"Davis, Richard Harding - The Lost House" - читать интересную книгу автора (Davis Richard Harding)

winder to a organ-grinder.' I snatches it, and runs. I didn't take
no time to look at the houses. But it wasn't so far from where I
showed you; about the middle house in the street and on the left
'and side."

Ford had never considered the man as a serious element in the
problem. He believed him to know as little of the matter as he
professed to know. But it was essential he should keep that little
to himself.

"No one will pay you for talking," Ford pointed out, "and I'll pay
you to keep quiet. So, if you say nothing concerning that note, at
the end of two weeks, I'll leave two pounds for you with James, at
the Embassy."

The man, who believed Ford to be an agent of the police, was only
too happy to escape on such easy terms. After Ford had given him a
pound on account, they parted.

From Wimpole Street the amateur detective went to the nearest
public telephone and called up Gerridge's Hotel. He considered his
first step should be to discover if Mr. Pearsall was at that hotel,
or had ever stopped there. When the 'phone was answered, he
requested that a message be delivered to Mr. Pearsall.

"Please tell him," he asked, "that the clothes he ordered are ready
to try on."

He was informed that no one by that name was at the hotel. In a
voice of concern Ford begged to know when Mr. Pearsall had gone
away, and had he left any address.

He was with you three weeks ago," Ford insisted. "He's an American
gentleman, and there was a lady with him. She ordered a
riding-habit of us: the same time he was measured for his clothes."

After a short delay, the voice from the hotel replied that no one
of the name of Pearsall had been at the hotel that winter.

In apparent great disgust Ford rang off, and took a taxicab to his
rooms in Jermyn Street. There he packed a suit-case and drove to
Gerridge's. It was a quiet, respectable, "old- established" house
in Craven Street, a thoroughfare almost entirely given over to
small family hotels much frequented by Americans.

After he had registered and had left his bag in his room, Ford
returned to the office, and in an assured manner asked that a card
on which he had written "Henry W. Page, Dalesville, Kentucky,"
should be taken to Mr. Pearsall.