to consider him my guardian."

The manager turned to me. I was an occasional customer, and he knew who
I was.

"Can you tell me anything about him, Mr. Greatson? The doctor will be
here in a moment, but I feel that I ought to be sending for some of his
friends. I am afraid that he is very ill."

"You were not in the room at the time it happened?" I remarked.

The manager shook his head.

"No, I was in the office."

"Have you sent for the police?" I asked.

"Police, no!" he exclaimed. "What have the police to do with it? It was
an ordinary fit, surely."

I felt that I had held my peace long enough.

"It was not a fit at all," I said gravely. "He was shot with a sort of
air-gun by a man sitting at my table. I think that you ought to send for
the police at once. The man's name was Grooten, but I know nothing else
about him."

The manager was for a moment speechless. The child looked at me eagerly.

"It was the little old gentleman who was sitting with you who did it,"
she exclaimed. "I saw him at Charing Cross."

"Yes, it was he!" I answered.

The child turned away.

"Perhaps after all, then," she murmured to herself, "I may have friends
in the world."

The manager, whose name was Huber, was inclined to be incredulous.

"An air-gun would have made as much noise as a revolver," he said. "Are
you sure of what you say, Mr. Greatson?"

"There is no doubt at all about it," I answered, "and you ought to
inform the police at once. This man--Grooten, he called himself--pulled
the pistol out of his pocket, and was pretending to show it to me when
he fired the shot. He told me that it was a new invention which he had
bought in America, and which was quite noiseless."

The manager hurried from the room. The child and I were alone, except
for the man on the couch. Every now and then he groaned--a sound I could
not hear without a shiver. The child, however, was unmoved. She fixed
her dark eyes on me.

"Do you think that he will get away?" she asked eagerly.

"You mean the man who shot Major Delahaye?"

"Yes."

"I think that it is very likely. He has a good start, and I expect that
he had made his arrangements."

"I hope he does," she murmured passionately. "I wish that I could help
him."

"You have no idea who he was?" I asked. "I do not believe that Grooten
was his real name."

She shook her head.

"I have never seen him before in my life," she said. "If I did know I
should not tell anyone."

The