‘Mornin’,’ the Colonel greeted him, as Tanner handed him his card and asked for a few moments conversation. ‘Certainly, I’ll go up to the house with you in a minute.’
‘I shouldn’t, sir, dream of troubling you so far,’ Tanner assured him. ‘Besides, it is not necessary. A minute or two here when you are disengaged is all I want.’
‘Be gad, sir, you’re modest. Comin’ all the way from London for a minute or two,’ and calling out some directions to a groom, he led the way into a kind of small office at the end of the stable.
‘Well, sir,’ he said as he seated himself before a small roll top desk, and pointed to a chair, ‘and what can I do for you?’
‘I am engaged, sir,’ Tanner answered, ‘in making some confidential inquiries into the movements of a man, who, I understand, was recently here—Mr Cosgrove Ponson of London.’
‘He was here’—the Colonel hesitated a moment—‘this day week. And what the devil has he been doin’?’
‘Nothing, sir, so far as we know. It is the case of another man altogether, but it is necessary for us to know if Mr Ponson really was out of London on that day.’
‘Well I’ve told you he was here. Is that evidence enough?’
‘Quite, sir, as far as that goes. But I would like also to know some details to assure myself if his business here was genuine. What was his business, if I might ask?’
‘You may ask and I’ll tell you too, be gad. He wanted to see Sir Jocelyn, that’s a three-year-old I’m goin’ to sell. Devilish good bit of horseflesh too. But he wouldn’t stretch to my figure. I wanted seven hundred, and he would only go five fifty. So it was no deal.’