“Cut it out, Harry,” snapped Moreland. “Pull yourself together. There’s a bit of a row on. Lucky I was on hand, or you’d have had one of your people croaked.”

The divisional detective inspector listened with grave face, as Moreland recited some of the evening’s happenings.

The Flying Squad man, with a couple of his subordinates, had happened, in the course of another case on which he was engaged, to be in the dining-room of a little Soho restaurant, when the sergeant who had been sent out to find Stebbins, entered with a man who was unknown to Moreland. They had sat down at a table where a third man was already eating, and Moreland saw the sergeant introduced. Without hesitation the hand of the diner immediately sought a water carafe and aimed a terrific blow at Labar’s sergeant. The blow had missed, but in a second the place was in an uproar and the two were rolling across an overturned table grappling with each other.