The Yellow Face

by Fred M. White

Jack started, but said nothing. It was not for him to say anything of the strange sight that he had seen in Spencer Anstruther's study. The young man in question had left his hansom; probably he had come back for something forgotten; therefore, on the whole, Jack felt that he could not in any way connect him with this mystery.

And yet Spencer Anstruther's young friend must have been close by at the very moment the murder was committed. It seemed impossible to believe that he had not heard that choking cry, and that strange noise like the tearing of calico or the scatter of peas on a tray. But, on the other hand, the murdered man had been shot, and shooting implies noise. Certainly Jack had heard nothing that in any way would be connected with the firing of a revolver.

And yet there was that tearing sound, and the strange fact that the Nostalgo of the poster had tears in him in exactly the same place as the real man who had been wounded. There was a plot calculated to puzzle Spencer Anstruther himself, and Jack said so aloud.

"I don't think as even he'd guess this," the policeman said. "Friend of yours by any chance, sir?"

"I had not left his house five minutes before I found that body," Jack said. "If you like, I will go back and bring Mr. Spencer Anstruther here."

Here was a chance to get at the other business, the mystery of the strange music. It was a legitimate errand enough, but the policeman shook his head. He did not want to take anything so important upon his own shoulders, his inspector being "down on that kind of thing." Two constables with the ambulance came at length. They asked no questions, but hoisted the body up and turned immediately in the direction of Shannon Street police station.

"I think you had better come along, sir," the first policeman suggested to Jack. "It's just possible that the inspector may want to ask you a few questions."

Masefield followed. He smiled just a little as he noted the speaker's tone. If not exactly in custody, he was at least expected to give a good account of himself. To his great relief he found the inspector not in the least disposed to assume the official manner; on the contrary, he seemed rather a timid man, though his eyes were steady enough.

"I have told you everything, sir," Jack said at length. "I only wish it might have been more. If there is any further way in which I can be of assistance to you----"

"You are very good, sir," the inspector said. "What we have to do now is to push the matter forward before the scent gets cold. It is very imperative that we discover who this man is. The first person to apply to is the firm of advertising contractors who posted those bills. Did anybody happen to notice the firm whose hoarding the deceased man was found against?"