side by the gentle pressure you applied to a
mother-of-pearl stud set in silver plate which, by some miracle, was
always within reach.

He had an entire suite converted to bath-rooms, where his masseur, his
manicurist and his barber attended him daily. He had conscripted modern
science to his service, he had so cunningly disguised its application,
that you might never guess the motive power of the old English clock
which ticked in the spacious hall, or realize that the soft light which
came from the many branched candelabra which hung from the centre of his
drawing-room was due to anything more up to date than the hundred most
life-like candles which filled the sockets.

Yet this suave gentleman with his elegant manners and his pretty taste
in old china, this genius who was the finest judge in the capital of
Pekinese dogs, and had been known to give a thousand-rouble fee to the
veterinary surgeon who performed a minor operation on his favourite
Borzoi, had another aspect. He who shivered at the first chill winds of
winter and wrapped himself in sables whenever he drove abroad after the
last days of September, and had sent men and women to the bleakness of
Alexandrowski without a qualm; he who had to fortify himself to face an
American dentist (his fees for missed appointments would have kept the
average middle-class family in comfort for a year), was ruthless in his
dealings with the half-crazed men and women who strayed across the
frontier which divided conviction from propaganda.

Physical human suffering left him unmoved--he hanged the murderer
Palatoff with his own hands. Yet in that operation someone saw him turn
very pale and shrink back from his victim. Afterwards the reason was
discovered. The condemned man had had the front of his rough shirt
fastened with a safety-pin which had worked loose. The point had ripped
a little gash in the inexperienced finger of the amateur hangman.

He brought Dr. Von Krauss from Berlin, because von Krauss was an
authority upon blood infection and spent a week of intense mental agony
until he was pronounced out of danger.

He sat before a long mirror in his bedroom, that gave on Horridge's
Hotel, and surveyed himself thoughtfully. He was looking at the only man
he trusted, for it was not vanity, but a love of agreeable company that
explained the passion for mirrors which was the jest of St. Petersburg.

It was his fourth day in London and a little table near the window was
co