‘Very well. I’ll ask him to meet us—shall I say at three to-morrow?’
‘That will suit me.’
The two men continued discussing the affair until a clock struck twelve, when Heppenstall made a move to return to town.
Mr. Georges La Touche was commonly regarded as the smartest private detective in London. Brought up in that city, where his father kept a small foreign book store, he learned till he was twelve the English language and ideas. Then, on the death of his English mother, the family moved to Paris, and Georges had to adjust himself to a new environment. At twenty, he entered Cook’s office as a courier, and, learning successively Italian, German, and Spanish, he gradually acquired a first-hand acquaintanceship with Middle and South-Western Europe. After some ten years of this work he grew tired of the constant travelling, and, coming to London, he offered his services to a firm of well-known private detectives. Here he did so well that, on the death of the founder some fifteen years later, he stepped into his place. He soon began to specialise in foreign or international cases, for which his early training peculiarly fitted him.
But he was not much in appearance. Small, sallow, and slightly stooped, he would have looked insignificant only for the strength of the clear-cut features and the intelligence of the dark, flashing eyes. Years of training had enabled him to alter his expression and veil these tell-tale signs of power, and he had frequently found the weak and insipid impression thus produced, an asset in allaying the suspicions of his adversaries.
His delight in the uncommon and bizarre had caused him to read attentively the details of the cask mystery. When, therefore, he received Clifford’s telephone asking him to act on behalf of the suspected man, he eagerly agreed, and cancelled some minor engagements in order to meet the lawyers at the time appointed.
The important question of fees having been settled, Clifford explained to the detective all that was known of the case, as well as the ideas he and Heppenstall had evolved with regard to the defence.
‘What we want you to do for us, Mr. La Touche,’ he wound up, ‘is to go into the case on the assumption that Boirac is the guilty man. Settle definitely whether this is a possible theory. I think you will agree that this depends on the truth of his alibi. Therefore, test that first. If it cannot be broken down, Boirac cannot be guilty, and our line of defence won’t work. And I need hardly say, the sooner you can give us some information the better.’
‘You have given me a congenial task, gentlemen, and if I don’t succeed it won’t be for want of trying. I suppose that is all to-day? I’ll go over these papers and make the case up. Then I fancy I had best go to Paris. But I’ll call in to see you, Mr. Clifford, before I start.’
La Touche was as good as his word. In three days he was again in Clifford’s room.