u'll stop a day or two
I'll show you some very decent fishing.'

We had a hot supper--and I wanted it pretty badly--and then drank grog
in a big cheery smoking-room with a crackling wood fire. I thought the
time had come for me to put my cards on the table. I saw by this man's
eye that he was the kind you can trust.

'Listen, Sir Harry,' I said. 'I've something pretty important to say
to you. You're a good fellow, and I'm going to be frank. Where on
earth did you get that poisonous rubbish you talked tonight?'

His face fell. 'Was it as bad as that?' he asked ruefully. 'It did
sound rather thin. I got most of it out of the PROGRESSIVE MAGAZINE
and pamphlets that agent chap of mine keeps sending me. But you surely
don't think Germany would ever go to war with us?'

'Ask that question in six weeks and it won't need an answer,' I said.
'If you'll give me your attention for half an hour I am going to tell
you a story.'

I can see yet that bright room with the deers' heads and the old prints
on the walls, Sir Harry standing restlessly on the stone curb of the
hearth, and myself lying back in an armchair, speaking. I seemed to be
another person, standing aside and listening to my own voice, and
judging carefully the reliability of my tale. It was the first time I
had ever told anyone the exact truth, so far as I understood it, and it
did me no end of good, for it straightened out the thing in my own
mind. I blinked no detail. He heard all about Scudder, and the
milkman, and the note-book, and my doings in Galloway. Presently he
got very excited and walked up and down the hearth-rug.

'So you see,' I concluded, 'you have got here in your house the man
that is wanted for the Portland Place murder. Your duty is to send
your car for the police and give me up. I don't think I'll get very
far. There'll be an accident, and I'll have a knife in my ribs an hour
or so after arrest. Nevertheless, it's your duty, as a law-abiding
citizen. Perhaps in a month's time you'll be sorry, but you have no
cause to think of that.'

He was looking at me with bright steady eyes. 'What was your job in
Rhodesia, Mr Hannay?' he asked.

'Mining engineer,' I said. 'I've made my pile cleanly and I've had a
good time in the making of it.'

'Not a profession that weakens the nerves, is it?'

I laughed. 'Oh, as to that, my nerves are good enough.' I took down a
hunting-knife from a stand on the wall, and did the old Mashona