We were still conversing in barely audible whispers, of course.

"Put me down," she said in a barely audible whisper.

"His secretary," said a man's voice in an audible whisper somewhere behind them.

His voice, already low, went to a barely audible whisper, almost a hiss.

"We must help each other," Karen said in a barely audible whisper.

"Not yet," she said in a whisper audible only to his trained ears.

Her reply, when it came, was in a barely audible whisper.

The final words were almost strangled, coming out in a barely audible whisper.

"You'll never find love that way," she said in a barely audible whisper.

In her surprisingly audible whisper she said, "Who is present?