquired.
"Your excellency knows as much as I do," said the officer, who was in fact no less than the sub-chief of the bureau.
"And I am in the dark, also," said Grumbach, twirling his hat.
Carmichael walked about, studying the many curios.

Occasionally Grumbach wiped his forehead, and, absently, the inner rim of his hat.

Perhaps the three of them waited twenty minutes; then the chancellor came in.