“Sorry,” said Giles. “Nothing doing at all. I'll tell you what, though: if anyone knows, Randall Matthews would. It's my belief there's precious little about his uncle that young gentleman doesn't know.”
Hannasyde smiled rather grimly. “Yes, I had thought of him. But I haven't found Mr Randall Matthews precisely falling over himself to take me into his confidence. Still, I can try him if all else fails.”
He left Adam Street, and journeyed east, to the City. At Foster's Bank the manager was civil, but by no means friendly. The Bank, he said, was no doubt what Superintendent Hannasyde would consider old-fashioned; they had old-fashioned ways in it; he himself greatly deplored the modern methods of the police in trying to obtain information through Banks. Time was…
Hannasyde, who never made enemies wantonly, listened, and sympathised, and quite agreed with the manager. In the end he got some information out of him, though not very much. The manager knew very little about John Hyde, who hardly ever came in person to the Bank. He had opened an account a good many years ago now. It was believed that he was an agent for some northern firm of manufacturers; his address was 17 Gadsby Row; the manager regretted he could give Hannasyde no further information.
Gadsby Row, which was a narrow, crowded street in the heart of the City, did not take Hannasyde long to find. He turned down it from the busy thoroughfare which it bisected, and, threading his way between hurrying typists and bare-headed errand-boys, soon arrived at No. 17. This was found to be a newsagent's shop, which also sold the cheaper kinds of cigarettes and tobacco. It was a mean little place, with dirty, fly-blown windows, and it bore the name H. Brown on the fascia board. A couple of steps led up into the interior of the shop, which was dark, and small, and smelled of stale smoke. Hannasyde walked in, and almost at once a door at the back of the shop opened, and a stout woman in an overall came into the shop, and asked him what he wanted.
“I am looking for a Mr John Hyde,” said Hannasyde. “I understand this is where he lives.”
“He ain't in,” she replied shortly. “Don't know when he'll be back.”
“Where can I find him, do you know?”
“I couldn't say, I'm sure.”
The door at the back of the shop opened again, and a middle-aged man with a wispy moustache and a pair of watery blue eyes came out in his shirt-sleeves, and said: “What's the gentleman want, Emma?”