that was pretty clear. Any shadow of a doubt I
might have had about the truth of Scudder's tale was now gone. The
proof of it was lying under the table-cloth. The men who knew that he
knew what he knew had found him, and had taken the best way to make
certain of his silence. Yes; but he had been in my rooms four days,
and his enemies must have reckoned that he had confided in me. So I
would be the next to go. It might be that very night, or next day, or
the day after, but my number was up all right.

Then suddenly I thought of another probability. Supposing I went out
now and called in the police, or went to bed and let Paddock find the
body and call them in the morning. What kind of a story was I to tell
about Scudder? I had lied to Paddock about him, and the whole thing
looked desperately fishy. If I made a clean breast of it and told the
police everything he had told me, they would simply laugh at me. The
odds were a thousand to one that I would be charged with the murder,
and the circumstantial evidence was strong enough to hang me. Few
people knew me in England; I had no real pal who could come forward and
swear to my character. Perhaps that was what those secret enemies were
playing for. They were clever enough for anything, and an English
prison was as good a way of getting rid of me till after June 15th as a
knife in my chest.

Besides, if I told the whole story, and by any miracle was believed, I
would be playing their game. Karolides would stay at home, which was
what they wanted. Somehow or other the sight of Scudder's dead face
had made me a passionate believer in his scheme. He was gone, but he
had taken me into his confidence, and I was pretty well bound to carry
on his work.

You may think this ridiculous for a man in danger of his life, but that
was the way I looked at it. I am an ordinary sort of fellow, not
braver than other people, but I hate to see a good man downed, and that
long knife would not be the end of Scudder if I could play the game in
his place.

It took me an hour or two to think this out, and by that time I had
come to a decision. I must vanish somehow, and keep vanished till the
end of the second week in June. Then I must somehow find a way to get
in touch with the Government people and tell them what Scudder had told
me. I wished to Heaven he had told me more, and that I had listened
more carefully to the little he had told me. I knew nothing but the
barest f