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 “That’s all right, my lad!” said Dunbar, holding up his hand to silence the voluble speaker. “There’s going to be no license-losing. You did not hear that you were wanted before?”

The watery eyes of the cabman protruded painfully; he respired like a horse.

“Me, guv’nor!” he exclaimed. “Gor’blimë! I ain’t the bloke! I was drivin’ back from takin’ the Honorable ’Erbert ’Arding ’ome—same as I does almost every night, when the ’ouse is a-sittin’—when I see old Tom Brian drawin’ away from the door o’ Palace Man—”

Again Dunbar held up his hand.

“No doubt you mean well,” he said; “but damme! begin at the beginning! Who are you, and what have you come to tell us?”

“’Oo are I?—’Ere’s ’oo I ham!” wheezed the cabman, proffering a greasy license. “Richard ’Amper, number 3 Breams Mews, Dulwich Village”…

“That’s all right,” said Dunbar, thrusting back the proffered document; “and last night you had taken Mr. Harding the member of Parliament, to his residence in?”—

“In Peers’ Chambers, Westminister—that’s it, guv’nor! Comin’ back, I ’ave to pass along the north side o’ the Square, an’ just a’ead o’ me, I see old Tom Brian a-pullin’ round the Johnny ’Orner,—’im comin’ from Palace Mansions.”

“Mr. Exel only mentioned seeing one cab,”