Read "The Step on the Stair" by Anna Katharine Green online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
Next day the thunderbolt fell. Entering Mr. Jackson's office, I found him quite alone and waiting for me. Though the man was almost a stranger to me and I had very little knowledge of his face or its play of expression, I felt sure that the look with which he greeted me was not common to him and that so far as he was concerned, my cause had rather gained than lost in interest since our last meeting.
"You did not telephone me last night," were his first words.