oolboy to a man you have literally not known for twenty-four
hours.

"Suppose you had made a mistake in me. What would there be to prevent
me telling the police who you are, and having you locked up with a
view to extradition to Russia?"

"In the first place," replied Colston quietly, "you would not do so,
because I am not mistaken in you, and because, in your heart, whether
you fully know it or not, you believe as I do about the destruction
that is about to fall upon Society.

"In the second place, if you did betray my confidence, I should be
able to bring such an overwhelming array of the most respectable
evidence to show that I was nothing like what I really am, that you
would be laughed at for a madman; and, in the third place, there
would be an inquest on you within twenty-four hours after you had
told your story. Do you remember the death of Inspector Ainsworth, of
the Criminal Investigation Department, about six months ago?"

"Yes, of course I do. Hermit and all as I was, I could hardly help
hearing about that, considering what a noise it made. But I thought
that was cleared up. Didn't one of that gang of garotters that was
broken up in South London a couple of months later confess to
strangling him in the statement that he made before he was executed?"

"Yes, and his widow is now getting ten shillings a week for life on
account of that confession. Birkett no more killed Ainsworth than you
did; but he had killed two or three others, and so the confession
didn't do him very much harm.

"No; Ainsworth met his death in quite another way. He accepted from
the Russian secret police bureau in London a bribe of L250 down and
the promise of another L250 if he succeeded in manufacturing enough
evidence against a member of our Outer Circle to get him extradited
to Russia on a trumped-up charge of murder.

"The Inner Circle learnt of this from one of our spies in the Russian
London police, and----, well, Ainsworth was found dead with the mark
of the Terror upon his forehead before he had time to put his
treachery into action. He was executed by two of the Brotherhood, who
are members of the Metropolitan police force, and who were afterwards
complimented by the magistrate for the intelligent efforts they had
made in bringing the murderers to justice."

Colston told the dark story in the most careless of tones between the
puffs of his after-breakfast cigarette. Arnold stifled his horror as
well as he was able, but h