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"Did they take anything from you, sir?" he asked. "I've nothing they could take," said Sam. "And they didn't try to find out. They just knocked me down." Forsythe turned to the big man. "This gentleman is a friend of mine, inspector," he said. "He is a stranger in town and was at Pavoni's only by accident." "We might need his testimony," suggested the official.
Lowell." At Pavoni's Sam found Forsythe already seated and, with evident interest, observing the scene of gayety before him. The place was new to Sam, and after the darkness and snow of the streets it appeared both cheerful and resplendent.
When he bought his evening paper six pairs of eyes watched him place a halfpenny in the hand of the news-vender, and during the entire time of his stay in Pavoni's every mouthful he ate was noted every direction he gave the waiter was overheard. Of this surveillance Hertz was well aware. To have been ignorant of it would have argued him blind and imbecile. But he showed no resentment.
His programme was invariably the same. Each night at seven from his front door he walked west. At Regent Street he stopped to buy an evening paper from the aged news-vender at the corner; he then crossed Piccadilly Circus into Coventry Street, skirted Leicester Square, and at the end of Green Street entered Pavoni's Italian restaurant.
Sam rose and stood unsteadily. He found himself surrounded by all of those who but a moment before he had left contentedly dining at Pavoni's. In an excited circle waiters and patrons of the restaurant, both men and women, stood in the falling snow, bareheaded, coatless, and cloakless, staring at him. Forsythe pushed them aside and took Sam by the arm. "What happened?" demanded Sam.
If he can promise me even a shilling a day I'll stay on and starve but I'll be near you. If Forsythe fails me I shall sail Wednesday." The telephone call found Forsythe at the Pall Mall office. He would be charmed to advise Mr. Lowell on a matter of business. Would he that night dine with Mr. Lowell? He would. And might he suggest that they dine at Pavoni's?
"So, it is evident," concluded Sam, "that each night some one in the service of the Times dined at Pavoni's, and that his hat was the same sort of hat as the one worn by Hertz; and each night, inside the lining of his hat, Hertz hid the report of that day's proceedings. And when the Times man left the restaurant he exchanged hats with Hertz. But to-night I got Hertz's hat and with it the treaty!"
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