"Is he a friend of yours?"
Joe laughed derisively. "Not much. I ain't pertic'ler, but I likes to draw the line somewhere."
"Oh, he's a bad lot, eh?"
"That's as it may be," replied Joe cautiously. "I ain't sayin' nothing, not one way nor the other, but any'ow, I don't fancy 'is comp'ny."
From the security of his retreat Colin subjected "Spike" Cooper to a critical examination. He was a tough-looking customer with broad, powerful shoulders and a lean, mahogany-coloured face. In spite of his somewhat shabby clothes he was evidently on familiar terms with Fenton, for he lounged back against the wall with his hands in his pockets and a half-smoked cigarette hanging from the corner of his lips.
Colin turned to Joe. "Where did you come across him?" he asked.
The ex-pugilist wrinkled his forehead. "Well, I can't say to rights. I think it was the Blue Boar at Shoreditch. 'E's bin 'anging arahnd these pubs for the last two months, though where 'e come from afore that Gawd knows. Some kind of a Yank, I reckon, judgin' by 'is talk."
Colin took another long and deliberate stare at the oddly assorted couple.
"Joe," he said, "will you do something for me?"
"You ain't no call to ask that," returned Joe a little reproachfully.