He entered the room switching on the light and closing the door.

    When he turned he looked first into the muzzle of a large Browning pistol and then into the completely masked face of the man who held it.

    "Ellroyd your name is, isn't it?"

    Joe blinked at the gun, and his hand dropped carelessly to his pocket.

    "Keep 'em up!" said the stranger. "This gun doesn't make much noise, and I could catch you before you fell. My name is Henry Arthur Milton—I am wanted by the police for killing a gentleman who deserved to die."

    "My God—'The Ringer'!" gasped Joe.

    "The Ringer—exactly. You are using my name to cover certain vulgar robberies—you are wanted for other and worse offences in various parts of the world. I object to my name being used by a cheap skate of a gunman. I have a greater objection to its use by a thief. I have taken a lot of trouble to find you, and my original intention was to hand you over to the mortuary keeper. I am giving you a chance."

    "Listen, Milton—" began Joe.

    "I am warning you. I shall not wain you again. If you are a wise man you will not need a second warning. That is all. Step over here—and step quickly!"

    Joe obeyed. The man moved to the door, and the lights went out.

    "Don't move—you're against the window and I can see you."

    A second later the door opened and closed. There was the sound of a snapping lock.

    Joe, breathing heavily, went cautiously forward, turned on the lights and tried the door. It was, as he suspected, locked. But there was a telephone...

    Before he picked up the instrument he saw the cut of trailing wires.

    "The Ringer!" he breathed, and sat down heavily on his bed, wiping the cold perspiration from his face. It was remarkable that there was perspiration to wipe, for Joe was the coolest man that ever shot a policeman.

    For two years after Joe lived without offence, as he could well afford to do, for he was a comparatively rich man.

    And then one day in Berlin...

 

* * * * *

 

    "Auf wiedersehen!"

    The perfect stranger, with the elaborate friendliness which is too often the attribute of his kind, flourished his hat extravagantly.

    "So long!" said Henry Arthur Milton, coldly indifferent.

    Why this sudden activity? he wondered. He passed out on to the Friedrichstrasse and nobody would imagine that he was in the slightest degree concerned with the big fat man he had left at the entrance to the bahnhof. His fingers said "snap!" to a watchful taxi-driver.

    "Kutscher! Do you .see that gentleman in the black coat with the fur collar?"

    "Most certainly: the Jew!"

    Arthur Milton nodded approvingly and opened and closed the door of the taxi once or twice in an absent-minded manner.

    "Is that insight or eyesight?" he asked.

    "I know him," said the kutscher complacently. "He is from Frankfort and his name is Sahl—a dealer in sausages."

    Mr. Milton inclined his head.

    "A local industry," he said lightly. "Now, my friend, drive me to the Hotel Zweinerman und Spiez."

    It was a very comfortable taxi: Berlin is famous for the luxury of these public vehicles, but it was a taxi. There was nothing remarkable about it except that its driver had ignored the summons of half a dozen of the passengers who had arrived by the Hamburg express, and had instantly responded to the signal of Henry Arthur Milton. But there was no spring lock on the door—he had tried that before he got in. And the driver was following the conventional route.

    Mr. Milton stroked his dark toothbrush moustache. His colouring gave him a somewhat saturnine appearance. His black glossy hair, his heavy black eyebrows, a marked lugubriousness of expression, corrected the attractions of good features and rather nice eyes.

    Before the barrack facade of the hotel the cab stopped. Milton gripped his suitcase and alighted.

    "Wait for me, I shall be five minutes."

    The hotel porter stood at the open door of the cab, his face set in the hospitable smile for which he was engaged. He sought to secure the suitcase, but was frustrated.

    "Is Mr.