“Things are happening. I will send at once a couple of sergeants to help you. Hold on till my men arrive and then come straight on to me.”
It is a far cry from Scotland Yard to Mare Street, Hackney. But, occupied with his own thoughts, it seemed only a few minutes to Varney when the two detectives drove up, and alighted at the door of the public-house. A swift taxi can do wonders in annihilating space.
The elder of the two men, whom Varney knew slightly, advanced towards him.
“Good-day, Mr Varney. We struck here first, as being the nearest. They’re still inside, eh?”
“I should have left, if not. Well, I suppose you will take up my job.”
“That’s about it, sir. Mr Smeaton told me he would like to see you as soon as possible. I think he has got something important to communicate. We’ll wait for these two gentlemen. Stent and the Russian, to come out—Farloe we have nothing against at present—and then we’ll clap the darbies on them in a twinkling.”
Varney, for a moment, looked incredulous. “But on what charge?”
The detective grinned. “One that we only knew of yesterday. A charge of fraud in connection with certain rubber property. Another man of the name of Whyman is in it, but he seems to have got clear away.”
Varney, his brain in a whirl, took his way back to Scotland Yard, still in his costume of a working-man.
“Well, what does it all mean?” he gasped, when he got into Smeaton’s room.