That day was the twenty-sixth of August, and as I walked along the Rue de Rivoli back to the Hotel Meurice, I suddenly remembered the mysterious tryst contained in that letter found in the pocket of Edward Craig. The appointment at the spot, "where the two C's meet," at Ealing.
I left Paris that night by the mail-train, crossed from Calais to Dover, and at noon next day alighted at Ealing Broadway station.
I had never been in Ealing before, and spent several hours wandering about its quiet, well-kept suburban roads, many of them of comfortable-looking detached villas. But I found the district a perfect maze of streets, therefore I went and sat on one of the seats in the small park in front of the station, wondering how best to act.
Two clear days were still before me ere the meeting which had apparently been arranged with old Gregory—the man with the master-mind.
"Where the two C's meet."
I lunched at the Feathers Hotel near the station, and all that hot afternoon wandered the streets, but failed to discover any clue. What "C's" were meant? Possibly two persons whose initials were C were in the habit of meeting at some spot, or in some house at Ealing—and Ealing is a big place when one is presented with such a problem.
Fagged and hungry, I returned to my rooms in Carlos Place, off Berkeley Square, where Rayner was awaiting me. He knew the object of my search, and as he admitted me, asked if I had been successful.
"No, Rayner, I haven't," I snapped. "I can see no ray of daylight yet. The appointment is an important one, no doubt, and one which we should watch. But how?"
"Well, sir," he replied, as I cast myself into my big arm-chair, and he got out my slippers, "we could watch the two railway stations at Ealing, and see if we detect old Gregory, or any of the others."
"They might go to Ealing in a tram or a taxi," I suggested.