She stopped, leant back in her chair and looked at me inquiringly.
"Good heavens!" I cried. "Have him up at once. I am quite certain that you could never have been deceived, Miss Dewsbury. You have not been with me for four years without my knowing how valuable your intuition is. Send him to me at once."
Miss Dewsbury gave a dry, gratified chuckle.
"I may have stretched things a little far in having too much confidence in my position here," she said, "but I was determined to gamble on it, and I've won. This morning, before I left for the office, I gave Mrs. O'Hagan a little note for Bill—he has an unfortunate habit of lying in bed in the morning. The note told him that by an odd coincidence, I thought I might put him in the way of writing an article for the Evening Special and that he was to be in the café at the corner by three o'clock, precisely."
She looked at her wrist-watch.
"It's five minutes to now. I will send for him at once."
"Rolston, did you say the name was, Miss Dewsbury?" said Williams.
"Yes,—Rolston. But the messenger can't mistake him. He's about five feet two high, very slim, with an innocent, baby face, and very dark red hair. Oh, and his ears stick out at the sides of his head almost at right angles. Please say nothing about my part in the matter, as yet at any rate," Miss Dewsbury asked as she went away, and some minutes afterwards a page boy ushered in one of the most curious little figures I have ever seen.
Mr. Rolston was short, slim and well proportioned. He looked active as a monkey and tough as whipcord. He was rather shabbily dressed in an old blue suit. His face was childish only in contour and complexion, and for the rest he could have sat as a model for Puck to any painter. There was something impish and merry in his rather slanting eyes, and his button of a mouth was capable of some very surprising contortions. His round-shaped ears, like the ears of a mouse, stood out on each side of his head and completed the elfish, sprite-like impression.
"Sit down, Mr. Rolston," I said, pointing to a chair on the other side of the table.