“I think so,” was the modest reply of his superior.  “There is one thing about Sir Horace’s account which struck me as peculiar.  Every four weeks for the past eight months Sir Horace drew a cheque for L24, and every cheque of the kind was made payable to Number 365.  Now, unless he wished to hide the nature of the transaction from his bankers, why not put in the cheque in the name of the person who received the money?  It couldn’t have been for his personal use, for in that case he would have made the cheques payable to self.  Besides, a man with a banking account doesn’t draw a regular L24 every four weeks for personal expenses.  He draws a cheque just when he wants a few pounds, instead of carrying five-pound notes about with him.  I asked the bank manager about these cheques and he looked up a couple of them and found they had been cashed over the counter.  So he called up the cashier and from him I learnt that Sir Horace came in and cashed them.  As far as he can remember Sir Horace cashed all these L24 cheques.  I assume he did so because he realised that there was less likely to be comment in the bank than if a well-dressed good-looking young lady arrived at the bank with them.  This L24 a month suggests that Sir Horace had something choice and not too expensive stowed away in a flat.  That is a matter on which Hill ought to be able to throw some light.  If he knows anything I’ll get it out of him.  It struck me as extraordinary that Sir Horace should have taken Hill into his service knowing what he was.  But this, apparently, is the explanation.  He knew that Hill wouldn’t gossip about him for fear of being exposed, for that would mean that Hill would lose his situation and would find it impossible to get another one without a reference from him.  We’ll have Hill brought here—­”

There was a knock at the door, and a boy in buttons entered and handed Inspector Chippenfield a card.

“Seldon from Hampstead,” he explained to Rolfe.  “Don’t go away yet.  It may be something about this case.”

Police-Inspector Seldon entered the office, and held the door ajar for a man behind him.  He shook hands with Inspector Chippenfield and Rolfe, and then motioned his companion to a chair.

“This is Mr. Robert Evans, the landlord of the Flowerdew Hotel, Covent Garden,” he explained.  He looked at Mr. Evans with the air of a police-court inspector waiting for a witness to corroborate his statement, but as that gentleman remained silent he sharply asked, “Isn’t that so?”

“Quite right,” said Mr. Evans, in a moist, husky voice.

He was a short fat man, with an extremely red face and bulging eyes, which watered very much and apparently required to be constantly mopped with a handkerchief which he carried in his hand.  This peculiarity gave Mr. Evans the appearance of a man perpetually in mourning, and this effect was heightened by a species of incipient palsy which had seized on his lower facial muscles, and caused his lips to tremble violently.  He was bald in the front of the head but not on the top.  The baldness over the temples had joined hands and left isolated over the centre of the forehead a small tuft of hair, which, with the playfulness of second childhood, showed a tendency to curl.