Inspector Tanner was extremely interested. Obviously they were talking about the Luce Manor tragedy, and from the reference to the alibi they seemed to have very first-hand information of Austin’s affairs. This, however, was natural enough and by no means suspicious. But the expression of anxiety on the lady’s face was not so natural. Tanner wished he was sure of its cause. After coffee Cosgrove lit a cigarette, and the Inspector was rather thrilled to notice it was of a light-brown colour. His thought turned to the end he had discovered in the Luce Manor boathouse. If Cosgrove’s case contained the same unusual brand as that found at Luce Manor, his suspicions would undoubtedly be strengthened. Cosgrove smoked quietly, while Tanner paid his bill and got ready to leave the restaurant. At last the others made a move, Cosgrove dropping the cigarette end into the saucer of his coffee cup. Tanner moved aside, and turned his back till they had passed, then returning to his table as if he had forgotten something, he rapidly picked up the cigarette end, quenched it and dropped it into one of the little boxes he always carried. Then he hurried out after his quarry, and as they took another taxi, re-entered his own. This time they had a longer run. It was not till they reached Lyme Avenue, Chelsea, that the chase ended. There at the door of a block of flats the two dismounted. But Cosgrove did not go in. When the lady had disappeared he returned to his taxi, and started back towards London. Tanner’s driver had run on towards the end of the road, but he skilfully manœuvred for position, and soon was back in his own place behind the other. At the door of the Huntingdon Club in Piccadilly, Cosgrove dismounted, paid off his driver and entered the building. This suiting Tanner’s plans as well as anything else, he also paid his man, and after a few minutes followed Cosgrove into the club. Handing the porter another of his false cards—Mr Percival Hepworth-Jones, The Constitutional—he asked for Cosgrove, and was shown into a waiting-room. In about ten minutes Cosgrove appeared—a questioning, puzzled look on his thin, good-looking face. ‘I must apologise, Mr Ponson,’ began the Inspector, ‘for sending in a card which is not my own. You are wondering where you have seen me before?’ ‘I confess that I am. I know your face, but I can’t recall our meeting.’ ‘We didn’t meet, but you saw me at the inquest at Luce Manor. I am Inspector Tanner of Scotland Yard, and I have been put in charge of the case.’ The Inspector, who was watching the other keenly, noticed a sudden look flash across his face and then disappear. It was not exactly a look of alarm. Rather was it that of a man brought suddenly face to face with a danger he had long recognised—a kind of bracing of himself to meet a crisis which was at last at hand. But his manner was free from any trace of anxiety as he motioned his visitor to a chair.