The manager, questioned casually on the point, maintained that it was the day before—on the second—when he had 'phoned to his hatter, but the boy persisted that it was on Saturday and not on Friday, as he himself had his afternoon off on Friday. The manager's hatter, when Pointer rang him up, could remember no call at all from the manager during the latter half of the week. Pointer put it to him that there must be some mistake; “and, frankly, we want to weed out the telephone calls as far as possible.” “Sorry, but I suppose some shop assistant forgot to make a note of my message—or, stay, I do believe I didn't succeed in getting through.” Inquiry proved that there had been another call occupying the hatter's wire at five, and a little before, but the Chief Inspector wondered whether this were merely a lucky chance or not. A telegram came from Watts during the morning: “Found Sikes. Denies visit to London. No alibi. Arriving four o'clock.” And punctually to the hour Watts presented himself at Pointer's room in the Yard. “Sikes—revised version of Isaacs, I fancy, sir—lives in a handsome villa at Brighton—garage and fairly good car. Maidservants. I told him, as agreed, that a wealthy American had disappeared rather suddenly, and the Embassy was making cautious inquiries; that he had last been seen at the Enterprise Hotel, and that there was some doubt as to the time of his arrival. I gave a very flattering description of his looks”—Watts laughed—“and then said that the manager had given us to understand that it was himself—Mr. Sikes—and not Mr. Beale who had been seen at noon on Saturday in the hotel in company with the manager; and as he very much resembled Mr. Beale's description, we had come to him to clear the matter up once for all. I put it most tactfully, I assure you, sir; but he got purple and banged the table. ‘Impudent lies! I never was near the place since March last. I don't care what the management says; I never was near the place on Saturday. Haven't been to London, except to a theatre, in months. Tell the Enterprise people that if they make any future mistake of the kind I'll have them up. I'll sue the manager, that's what I'll do!’ He had heard about the whole business already from someone else, I'll swear, and was fed up with it.” “Humph! Well?”