ce thing, isn't it? But he
doesn't stand an earthly."

"Where will he be hanged?"

"Pentonville."

Michael thought how Mrs. Murdoch in Neptune Crescent would shudder some
Tuesday morning in the near future.

"I'm sorry you should have had to come all this way to find me," Michael
said. He hated himself for being polite to the inspector, but he could
not help it. He rang the bell.

"Oh, Dawkins, will you give Inspector--what is your name, by the bye?"

"Dawkins," said the inspector.

"How curious!" Michael laughed.

"Yes, sir," the inspector laughed.

"Lunch in the gun room, Dawkins. You must be hungry."

"Well, sir, I could do with a snack, I daresay." He followed his
namesake from the room, and outside Michael could hear them begin to
chatter of the coincidence.

"But supposing I'd been in the same state of life as Meats," Michael
said to himself. "What devil's web wouldn't they be trying to spin round
me?"

He was seized with fury at himself for his cowardice. He had thought of
nothing but his own reputation ever since Meats had been arrested. He
had worried over the opinion of a police inspector; had been ashamed of
the appearance of the rooms; had actually been afraid that he would be
implicated in the disgraceful affair. So long as it had been easy to
flatter himself with the pleasure he was giving or the good he was doing
to Meats, he had kept him with money. Now when Meats had been dragged
away, he was anxious to disclaim the whole acquaintanceship for fear of
the criticism of a big man with a bristly mustache. The despair in
Meats' last cry to him echoed round this library. He had seen society in
action: not all the devils and fiends imagined by mediaeval monks were so
horrible as those big men with bristly mustaches. What did they know of
Meats and his life? What did they care, but that they were paid by
society to remove rubbish? Justice had decreed that Meats should be
arrested, and like a dead rat in the gutter he was swept up by these
scavengers. What compact had he broken that men should freeze to stones
and crush him? He had broken the laws of men and the laws of God; he had
committed murder. And were not murders as foul being committed every
moment? Murdered ambition, murdered love, murdered pity, murdered
gratitude, murdered faith, did none of these cry out for vengeance?

Society had seized the murderer, and it was useless to cry out. Himself
was as impotent as the prisoner. Meats had