"Do you know the name of the man?"
Davis tapped his forehead in the effort of recollection.
"It's on the tip of my tongue, sir: it will come to me in a moment—a man who was mixed up in a gambling scandal, and had to leave the country. Ah, I have got it now, he was known familiarly as Tommie Esmond."
Mr. Bryant rose. He had got all he could out of his new acquaintance. The threads in his hand were drawing closer into a web.
"Well, Mr. Davis, good-day. Many thanks for the information you have given me, it has been very helpful. I will keep in touch with you."
"And you think, with me, it was a murder, and not a suicide?" questioned Davis as he left.
But Bryant was not the man to express a decided opinion until he was fully justified by the facts. He kept his thoughts to himself till the last moment.
He smiled pleasantly. "Time will show. I shall have that body exhumed, as soon as I have made a few further inquiries."
Davis had to be content with this oracular utterance, and bowed himself out. He solaced himself by narrating all that had occurred to the wondering Carrie.
The matter had now become one for the activities of Scotland Yard. The first thing to be done was to ascertain the whereabouts of Hugh Murchison, that is to say, if he was still in the land of the living. Some time had elapsed since he had communicated with Parkinson. Of course, in itself, there would be nothing strange in that. Parkinson had got the information that was required, been paid for it, and with that payment, their relations had ended.