“That’s the curious point. He was an old chap I’ve seen about the neighbourhood many times—thin, rather shabby and disreputable, grey hair and moustache—lives in your road, I think. Drake says you know him.”
“Kershaw Kirk!” I gasped.
“Yes; that’s the name Drake said before he went out with the ‘sixty,’” replied my manager.
“What does he want with a tyre when he hasn’t got a car?”
I stood in silence. What, indeed, did that man want with one of the new tyres? Had he merely come down there to have further words with me, or did he require a cover for some specific purpose?
My mind, however, was made up. I had resolved to go to New Scotland Yard, and, even though tardily, to place the whole of the facts before the Criminal Investigation Department. Therefore I got out the “forty-eight” and drove along the Hammersmith Road and Knightsbridge, across St. James’s Park, and through Storey’s Gate to Whitehall. I alighted in the big courtyard of the police headquarters, where a number of motor-’buses were drawn up for inspection, and entered the large stone hall, when a constable came forward to inquire my business.
I handed him my card, explaining that I wished to see one of the detective inspectors upon a confidential matter, and was shown upstairs and along a wide corridor to a bare waiting-room.
For some ten minutes I remained there, when the door opened, and I found myself face to face with a middle-aged, pleasant-faced man, who was one of the most noted and experienced officers of the department.
For a moment I held my breath. I recollected all the threats that had been made of Mabel’s peril if I dared to speak the truth.
The detective-inspector closed the door behind him, and, wishing me a polite “Good morning,” inquired my business.