Page:Yellow Claw 1920.djvu/77

 Dunbar, glancing keenly aside at Sowerby.

“Wotcher say, guv’nor?” asked the cabman.

“I say—did you see a gentleman approaching from the corner?” asked Dunbar.

“Yus,” declared the man; “I see ’im, but ’e ’adn’t got as far as the Johnny ’Orner. As I passed outside old Tom Brian, wot’s changin’ ’is gear, I see a bloke blowin’ along on the pavement—a bloke in a high ’at, an’ wearin’ a heye-glass.”

“At this time, then,” pursued Dunbar, “you had actually passed the other cab, and the gentleman on the pavement had not come up with it?”

“’E couldn’t see it, guv’nor! I’m tellin’ you ’e ’adn’t got to the Johnny ’Orner!”

“I see,” muttered Sowerby. “It’s possible that Mr. Exel took no notice of the first cab—especially as it did not come out of the Square.”

“Wotcher say, guv’nor?” queried the cabman again, turning his bleared eyes upon Sergeant Sowerby.

“He said,” interrupted Dunbar, “was Brian’s cab empty?”

“’Course it was,” rapped Mr. Hamper, “’e ’d just dropped ’is fare at Palace Mansions.”…

“How do you know?” snapped Dunbar, suddenly, fixing his fierce eyes upon the face of the speaker.

The cabman glared in beery truculence.

“I got me blarsted senses, ain’t I?” he inquired. “There’s only two lots o’ flats on that side o’ the