let me know his address later."

"Amazing impudence!" cried my friend. "He called in order to show his
utter defiance of the police, I should think."

"No. My belief is that he wished to tell me something," I said. "Anyhow,
he will either return or send his address."

"I very much doubt it. He's a clever rogue, but, like all men of his
elusiveness and cunning, he never takes undue chances. No, Mr. Royle,
depend upon it, he'll never visit you again."

"But I may be able to find him. Who knows?"

The detective moved his papers aside, and with a sigh admitted:

"Yes, you may have luck, to be sure."

Then, after some further conversation, he looked at the piece of sticking
plaster on my head and remarked:

"I see you've had a knock. How did you manage it?"

I made an excuse that in bending before my own fireplace I had struck it
on the corner of the mantelshelf. Afterwards I suddenly said:

"You recollect those facts you told me regarding the alleged death of the
real Kemsley in Peru, don't you?"

"Of course."

"Well, they've interested me deeply. I'd so much like to know any further
details."

Edwards reflected a moment, recalling the report.

"Well," he said, taking from one of the drawers in his table a voluminous
official file of papers. "There really isn't very much more than what you
already know. The Consul's report is a very full one, and contains a
quantity of depositions taken on the spot--mostly evidence of Peruvians,
in which little credence can, perhaps, be placed. Of course," he added,
"the suspected man Cane seems to have been a very bad lot. He was at one
time manager of a rubber plantation belonging to a Portuguese company,
and some very queer stories were current regarding him."

"What kind of stories?" I asked.

"Oh, his outrageous cruelty to the natives when they did not collect
sufficient rubber. He used, they said, to burn the native villages and
massacre the inhabitants without the slightest compunction. He was known
by the natives as 'The Red Englishman.' They were terrified by him. His
name, it seems, was Herbert Cane, and so bad became his reputation that
he was dismissed by the company after an inquiry by a commission sent
from Lisbon, and drifted into Argentina, sinking lower and lower in the
social scale."

Then, after referring to several closely-written pages of foolscap, each
one bearing the blue embossed stamp of the British Consulate in Lima, he
went on:

"Inquiries s