"It was light, Daphne? You could see?"
"Oh, yes, sir."
Inspector Chippenfield told the child she was a good girl, and gave her sixpence. The little one slipped off his knee and ran across to her mother with delight, to show the coin; all unconscious that she had betrayed her father. The mother pushed the child from her with a heart-broken gesture.
A heavy step was heard in the shop, and the inspector, looking through the window, saw Rolfe. He opened the door leading from the shop and beckoned his subordinate in.
Rolfe was excited, and looked like a man burdened with weighty news. He whispered a word in Inspector Chippenfield's ear.
"Let's go into the shop," said Inspector Chippenfield promptly. "But, first, I'll make things safe here." He locked the door leading to the kitchen, put the key into his pocket, and followed his colleague into the shop. "Now, Rolfe, what is it?"
"I've found out that Hill put in nearly the whole day after the murder drinking in a wine tavern. He sat there like a man in a dream and spoke to nobody. The only thing he took any interest in was the evening papers. He bought about a dozen of them during the afternoon."
"Where was this?" asked the inspector.
"At a little wine tavern in High Street, where he's never been seen before. The man who keeps the place gave me a good description of him, though. Hill went there about ten o'clock in the morning, and started drinking port wine, and as fast as the evening papers came out he sent the boy out for them, glanced through them, and then crumpled them up. He stayed there till after five o'clock. By that time the 6.30 editions would reach Camden Town, and if you remember it was the six-thirty editions which had the first news of the murder. The tavern-keeper declares that Hill drank nearly two bottles of Tarragona port, in threepenny glasses, during the day."
"I should have credited Hill with a better taste in port, with his opportunities as Sir Horace Fewbanks's butler," said Inspector Chippenfield drily. "What you have found out, Rolfe, only goes to bear out my own discovery that Hill is deeply implicated in this affair. I have found out, for my part, that Hill did not spend the night of the murder at home here."