Daunt felt his anger rising.
‘It’s a mistake that will cost you your life if you don’t rectify it,’ he answered sharply. ‘If you can’t be open with me I must give up the case.’
‘Then you don’t believe me?’
‘Believe you? How can I believe you? I show your photograph to four separate men at that café and all identify you without hesitation. But see here’—he spoke as if a new idea had occurred to him—‘the thing can be easily settled. If you weren’t at the café with Sir William where were you? Tell me that?’
‘I lunched that day at the Savoy.’
‘For three hours?’
‘Well, no. I sat and smoked in the lounge. Then I got one or two things—tobacco and those two pairs of shoes.’
Jimmy Daunt did not believe him, but all the persuasion of which he was a master failed to induce Austin, whatever he might or might not know, to supplement or vary his statement. But the latter consistently scouted the idea that the trial could end in a conviction, stoutly maintaining that there was no evidence to lead to such a conclusion.
At last Jimmy took his leave, intensely dissatisfied with the result of the interview. As had been arranged between them, he sent a wire to Lois asking her to come to town that afternoon, though he looked forward to the meeting with anything but pleasure.
It was nearly five when she arrived. He greeted her with no hint that his news was bad, and as before insisted on an immediate visit to the quiet restaurant. Over a cup of tea he told her all of Tanner’s adventures and discoveries, with the single exception of his learning of the meeting between Sir William, Austin, and Cosgrove at the Étoile restaurant. But when they had returned to his office, he became more serious.