shore at Leith. What's the
harm in a poor devil with an empty stomach picking up some money he
finds in a bust-up motor-car? That's all I done, and for that I've
been chivvied for two days by those blasted bobbies over those blasted
hills. I tell you I'm fair sick of it. You can do what you like, old
boy! Ned Ainslie's got no fight left in him.'

I could see that the doubt was gaining.

'Will you oblige me with the story of your recent doings?'he asked. 'I
can't, guv'nor,' I said in a real beggar's whine. 'I've not had a bite
to eat for two days. Give me a mouthful of food, and then you'll hear
God's truth.'

I must have showed my hunger in my face, for he signalled to one of the
men in the doorway. A bit of cold pie was brought and a glass of beer,
and I wolfed them down like a pig--or rather, like Ned Ainslie, for I
was keeping up my character. In the middle of my meal he spoke
suddenly to me in German, but I turned on him a face as blank as a
stone wall.

Then I told him my story--how I had come off an Archangel ship at Leith
a week ago, and was making my way overland to my brother at Wigtown. I
had run short of cash--I hinted vaguely at a spree--and I was pretty
well on my uppers when I had come on a hole in a hedge, and, looking
through, had seen a big motor-car lying in the burn. I had poked about
to see what had happened, and had found three sovereigns lying on the
seat and one on the floor. There was nobody there or any sign of an
owner, so I had pocketed the cash. But somehow the law had got after
me. When I had tried to change a sovereign in a baker's shop, the
woman had cried on the police, and a little later, when I was washing
my face in a burn, I had been nearly gripped, and had only got away by
leaving my coat and waistcoat behind me.

'They can have the money back,' I cried, 'for a fat lot of good it's
done me. Those perishers are all down on a poor man. Now, if it had
been you, guv'nor, that had found the quids, nobody would have troubled
you.'

'You're a good liar, Hannay,' he said.

I flew into a rage. 'Stop fooling, damn you! I tell you my name's
Ainslie, and I never heard of anyone called Hannay in my born days.
I'd sooner have the police than you with your Hannays and your
monkey-faced pistol tricks ... No, guv'nor, I beg pardon, I don't mean
that. I'm much obliged to you for the grub, and I'll thank you to let
me go now the coast's clear.'

It was obvious that he wa