"Seldon from Hampstead," he explained to Rolfe. "Don't go away yet. It may be something about this case."
Police-Inspector Seldon entered the office, and held the door ajar for a man behind him. He shook hands with Inspector Chippenfield and Rolfe, and then motioned his companion to a chair.
"This is Mr. Robert Evans, the landlord of the Flowerdew Hotel, Covent Garden," he explained. He looked at Mr. Evans with the air of a police-court inspector waiting for a witness to corroborate his statement, but as that gentleman remained silent he sharply asked, "Isn't that so?"
"Quite right," said Mr. Evans, in a moist, husky voice.
He was a short fat man, with an extremely red face and bulging eyes, which watered very much and apparently required to be constantly mopped with a handkerchief which he carried in his hand. This peculiarity gave Mr. Evans the appearance of a man perpetually in mourning, and this effect was heightened by a species of incipient palsy which had seized on his lower facial muscles, and caused his lips to tremble violently. He was bald in the front of the head but not on the top. The baldness over the temples had joined hands and left isolated over the centre of the forehead a small tuft of hair, which, with the playfulness of second childhood, showed a tendency to curl.
"Yes, you're quite right," he repeated huskily, as though some one had doubted the statement. "Evans is my name and I'm not ashamed of it."
"He came to me this morning and told me that Hill gave false evidence at the inquest yesterday," Inspector Seldon explained. "So I brought him along to see you."
"False evidence—Hill?" exclaimed Inspector Chippenfield, with keen interest. "Let us hear about it."
"Well, you will remember Hill said he was at home on the night of the murder," pursued Inspector Seldon. "I looked up his depositions before I came away and what he said was this: 'I took my daughter to the Zoo in the afternoon. We left the Zoo at half past five and went home and had tea. My wife then took the child to the picture-palace and I remained at home. I did not go out that night. They returned about half-past ten, and after supper we all went to bed.' But Evans tells me he saw Hill in his bar at three o'clock on the morning of the 19th of August. He has an early license for the accommodation of the Covent Garden traffic. He can swear to Hill. A man who goes to bed at half-past ten has no right to be wandering about Covent Garden at 3 a. m. And besides, Hill told us nothing about this. So I brought Evans along to see what you make of it."
Inspector Chippenfield had taken up a pencil and was making a few notes.