CHAPTER TWO
THE SECRET MAN
Wedgwood was a quiet, stolid, reserved man, who had learnt how to hold his tongue. He had seen the diamond—or, at any rate, something which he fancied might turn out to be a diamond—on first entering the room, and had said nothing about it to his companions. Now that he held it in his hand, he knew it to be a diamond: he had had experience of diamonds in the course of his professional career. It looked like a good diamond, too—worth a fair amount of money. And it had undoubtedly dropped out of its setting in a ring or a pin. His assurance as to that fact made him examine the dead man's hands and his neck-wear. But Wraypoole had no ring on either hand, and there was no scarf-pin in his cravat. The detective put the diamond carefully away in his pocketbook, and when the police had removed the body from the parlour he locked up the flat and took the key to Miss Tandy. He said nothing to her about the diamond, but he asked her a question or two about Wraypoole.
"Porteous Road, Paddington, was the ad-
15
