This is Mr. Scarterfield—from the police at Devonport. Mr. Scarterfield has been in charge of the investigations about the affair—Noah Quick, you know—down there, and he has come here to make some further inquiries."
Mr. Raven murmured some commonplace about being glad to see his visitors, and, with his usual hospitality, offered them refreshment. We made room for them at the table at which we were sitting, and some of us, I think, were impatient to hear what Mr. Scarterfield had to tell. But the detective was evidently one of those men who readily adapt themselves to whatever company they are thrown into, and he betrayed no eagerness to get to business until he had lighted one of Mr. Raven's cigars and pledged Mr. Raven in a whisky and soda. Then, equipped and at his ease, he turned a friendly, all-embracing smile on the rest of us.
"Which," he asked, looking from one to the other, "which of these gentlemen is Mr. Middlebrook?"
The general turning of several pairs of eyes in my direction gave him the information he wanted—we exchanged nods.
"It was you who found Salter Quick?" he suggested. "And who met him, the previous day, on the cliffs hereabouts, and went with him into the Mariner's Joy?"
"Quite correct," said I. "All that!"
"I have read up everything that appeared in print in connection with the Salter Quick affair," he remarked. "It has, of course, a bearing on the Noah Quick business. Whatever is of interest in the one is of interest in the other."
