“Have you anything to add to that?” said Dunbar, fixing his tawny eyes upon the cabman.
“Nothing at all,” replied the man—a very spruce and intelligent specimen of his class and one who, although he had moved with the times, yet retained a slightly horsey appearance, which indicated that he had not always been a mechanical Jehu.
“It is quite satisfactory as far as it goes,” muttered Dunbar. “I'll get you to sign it now and we need not detain you any longer.”
“There is not the slightest doubt,” said Dr. Cumberly, stepping forward and speaking in an unusually harsh voice, “that Helen endeavored to track this man Gianapolis, and was abducted by him or his associates. The limousine was the car of which we have heard so much”...
“If my cabman had not been such a... fool,” broke in Denise Ryland, clasping her hands, “we should have had a different... tale to tell.”
“I have no wish to reproach anybody,” said Dunbar, sternly; “but I feel called upon to remark, madam, that you ought to have known better than to interfere in a case like this; a case in which we are dealing with a desperate and clever gang.”
For once in her life Denise Ryland found herself unable to retort suitably. The mildly reproachful gaze of Leroux she could not meet; and although Dr. Cumberly had spoken no word of complaint against her, from his pale face she persistently turned away her eyes.
The cabman having departed, the door almost immediately reopened, and Sergeant Sowerby came in.
“Ah! there you are, Sowerby!” cried Dunbar, standing up and leaning eagerly across the table. “You have the particulars respecting the limousine?”
Sergeant Sowerby, removing his hat and carefully placing it upon the only vacant chair in the room, extracted a bulging notebook from a pocket concealed beneath his raincoat, cleared his throat, and reported as follows: