A Tramp and the Toothache

I said nothing to her, however, of the detective's suspicions about
Alex. Little things that I had not noticed at the time now came back
to me. I had an uncomfortable feeling that perhaps Alex was a spy, and
that by taking him into the house I had played into the enemy's hand.
But at eight o'clock that night Alex himself appeared, and with him a
strange and repulsive individual. They made a queer pair, for Alex was
almost as disreputable as the tramp, and he had a badly swollen eye.

Gertrude had been sitting listlessly waiting for the evening message
from Mr. Jamieson, but when the singular pair came in, as they did,
without ceremony, she jumped up and stood staring. Winters, the
detective who watched the house at night, followed them, and kept his
eyes sharply on Alex's prisoner. For that was the situation as it
developed.

He was a tall lanky individual, ragged and dirty, and just now he
looked both terrified and embarrassed. Alex was too much engrossed to
be either, and to this day I don't think I ever asked him why he went
off without permission the day before.

"Miss Innes," Alex began abruptly, "this man can tell us something very
important about the disappearance of Mr. Innes. I found him trying to
sell this watch."

He took a watch from his pocket and put it on the table. It was
Halsey's watch. I had given it to him on his twenty-first birthday: I
was dumb with apprehension.

"He says he had a pair of cuff-links also, but he sold them--"