"You want to have it out of a bottle," I continued confidentially--
"Martell's Three Stars."
He stared at me uncomprehendingly.
"I don't know," he said haltingly. "I have very little English."
"Oh, that's it!" I cried, speaking French with a barbarous accent.
"You only speak French?"
"Yes, yes," he replied eagerly. "It is so difficult to make oneself
understood. This spirit is not cognac, it is some kind of petrol!"
Finishing my bitter, I ordered two glasses of good brandy and placed
one before "Le Balafre."
"Try that," I said, continuing to speak in French, "You will find it
is better."
He sipped from his glass and agreed that I was right. We chatted
together for ten minutes and had another drink, after which my
dangerous-looking acquaintance wished me good-night and went out. The
car had come from the West, and I strongly suspected that my man either
lived in the neighbourhood or had come there to keep an appointment.
Leaving my cab outside the public-house, I followed him on foot, down
Three Colt Street to Ropemaker Street, where he turned into a narrow
alley leading to the riverside. It was straight and deserted, and I
dared not follow further until he had reached the corner. I heard his
footsteps pass right to the end. Then the sound died away. I ran to
the corner. The back of a wharf building--a high blank wall--faced a
row of ramshackle tenements, some of them built of wood; but not a
soul was in sight.
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