I was getting to like the little chap. His jaw had shut like a rat-trap, and

there was the fire of battle in his gimlety eyes. If he was spinning me a yarn

he could act up to it.

 

“Where did you find out this story?” I asked.

 

“I got the first hint in an inn on the Achensee in Tyrol. That set me inquiring,

and I collected my other clues in a fur-shop in the Galician quarter of Buda, in

a Strangers’ Club in Vienna, and in a little bookshop off the Racknitzstrasse in

Leipsig. I completed my evidence ten days ago in Paris. I can’t tell you the

details now, for it’s something of a history. When I was quite sure in my own

mind I judged it my business to disappear, and I reached this city by a mighty

queer circuit. I left Paris a dandified young French-American, and I sailed from

Hamburg a Jew diamond merchant. In Norway I was an English student of Ibsen

collecting materials for lectures, but when I left Bergen I was a cinema-man

with special ski films. And I came here from Leith with a lot of pulp-wood

propositions in my pocket to put before the London newspapers. Till yesterday I

thought I had muddied my trail some, and was feeling pretty happy. Then....”

 

The recollection seemed to upset him, and he gulped down some more whisky.

 

“Then I saw a man standing in the street outside this block. I used to stay

close in my room all day, and only slip out after dark for an hour or two. I

watched him for a bit from my window, and I thought I recognized him.... He came