“You’re certain you’ve never seen him before?”
“Quite certain,” he replied.
At that moment his wife entered, and, addressing her, he said:
“We’re talking of that stranger who’s just gone, missus. His movements were a bit suspicious, weren’t they?”
“Yes. Why he should want to go out half the night wandering about the neighbourhood I can’t make out, unless he were a burglar or something o’ that sort,” the woman answered, adding: “I shouldn’t be at all surprised to hear that one of the houses about here has been broken into. Anyhow, we’d know him again among a thousand.”
“What kind of man was he?”
“Tall and dark, with a beard, and a pair of eyes that seemed to look you through. He spoke all right, but I’ve my doubts as to whether he wasn’t a foreigner.”
“A foreigner!” I echoed quickly, interested. “What made you suspect that?”
“I really can’t tell. I had a suspicion of it the first moment I saw him. He pronounced his ‘r’s’ rather curiously. His clothes seemed to be of foreign cut, and his boots, although worn out, were unusually long and narrow. I brushed ’em this morning, and saw on the tabs a foreign name. I think it was ‘Firenze,’ or something like that.”
I reflected for an instant. The word “Firenze” was Italian for Florence, the town where the boots had evidently been made. Therefore the mysterious stranger might be Italian.