Detective and mystery stories; Hoodlums -- Fiction; London (England) -- Social life and customs -- Fiction; Murder -- Fiction
Dr. Cumberly, his face unusually pale, stood over by the window of
Inspector Dunbar's room, his hands locked behind him. In the chair
nearest to the window sat Henry Leroux, so muffled up in a fur-collared
motor-coat that little of his face was visible; but his eyes were tragic
as he leant forward resting his elbows upon his knees and twirling his
cap between his thin fingers. He was watching Inspector Dunbar intently;
only glancing from the gaunt face of the detective occasionally to look
at Denise Ryland, who sat close to the table. At such times his gaze was
pathetically reproachful, but always rather sorrowful than angry.
As for Miss Ryland, her habitual self-confidence seemed somewhat to
have deserted her, and it was almost with respectful interest that she
followed Dunbar's examination of a cabman who, standing cap in hand,
completed the party so strangely come together at that late hour.
“This is what you have said,” declared Dunbar, taking up an official
form, and, with a movement of his hand warning the taxi-man to pay
attention: “'I, Frederick Dean, motor-cab driver, was standing on the
rank in Little Abbey Street to-night at about a quarter to nine. My cab
was the second on the rank. A young lady who wore, I remember, a woolen
cap and jersey, with a blue serge skirt, ran out from the corner of the
Square and directed me to follow the cab in front of me, which had just
been chartered by a dark man wearing a black overcoat and silk hat. She
ordered me to keep him in sight; and as I drove off I heard her calling
from the window of my cab to another lady who seemed to be following
her. I was unable to see this other lady, but my fare addressed her as
'Denise.' I followed the first cab to Whitechapel Station; and as I
saw it stop there, I swung into Mount Street. The lady gave me
half-a-sovereign, and told me that she proposed to follow the man on
foot. She asked me if I could manage to keep her in sight, without
letting my cab be seen by the man she was following. I said I would
try, and I crept along at some distance behind her, going as slowly as
possible until she went into a turning branching off to the right of
Cambridge Road; I don't know the name of this street. She was some
distance ahead of me, for I had had trouble in crossing Whitechapel
Road.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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