Page:Fletcher - The Mortover Grange Affair.pdf/119

 And there at the counter, chatting familiarly with the barmaid was a stranger, a somewhat over-dressed, loud-voiced person, of a type suggestive of a certain sort of City man, who was sipping a glass of sherry and puffing a big, strong-smelling cigar. He glanced carelessly at the detective as he entered, then more closely, finished his sherry and with a nod to the girl went out, and crossing the hall vanished into a room on the other side, the door of which Wedgwood noticed had, since morning, been furnished with a printed label—Private.

The barmaid glanced at Wedgwood with a knowing smile.

"That's Mr. Levigne!" she announced with importance. "The gentleman that's all to do with this new colliery. A great London gentleman he is. Down here for a few days again—he always has a private sitting-room when he comes."

"Oh!" said Wedgwood. "Indeed! Great man, no doubt!"

He sat awhile, thinking, and watching the door on the opposite side of the hall—Levigne, in walking out, had left the smoking-room door wide open. And Wedgwood did not watch unprofitably. Before many minutes had elapsed Janet Clagne, evidently attired in her best, walked sharply into the hotel, and, as if know-