“Why, yes!” cried Hamilton Gould. “I’m ready to wager he is.”
“Will you show us the man?” demanded Mrs. Bigelow.
“Perhaps I may, who knows?”
Then all burst out laughing; Ascott had just drawn their attention to the smoking compartment at the far end of the car, where a passenger lay fast asleep, adding the suggestion:
“Perhaps it’s that gentleman.”
First the men, then the ladies, all equally amused and curious, stole one by one to peep in at the traveller who was still fast asleep, little dreaming of the interest he aroused.
But the man of the silvery hair again drew attention to himself by his criticism of Ascott’s identification.
“It shows a want of perspicacity, sir,” he declared, “to take the gentleman sleeping there for Tom Bob. In the first place a detective does not sleep; besides which, one has only to look at your man in the smoking carriage to be quite sure, first, that he is a Frenchman; that is plain from the cut of his clothes, and second, that he is an officer, in fact I should say an officer actually serving with the colours.”
Much impressed, Sonia Danidoff drew nearer to the speaker: “And what tells you that, sir?” The man bowed gravely.
“Nothing simpler, madam! To begin with, look at that bundle of sticks and umbrellas in the net above his head; amongst them don’t you see something long in a green baize case?—a sword, an officer’s sword, obviously! Then notice his temples; the hair lies flat to the head all round a circular line, while it sticks out like other people’s just below at the level of the top of the ear—that means our gentleman usually wears a képi. Then, consider, apart from the moustache, the only hair he wears on his face, the bronze of the skin, stopping short at the neck—there you have a man used to living in the open air. I believe I am pretty accurate in my diagnosis ... what do you think of it?”