The inspector put his hand into his pocket and brought it out full of coins, as if to make sure of his loose change before setting out. A sixpenny piece slid through his fingers and rolled swiftly across the smooth surface of the table towards Miller, and Miller's hand shot out in an abrupt preventive movement as it was about to drop off the table's edge to the floor. He fumbled for a moment with his gloved hand and then laid the coin down on the table.
"Trifling things, these," he remarked in his flat amiable voice. But it was his right hand that he had used to stop it.
As they were driving down to the mortuary in a car he turned to the inspector with the almost noiseless expulsion of breath that in him did duty for a laugh. "Say," he said, "if any of my pals see me now, they'll all be boarding a dangler for Southampton inside five minutes and not waiting to pack."
"Well, we'd do the packing — back," said Grant.
"Got us all taped like that, have you? Would you bet on it? I'll lay you five to one in dollars — no, pounds — five to one in pounds that you don't have one of us settled inside two years. You won't take it? Well, I think you're wise."
When Miller was brought face to face with the body of the murdered man, Grant's eager eyes could trace no shadow of expression on that poker face. Danny's cool grey glance wandered over the dead man's features in a half-interested indifference. And Grant knew certainly that, even had Miller known the man, his hope of a betraying gesture or expression had been a vain one.
"No," Danny was saying, "I never saw the man in my — " He stopped. There was a long pause. "Say, but I did!" he said. "Oh, gosh, let me think! Where was it? Where was it? Wait a minute, and it'll come." He beat a hectic tattoo on his forehead with his gloved palm. Was this acting, thought Grant? Good acting, if so. But then Miller would never make the mistake of acting badly. "Oh, gosh, I can't get it! I talked to him, too. Don't think I ever knew his name, but I'm. sure I talked to him."
In the end Grant gave it up — he had the inquest in front of him — but it was more than Danny Miller did. The fact that his brain had gone back on him was an outrage in his eyes and quite insupportable. "I never forget a man," he kept saying, "any more than a 'bull' does."
"Well, you can think it over and telephone to me," said Grant. "Meanwhile, will you do one thing more for me?…Will you take your gloves off?"
Danny's eyes shut suddenly to bright slits. "What's the big idea?" he said.