“Parkyns,” he said, “I want you to do me a favour.”
“Delighted to, if I can, Mr. Tempest.”
“You’ve seen the account of this suicide at the Charing Cross Hotel?”
“Yes. As it happens, the case is in my hands.”
“That’s lucky. I want you to take me and let me see the room and the body without making any fuss about it. Can you do it?”
“Well, perhaps it can be managed. Why are you so keen about it, sir? You are not briefed by anybody yet, are you, sir?”
“No, Parkyns. Honest injun—I’m not. It’s purely curiosity. Look here, inspector! Do you remember the suicide of the actress Dolores Alvarez—the sister of Lady Madeley, you know—about twenty years ago?”
“Of course I do. I was in that as well; but I’d really forgotten all about it.”
“I was in that case too, Parkyns. I had a watching brief at the inquest from Lord Madeley’s solicitor, and ever since then that case has stuck in my mind, because I never could see why she committed suicide, and I want to know why. I don’t know whether you have noticed, now; but in this case to-day, saving locale, you get every single detail of that other case duplicated in this one. Of course, coincidences do occur in the world. I don’t suppose or suggest there is any connection between the two; but the details are so alike, that if this one can be explained it may give me a hint I can build on, and so find an explanation of the other.”
“I see what you mean, sir. Can you come along now, at once?”