“After lunch, of course,” said Mallett with decision. “Let’s see, Fanshawe’s coming here at three, isn’t he? Well, I’m not going to interview him on an empty stomach, if I can help it. There’s nothing else, is there?”

“There’s a big bunch of reports from all over the country about people resembling James,” answered the sergeant. “I suppose they’ll all have to be enquired into, but not one of them looks the least helpful.”

A description of James based upon the evidence already obtained and described with the usual euphemism as that of “a man whom the police desire to interview” had been circulated. These were just beginning to bear fruit, and the resulting harvest was, as Frant said, an unpromising one. Mysterious stout men with beards seemed to have appeared all at once in every part of England. They had been seen leaping into taxis, disappearing down subways, lurking suspiciously behind the hedges of country lanes. Late at night, they had drunk hasty cups of tea at London coffee-stalls or cadged lifts from lorry-drivers on arterial roads. They had even been seen, faces in the dark, peering through the windows of blameless suburban residences. Every one of them, Mallett knew, was probably the product of mere hysteria, begotten of an urge to figure in the news; but somewhere in the heap of nonsense might lurk the one grain of information that would make all the difference. Therefore it would all have to be sifted, enquired into, patiently and relentlessly, until its worthlessness was proved.

Mallett looked at the bulging file and then at his watch.

“Not now,” he said. “Have you ever noticed, Frant, how a big dinner the night before gives you an appetite for lunch next day?”

“I can’t say that I have,” answered Frant.

“Really, I have, often. I’m off now. These things must wait. I feel so hungry that I shouldn’t care to stop if Mr. James stepped into the room this minute.”

There was a knock at the door.

“Yes, yes, what is it?”

An officer put his head round the door.

“Excuse me, sir,” he said, “but there’s a man here who’s very anxious to see you at once. He says his name is Colin James.”

Mallett sank back into his chair.

“I take it all back,” he gasped.

Whatever anxiety Mr. James may have had to visit Scotland Yard, it was apparent that once there he found himself in a state of great embarrassment. He stood in the doorway of Mallett’s room, shifting his heavy weight from one foot to another, and turning watery blue eyes first on Mallett, then on Frant, and finally on a vacant spot midway between them. He was palpably in a miserably nervous state, and looked as though an incautious sound or movement would send him bolting back through the door again.