AINS

The next I knew I was in bed, in a cool, darkened room, with a man
seated in an easy-chair near at hand, smoking a cigarette, and reading
what looked remarkably like an English newspaper.

I lay and looked at him lazily, for a few minutes. I hadn't the least
idea as to where I was, or how I came there; I didn't feel any curiosity
on the point. The blissful consciousness of cleanliness and comfort was
quite sufficient for me at present. My broken arm had been set and put
in rude splints while I was in the prison, by one of my fellow
sufferers, I expect, and was now scientifically cased in plaster of
Paris; the bullet wounds in my right arm and side were properly dressed
and strapped, and felt pretty comfortable till I tried to shift my
position a little, when I realized they were there.

At the slight movement the man in the chair laid down his paper and came
up to the bed.

"Hello, Mr. Wynn; feel a bit more like yourself, eh?" he asked bluffly,
in English.

"Why, yes, I feel just about 'O. K.,' thanks," I responded, and laughed
inanely. My voice sounded funny--thin and squeaky--and it jumped from
one note to another. I hadn't the least control over it. "Say, where am
I, and who are you? I guess you've done me a good turn!"

"Humph, I suppose we have. Good Lord, think of an Englishman--you're an
American, but it's all the same in this case--being treated like that by
these Russian swine! You're still in St. Petersburg; we've got to patch
you up a bit before we can take you back to good old England."

Now why should he, or any one else, be "taking me back to England?" I
puzzled over it in silence before I put the question.

"Never you mind about that now," he said with brusque kindliness. "All
you've got to think about is getting strong again."

But already I began to remember, and past events came jumping before my
mind like cinematograph pictures.

"You fetched me out of prison,--you and Inspector Freeman," I said
slowly.

"Look here, don't you worry," he began.

"Yes, I must--I want to get things clear; wait a bit. He said something.
I know; he came to arrest me for murder,--the murder of Cassavetti."

"Just so; and a jolly good thing for you he did! But, as you've
remembered that much, I must warn you that I'm a detective in charge of
you, and anything you say will be used against you."

More cinematograph pictures,--Cassavetti as I saw him, lying behind the
door, his eyes open, staring; mysel