down, double quick, and let us in, that's all!"

"'Ere, don't you skulk up there!" added a coarser voice. "We know
y'er there; and if yer don't come down to us, why, we'll come up to
you!"

This brought Leander forward again. "Gentlemen," he said, leaning out,
and speaking in an agitated whisper, "for goodness' sake, what do you
want with me?"

"You let us in, and we'll tell you."

"Will it do if I come down and speak to you outside?" said Leander.

There was a consultation between the two at this, and at the end of it
the first man said: "It's all the same to us, where we have our little
confabulation. Come down, and look sharp about it!"

Leander came down, taking care to shut the street door behind him. "You
ain't the police?" he said, apprehensively.

They each took an arm, and walked him roughly off between them towards
Queen Square. "We'll show you who we are," they said.

"I--I demand your authority for this," gasped Leander. "What am I
charged with?"

They had brought him into the gloomiest part of the square, where the
houses, used as offices in the daytime, were now dark and deserted. Here
they jammed him up against the railings, and stood guard over him, while
he was alarmed to perceive a suppressed ferocity in the faces of both.

"What are you charged with? Grr----! For 'arf a pint I'd knock your
bloomin 'ed in!" said the coarser gentleman of the two--an evasive form
of answer which did not seem to promise a pleasant interview.

[Illustration: "FOR 'ARF A PINT I'D KNOCK YOUR BLOOMIN' 'ED IN!"]

Leander was not naturally courageous, and what he had gone through
lately had shaken his nerves. He thought that, for policemen, they
showed too strong a personal feeling; but who else could they be? He
could not remember having seen either of them before. One was a tall,
burly, heavy-jawed man; the other smaller and slighter, and apparently
the superior of the two in education and position.

"You don't remember me, I see," said the latter; and then suddenly
changing his tone to a foreign accent, he said: "Haf you been since to
drink a glass of beer at your open-air gardens at Rosherwich?"

Leander knew him then. It was his foreign customer of Monday evening.
His face was clean-shaven now, and his expression changed--not for the
better.

"I think," he said, faintly, "I had the privilege of cutting your 'air
the other evening."

"You did, my friend, and I admired your taste for the fine arts. This