“By Jove, yes!” Cheyne cried, “there is news. You remember that Arnold Price had disappeared? Well, yesterday I had a letter from him!”
“You don’t say so?” French rejoined in surprise. “Where did he write from?”
“Bombay. He was shortly leaving for home. He expects to be here in about a month.”
“And what about his disappearance?”
“He was ill in hospital. He had gone up to Agra on some private business and met with an accident—was knocked down in the street and was insensible for ages. He couldn’t say who he was, and the hospital people in Agra couldn’t find out, and he hadn’t told the Bombay people where he was going to spend his leave.”
“Did he mention the letter?”
“Yes, he thanked me for taking charge of it and said that when he reached home he would relieve me of further trouble about it. He little knows!”
“That’s so,” French assented.
Their taxi had been held up by a block at the end of Westminster Bridge, but now the mass cleared and in a few seconds they reached the Yard.
French’s first care was to get rid of Cheyne. He repeated what he had learned about Joan Merrill, then, assuring him that the key of the matter lay in the cipher, he advised him to go home and try it once more. Directly any more news came in he would let him know.