‘I don’t know. I didn’t ask him. But I should think he would. He struck me as being a very efficient and intelligent young man.’
‘You didn’t ask him for details?’
‘If someone told you, Mr Grant, that he had discovered a holly tree growing in the middle of Piccadilly immediately opposite the In and Out, would you be interested? Or would you just think that you must be patient with him? I know the Empty Quarter as well as you know Piccadilly.’
‘Yes, of course. Then it was not you who saw him off at the station?’
‘Mr Grant, I never see anyone off. A combination of masochism and sadism that I have always deplored. Off where, by the way?’
‘To Scoone.’
‘To the Highlands? I understood that he was longing for some gaiety. Why was he going to the Highlands?’
‘We don’t know. That is one of the things we are most anxious to find out. He said nothing to you that might provide a clue?’
‘No. He did suggest finding other backing. I mean, when I had proved a broken reed. Perhaps he had found a backer, or hoped to find a backer, who lives up there. I can’t think of any obvious one off-hand. There is Kinsey-Hewitt, of course. He has Scottish connections. But I think he is in Arabia at the moment.’
Well, at least Lloyd had provided the first reasonable explanation of the flying visit north with an overnight case. To talk to a possible backer. He had found a backer at the last moment, when he was almost due to meet Tad Cullen in Paris, and had dashed north to see him. That fitted beautifully. They were getting on. But why as Charles Martin?