Detective and mystery stories, English; Private investigators -- Fiction
The inspector shook his head. "Half the doors in the street are open,"
he said, "pretty nearly all day."
"Ah, then there's nothing in that. I don't think he lives there, by the
bye. I fancy he comes from more in the Seven Dials or Drury Lane
direction. Did you notice anything about the man that gave you a clue to
his occupation--or at any rate to his habits?"
"Can't say I did."
"Well, just take a look at the back of his coat before he goes
away--just over the loins. Good-day."
As I have said, Hewitt's messenger was quick. I happened to be
in--having lately returned from a latish lunch--when he arrived with
this note:--
"My dear B.,--I meant to have lunched with you to-day, but have
been kept. I expect you are idle this afternoon, and I have a
case that will interest you--perhaps be useful to you from a
journalistic point of view. If you care to see anything of it, cab
away _at once_ to Fitzroy Square, south side, where I'll meet you.
I will wait no later than 3.30. Yours, M. H."
I had scarce a quarter of an hour, so I seized my hat and left my
chambers at once. As it happened, my cab and Hewitt's burst into Fitzroy
Square from opposite sides almost at the same moment, so that we lost no
time.
"Come," said Hewitt, taking my arm and marching me off, "we are going to
look for some stabling. Try to feel as though you'd just set up a
brougham and had come out to look for a place to put it in. I fear we
may have to delude some person with that belief presently."
"Why--what do you want stables for? And why make me your excuse?"
"As to what I want the stables for--really I'm not altogether sure
myself. As to making you an excuse--well, even the humblest excuse is
better than none. But come, here are some stables. Not good enough,
though, even if any of them were empty. Come on."
We had stopped for an instant at the entrance to a small alley of rather
dirty stables, and Hewitt, paying apparently but small attention to the
stables themselves, had looked sharply about him with his gaze in the
air.
"I know this part of London pretty well," Hewitt observed, "and I can
only remember one other range of stabling near by; we must try that. As
a matter of fact, I'm coming here on little more than conjecture, though
I shall be surprised if there isn't something in it. Do you know
anything of aphasia?"
"I have heard of it, of course, though I can't say I remember ever
knowing a case."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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