g a passage lighted by a lonely gas-jet, then up a flight
of winding stairs, and through a glazed and cheerful corridor on the
first floor. The footman threw open a door, and stood aside. The feet
of Mr Verloc felt a thick carpet. The room was large, with three
windows; and a young man with a shaven, big face, sitting in a roomy
arm-chair before a vast mahogany writing-table, said in French to the
Chancelier d'Ambassade, who was going out with, the papers in his hand:

"You are quite right, mon cher. He's fat--the animal."

Mr Vladimir, First Secretary, had a drawing-room reputation as an
agreeable and entertaining man. He was something of a favourite in
society. His wit consisted in discovering droll connections between
incongruous ideas; and when talking in that strain he sat well forward of
his seat, with his left hand raised, as if exhibiting his funny
demonstrations between the thumb and forefinger, while his round and
clean-shaven face wore an expression of merry perplexity.

But there was no trace of merriment or perplexity in the way he looked at
Mr Verloc. Lying far back in the deep arm-chair, with squarely spread
elbows, and throwing one leg over a thick knee, he had with his smooth
and rosy countenance the air of a preternaturally thriving baby that will
not stand nonsense from anybody.

"You understand French, I suppose?" he said.

Mr Verloc stated huskily that he did. His whole vast bulk had a forward
inclination. He stood on the carpet in the middle of the room, clutching
his hat and stick in one hand; the other hung lifelessly by his side. He
muttered unobtrusively somewhere deep down in his throat something about
having done his military service in the French artillery. At once, with
contemptuous perversity, Mr Vladimir changed the language, and began to
speak idiomatic English without the slightest trace of a foreign accent.

"Ah! Yes. Of course. Let's see. How much did you get for obtaining
the design of the improved breech-block of their new field-gun?"

"Five years' rigorous confinement in a fortress," Mr Verloc answered
unexpectedly, but without any sign of feeling.

"You got off easily," was Mr Vladimir's comment. "And, anyhow, it served
you right for letting yourself get caught. What made you go in for that
sort of thing--eh?"

Mr Verloc's husky conversational voice was heard speaking of youth, of a
fatal infatuation for an unworthy--

"Aha! Cherchez la femme," Mr Vladi