"Who was that you were with as you came up the road?"
"What! Don't you all know him? Why, who could it be but Tom Blake?"
Significant looks passed between the three men. Paulton was the first to speak:
"You don't mean to say, Jerry, that you have----"
"Indeed I have. I met him on the platform at Victoria, and we came out in the same compartment together."
Jerry O'Brien seemed as much astonished at what he had done as his friends.
"But," urged Paulton, "you gave him the worst of characters the day before yesterday, and said he had something to do with this awful affair. Since then things have grown blacker against him, and yet you don't cut him! You come out here arm-in-arm with him to the very inquest where you say he will have to answer the ugliest questions which can be put to a man!"
"I bar only one thing in what you have said, Alfred. I did not walk out with him arm-in-arm. I met him quite accidentally at Victoria. I told you I should be here at the inquest. I was on my way here. I no more expected to see him than the man in the moon. He pounced on me suddenly, and rushed me. As a rule, I can take care of myself, but I admit I am no match for Blake. I am not sure I ever met his match. Look here, Pringle; I know you're a first-rate fellow at your work. You're not as old as you might be, but you're one of the best men in England for this kind of a job. However, if you have to tackle Tom Blake, he'll give you as much as you want."
Jerry O'Brien spoke with heightened colour, and in a tone of intense irritation.
This opinion was not unwelcome to Pringle's ears, for he knew that, no matter how big a scoundrel Blake might be, he would say nothing to inculpate Mrs. Davenport.