u shall
see. I shall be at hand. That I have a reason for this play be assured."

"But suppose he shoots?" persisted the other uneasily.

"He will not shoot," said Kara easily. "Besides, his revolver is not
loaded. Now you may go. You have a long walk before you. You know the
way?"

The man nodded.

"I have been over it before," he said confidently.

Kara returned to the big limousine which had drawn up some distance from
the station. He spoke a word or two to the chauffeur in Greek, and the
man touched his hat.

CHAPTER II

Assistant Commissioner of Police T. X. Meredith did not occupy offices
in New Scotland Yard. It is the peculiarity of public offices that they
are planned with the idea of supplying the margin of space above
all requirements and that on their completion they are found wholly
inadequate to house the various departments which mysteriously come into
progress coincident with the building operations.

"T. X.," as he was known by the police forces of the world, had a big
suite of offices in Whitehall. The house was an old one facing the Board
of Trade and the inscription on the ancient door told passers-by that
this was the "Public Prosecutor, Special Branch."

The duties of T. X. were multifarious. People said of him--and like most
public gossip, this was probably untrue--that he was the head of the
"illegal" department of Scotland Yard. If by chance you lost the keys of
your safe, T. X. could supply you (so popular rumour ran) with a burglar
who would open that safe in half an hour.

If there dwelt in England a notorious individual against whom the police
could collect no scintilla of evidence to justify a prosecution, and if
it was necessary for the good of the community that that person should
be deported, it was T. X. who arrested the obnoxious person, hustled
him into a cab and did not loose his hold upon his victim until he had
landed him on the indignant shores of an otherwise friendly power.

It is very certain that when the minister of a tiny power which shall be
nameless was suddenly recalled by his government and brought to trial
in his native land for putting into circulation spurious bonds, it was
somebody from the department which T. X. controlled, who burgled His
Excellency's house, burnt the locks from his safe and secured the
necessary incriminating evidence.

I say it is fairly certain and here I am merely voicing the opinion of
very knowledgeable people indeed, h