“Now you’re asking me a riddle,” said the taxi man. “I may have seen two ladies, or again I may have seen a hundred of them, or I mayn’t have seen none at all. That’s more than I could tell you.”
“You didn’t happen to notice any particular two?”
“No, sir, I did not. If I was to go driving about the streets a-looking at all the pretty ladies I see about, I’d be troubling the insurance people a bit too often. I keep my eyes on what’s in the roadway and that takes me all my time, I don’t think.”
“Quite so,” said Gimblet. “Of course you are perfectly right not to look about you. Well now, perhaps you could tell me this. In going from Hilliard Street to Carolina Road, would you pass through a row of single detached houses on the way? Houses all standing in their own gardens some little way apart from each other?”
The man considered, mumbling to himself the names of the streets, as he made a mental journey along the route the detective indicated. In a minute he looked up.
“There’s Scholefield Avenue,” he suggested, “that’s all little places like what you say.”
“Did you go by it on Monday?” asked Gimblet.
“I did, sir. It’s about half-way. There isn’t no other street on the road with the houses all separate like that, so far’s I can recollect. I’ve got me cab down at the door, sir; why don’t you jump in and let me take you along to see for yourself?”
“I think that’s exactly what I will do,” said Gimblet. “You go down and I’ll follow in a moment.”