“Ah, yes,” he replied, with a slight gesticulation; “it is true that I was in Manchester. But our meeting here must be by mere chance. I was unaware that monsieur was in Manchester,” he assured me in a suave manner.
“Well,” I said in French, “yours is a very lame story, monsieur. I saw you, and you also saw me talking to Mr. Pennington in the Midland Hotel. Perhaps you’ll deny that you know Mr. Pennington—eh?”
“I certainly do not deny that,” he said, with a smile. “I have known Monsieur Penning-ton for some years. It is true that I saw him at the Midland.”
“And you withdrew in order to escape his observation—eh?”
“Monsieur has quick eyes,” he said. “Yes, that is quite true.”
“Why?”
“For reasons of my own.”
“And you deny having followed me here?”
He hesitated for a second, looking straight into my face in the darkness.
“Come,” I said, “you may as well admit that you followed me from Manchester.”