"You mean that you have a clue, sir."
"Certainly I do. This is a most amazing case. Why, it is copied from the plot of one of my own novels. And, stranger still, that novel has not yet been written!"
[CHAPTER IX.]
THE MISSING NOTES.
It was late in the afternoon before Prout hit upon the trail he was looking for. He had been keeping the telegraph and the telephone busy. The scent was still hot, and it was just possible that he might come upon some trace of the missing notes before they left the country.
At any rate, it could only have been hours since they found their way into the hands of the murdered man. According to his letter, he had received £400 in gold--probably the result of some blackmailing transaction--after which he had hastened to turn them into banknotes for transmission, probably abroad.
Now there is only one place of business where a man can turn so large a sum of money into notes, and that place must be a bank. There are a great many banks in London, and the difficulty in finding the right one was enhanced by the fact that nobody besides Prout knew that there was anything wrong about these particular notes. On the face of it, the transaction was a very casual one.
It was nearly four o'clock before Prout raised the trail. On the previous day but one a cashier at the National Credit Bank had changed £400 in gold into notes for a stranger who answered to the description of the murdered man. Prout dashed down to Leadenhall Street in a fast hansom. The cashier was a little nervous, but quite willing to speak freely.
"I remember the transaction perfectly well," he said. "We do a lot of money-changing and that kind of thing, as our foreign connection is a large one. I should not have heeded the matter but for noticing the curious disfigurement of the man's hands."