The visitor looked from one man to the other and lowered his voice a
little.

"It's possible I can give you a little," he said. "That, indeed, is the
real reason why I set off to see you this morning. You will remember
that Hyde, the man who is charged with the murder, said before the
Coroner that as he turned into Lonsdale Passage, he saw coming out of
it a tall man in black clothes who was swathed to the very eyes in a big
white muffler?"

"Yes!" said Mr. Pawle. "Well?"

"I saw such a man with Ashton in Paris," answered Mr. Armitstead. "Hyde's
description exactly tallies with what I myself should have said."

Mr. Pawle looked at his visitor with still more interest and attention.

"Now, that really is of importance!" he exclaimed. "If Hyde saw such a
man--as I believe he did--and you saw such a man, then that man must
exist, and the facts that you saw him with Ashton, and that Hyde saw him
in close proximity to the place where Ashton was murdered, are of the
highest consequence. But--you can tell us more, Mr. Armitstead?"

"Unfortunately, very little," replied the visitor. "What I saw was on the
night before I left Paris--after it I never saw Ashton again to speak to.
It was late at night. Do you know the Rue Royale? There is at the end of
it a well-known restaurant, close to the Place de la Concorde--I was
sitting outside this about a quarter to eleven when I saw Ashton and the
man I am speaking of pass along the pavement in the direction of the