第95章

He was intensely disgusted in the secrecy of his heart at the unofficial conduct of his immediate chief.But he was not quixotic.He lost all desire to await Mr Verloc's return.What they had gone out for he did not know, but he imagined it possible that they would return together.The case is not followed properly, it's being tampered with, he thought, bitterly.

`I am afraid I haven't time to wait for your husband,' he said.

Mrs Verloc received this declaration listlessly.Her detachment had impressed Chief Inspector Heat all along.At this precise moment it whetted his curiosity.Chief Inspector Heat hung in the wind, swayed by his passions like the most private of citizens.

`I think,' he said, looking at her steadily, `that you could give me a pretty good notion of what's going on if you liked.'

Forcing her fine, inert eyes to return his gaze, Mrs Verloc murmured:

`Going on! What is going on?'

`Why, the affair I came to talk about a little with your husband.'

That day Mrs Verloc had glanced at a morning paper as usual.But she had not stirred out of doors.The newsboys never invaded Brett Street.

It was not a street for their business.And the echo of their cries, drifting along the populous thoroughfares, expired between the dirty brick walls without reaching the threshold of the shop.Her husband had not brought an evening paper home.At any rate she had not seen it.Mrs Verloc knew nothing whatever of any affair.And she said so, with a genuine note of wonder in her quiet voice.

Chief Inspector Heat did not believe for a moment in so much ignorance.

Curtly, without amiability, he stated the bare fact.

Mrs Verloc turned away her eyes.

`I call it silly,' she pronounced, slowly.She paused.`We ain't downtrodden slaves here.'

The Chief Inspector waited watchfully.Nothing more came.

`And your husband didn't mention anything to you when he came home?'

Mrs Verloc simply turned her face from right to left in sign of negation.

A languid, baffling silence reigned in the shop.Chief Inspector Heat felt provoked beyond endurance.

`There was another small matter,' he began in a detached tone, which I wanted to speak to your husband about.There came into our hands a -a - what we believe is - a stolen overcoat.

Mrs Verloc, with her mind specially aware of thieves that evening, touched lightly the bosom of her dress.

`We have lost no overcoat,' she said, calmly.

`That's funny,' continued Private Citizen Heat.`I see you keep a lot of marking ink here--'

He took up a small bottle, and looked at it against the gas-jet in the middle of the shop.

`Purple - isn't it? he remarked, setting it down again.`As I said, it's strange.Because the overcoat has got a label sewn on the inside with your address written in marking ink.'

Mrs Verloc leaned over the counter with a low exclamation.

`That's my brother's, then.'

`Where's your brother? Can I see him?' asked the Chief Inspector, briskly.

Mrs Verloc leaned a little more over the counter.

`No.He isn't here.I wrote that label myself.'

`Where's your brother now?'

`He's been away living with - a friend - in the country.'

`The overcoat comes from the country.And what's the name of the friend?'

`Michaelis,' confessed Mrs Verloc in an awed whisper.

The Chief Inspector let out a whistle.His eyes snapped.

`Just so.Capital.And your brother now, what's he like - a sturdy, darkish chap - eh?'

`Oh, no,' exclaimed Mrs Verloc, fervently.`That must be the thief.

Stevie's slight and fair.'

`Good,' said the Chief Inspector in an approving tone.And while Mrs Verloc, wavering between alarm and wonder, stared at him, he sought for information.Why have the address sewn like this inside the coat? And he heard that the mangled remains he had inspected that morning with extreme repugnance were those of a youth, nervous, absent-minded, peculiar, and also that the woman who was speaking to him had had the charge of that boy since he was a baby.

`Easily excitable?' he suggested.

`Oh, yes.He is.But how did he come to lose his coat--'

Chief Inspector Heat suddenly pulled out a pink newspaper he had bought less than half an hour ago.He was interested in horses.Forced by his calling into an attitude of doubt and suspicion towards his fellow citizens, Chief Inspector Heat relieved the instinct of credulity implanted in the human breast by putting unbounded faith in the sporting prophets of that particular evening publication.Dropping the extra special on to the counter, he plunged his hand again into his pocket, and pulling out the piece of cloth fate had presented him with out of a heap of things that seemed to have been collected in shambles and rag shops, he offered it to Mrs Verloc for inspection.

`I suppose you recognize this?'

She took it mechanically in both her hands.Her eyes seemed to grow bigger as she looked.

`Yes,' she whispered, then raised her head, and staggered backward a little.

`Whatever for is it torn out like this?'

The Chief Inspector snatched across the counter the cloth out of her hands, and she sat heavily on the chair.He thought: identification's perfect.

And in that moment he had a glimpse into the whole amazing truth.Verloc was the `other man'.

`Mrs Verloc,' he said, `it strikes me that you know more of this bomb affair than even you yourself are aware of.'

Mrs Verloc sat still, amazed, lost in boundless astonishment.What was the connection? And she became so rigid all over that she was not able to turn her head at the clatter of the bell, which caused the private investigator Heat to spin round on his heel.Mr Verloc had shut the door, and for a moment the two men looked at each other.

Mr Verloc, without looking at his wife, walked up to the Chief Inspector, who was relieved to see him return alone.

`You here!' muttered Mr Verloc, heavily.`Who are you after?'

`No one,' said Chief Inspector Heat in a low tone.`Look here, I would like a word or two with you.'

Mr Verloc, still pale, had brought an air of resolution with him.Still he didn't look at his wife.He said: