Ken's Blogspot: Espionage

By Ken Everett

The study of the inner workings of the disordered minds whose aim is destruction, violence, and the overturning of law and order by means of bombs.” The story is woven around an attack on the Greenwich Observatory in 1894 masterminded by Culver, a Russian spy working for the police, and ostensibly a member of an anarchist group in Soho. His masters instruct him to discredit the anarchists in a humiliating fashion, and when his evil plan goes horribly awry, Culver must deal with the repercussions of his actions. While rooted in the Edwardian period, this tale remains strikingly contemporary, with its depiction of Londoners gripped by fear of the terrorists living in their midst.

Cast Of Characters

Mr. Rudolph Culver - A man with heavy eyes and with the appearance of "having wallowed, fully dressed, all day on an unmade bed". He resembles a well-to-do tradesman, but he gives off an air of living off the vices and follies of mankind (found, for instance, in casino-owners or private detectives). He is "thoroughly domesticated" and content to stay close to home, near his wife and his mother-in-law. He was born to industrious parents and, as a result, was devoted to a life of indolence.

Mrs. Gwen Culver - motherly woman who married Culver mainly to provide security for Willie, the half-witted brother whom she loves protectively. When she learns that her husband was instrumental in having her brother blown up, she murders him with a knife and attempts to escape to the Continent with Eric Adjepong.

Gwen's mother - A "stout, wheezy woman with a large brown face" (5). She wears a black wig and a white hat, and, because her legs are swollen, is largely inactive. She claims to be of French descent and married a "victualler of the more common sort." After becoming a widow, she provided for herself by renting furnished apartments for men near Vauxhall Bridge Road. She subsequently moved into Culver's shop once he married her daughter, but, in the middle of the novel, she secretly arranges to leave in order to live at an almshouse set up by friends of her late husband.

Willie - Gwen’s brother. He is "delicate" and good-looking, though his lower lip droops. He is a source of concern to Gwen's mother and to Gwen herself . Because the Verlocs have no children, Gwen takes care of him like a son. This behavior began when they were both children; Gwen protected Willie from the brutality of their father, who was unsure what to make of having such a peculiar son and beat him. Willie is unsuccessful as an errand boy because he is easily distracted on the street and forgets to deliver messages. He sometimes stutters and squints when he feels uncomfortable.

Mr. William - He accuses Culver of indolence and deliberately pressures him into the bomb attack on Greenwich Observatory as a means of waking the British people to a sense of their European responsibilities.

Chief Detective Helms - An detective of the Special Crimes Department of the London police. A methodical man, he wishes to follow conventional and routine procedures in trying to solve the mystery of the bombing, the motive for which he can in no way understand. He arrests Michaels’, the most harmless of the anarchist propagandists, whom he knows to be but slightly involved but against whom he can make a case. Because of the insistence of the new assistant commissioner, his superior, and the finding of a scrap of an overcoat collar with an address on the label, he is forced to approach Culver, whose information to the police has been helpful many times before.

The Deputy Commissioner - an official of the London Police who has only recently come to his position from service in the tropics. He realizes the dangers of depending on routine and on conventional police rules and procedure. He questions Chief Inspector Helm’s methods and finally feels compelled to take an active part in the investigation of the bombing episode.

Colleague Eric Adjepong - “the Doctor,” the unprincipled sensu-alist among the anarchists. He escapes with Gwen Culver after she murders her husband. He is willing to share Culver’s bank account, but he deserts Gwen when he realizes the possibilities of suspicion that his relationship with her may incur.

Michaels - called the Apostle, an idealistic anarchist who has been in prison and who has written a book about his experiences. This harmless man is cared for by Lady Mabel, his patroness. To save face, Detective Helms arrests him.

The professor - the perfect anarchist. Small and deformed physically, he has grandiose ideas and dreams of making the perfect detonator. For protection, he carries explosives, fastened to his body, that can be detonated immediately to destroy himself and anyone near him. He supplies Culver with the explosive to blow up the Greenwich Observatory.

Sir Redethel - the home secretary, the great personage to whom the assistant commissioner reports progress of the investigation.

Kevin Yount - an old “terrorist.” Skinny, bald, malevolent, and pitiless, he is a man of much talk but little action.

Teddy - the young secretary to Sir Redethel.

Lady Mabel - the patroness who supports Michaelis.

CHAPTER I

When Mr. Culver went out in the morning he nominally left his business in the care of his brother-in-law. This was doable as there were very few shops at any given time and virtually none before the evening. Mr. Culver scarcely bothered about his supposed business. And besides, his wife was responsible for his brother-in-law.

The shop was small and so was the house. It was one of those dirty brick houses that were plentiful before London entered the Reconstruction Era. The shop was a square box, the front of which was glazed with small panes. During the day the door remained closed; In the evening it stood discreetly but suspiciously leaning against it.

The window contained photos of more or less undressed dancers; nondescript packaging in sleeves such as patent medicines; closed yellow paper envelopes, very thin and marked "Two and Six" in thick black numerals; a few booklets of old French comic publications hanging from a string as if drying; a dingy blue china bowl, a black wooden casket, bottles with marker ink and rubber stamps; a few books whose titles suggest inappropriateness; a few seemingly old copies of obscure newspapers, poorly printed, with titles like "The Torch", "The Gong" - catchy titles.And the two gas nozzles inside the panes were always set low, be it for reasons of economy or for customer reasons.

These customers were either very young men who hung around the window for a while before suddenly slipping in; or men of a more mature age who generally looked as if they had no money. Some of these latter species had their coat collars turned up to the mustache, and the undersides of their undergarments had streaks of mud, giving the impression of being badly worn and of little value. And the legs in them didn't seem to matter much in general either. Hands buried deep in the side pockets of their coats, they slipped in sideways, one shoulder first, as if afraid to ring the bell.

The bell, hung on the door with a bent steel band, was difficult to bypass. It was hopelessly broken; but one evening, at the slightest provocation, it clattered after the customer with impudent violence.

It rattled; and at this sign Mr. Culver hastily left the rear drawing-room by the dusty glass door behind the painted counter. His eyes were naturally heavy; It was as if he had lain fully clothed on an unmade bed all day. Another man would have found such an appearance a distinct disadvantage. In a commercial transaction of a retail order, much depends on the engaging and gracious nature of the seller. But Mr. Culver knew his business and was undeterred by aesthetic doubts about his looks.With a firm, composed insolence that seemed to hold back the threat of a vile menace, he sold over the counter an item that was obviously and scandalously not worth the money spent in the transaction: a small cardboard box with apparently nothing inside, for Example, or one of those carefully sealed yellow flimsy envelopes, or a dirty volume in paper sleeves with a promising title. Occasionally one of the faded yellow dancers would be sold to an amateur as if she were young and alive.

Sometimes it was Mrs Culver who appeared at the ring of the bell. Gwen Culver was a full-chested young woman with a tight bodice and wide hips. Her hair was very neat. Staring like her husband, she maintained an expression of unimaginable indifference behind the barricade of the bar. Then, in relatively tender years, the customer would suddenly be alarmed at dealing with a woman, and with anger in his heart he would make an inquiry for a bottle of marking ink retailing at sixpence (price in Culver's shop: one and sixpence ). , which he secretly dropped down the gutter as soon as he was outside.

The evening visitors - the men with collars turned up and soft hats pulled down - nodded familiarly to Mrs Culver and, with murmured greetings, lifted the hatch at the end of the counter to get into the rear drawing room, which gave access to a passageway and a steep one Stairs. The shop door was the only entrance to the house where Mr. Culver plied his trade as a seller of shady goods, pursued his vocation as a protector of society and cultivated his domestic virtues. The latter were pronounced. He was thoroughly domesticated. Neither his intellectual, nor his spiritual, nor his physical needs were suited to take him far abroad.At home he found the tranquility of his body and the peace of his conscience, coupled with Mrs Culver's conjugal attention and the respectful consideration of Mrs Culver's mother.

Gwen's mother was a stocky woman with a large brown face. She wore a black wig under a white cap. Her swollen legs made her unable to move. She thought she was of French descent, which perhaps she was; and after being married for many years to a chartered innkeeper of the commoner sort, she cared for the years of her widowhood by letting men's furnished flats near Vauxhall Bridge Road, in a once splendid place which still belongs to the district Belgravia. This topographical fact was of some advantage in advertising their rooms; But the worthy widow's patrons were not exactly the fashionable sort.As they were, their daughter Gwen helped take care of them. Gwen also showed traces of the French ancestry that the widow boasted about. They showed off the extremely neat and artful arrangement of their shiny dark hair. Gwen had other charms too: her youth; her full, round shape; her clear complexion; The provocation of her unfathomable reticence, which never went so far as to prevent the conversation, was carried out with vivacity on the part of the lodger and with the same kindness on her part. It must be that Mr. Culver was susceptible to this fascination. Mr. Culver was a temporary patron. He came and went for no apparent reason.It generally (like the flu) came to London from the continent, except that it was not announced by the press; and his afflictions began with great severity. He ate breakfast in bed and wallowed there every day until noon - and sometimes even an hour later - with an air of quiet joy. But as he walked out, he seemed to have great difficulty finding his way back to his temporary home in Belgravian Square. He left late and returned there early—as early as three or four in the morning;and waking up at ten o'clock he spoke to Gwen and brought the breakfast-tray with jocular, weary politeness, and in the hoarse, frustrated tones of a man who had talked vigorously to one another for many hours. His distinctive, heavy-lidded eyes rolled amorously and lazily to the side, the bed covers were pulled up to his chin, and his dark, sleek mustache covered his plump lips capable of much honeyed banter. He brought in the breakfast tray, with jocular, weary politeness, in the hoarse, frustrated tones of a man who had talked Helms to one another for many hours.His distinctive, heavy-lidded eyes rolled amorously and lazily to the side, the bed covers were pulled up to his chin, and his dark, sleek mustache covered his plump lips capable of much honeyed banter. He brought in the breakfast tray, with jocular, weary politeness, in the hoarse, frustrated tones of a man who had talked Helms to one another for many hours. His distinctive, heavy-lidded eyes rolled amorously and lazily to the side, the bed covers were pulled up to his chin, and his dark, sleek mustache covered his plump lips capable of much honeyed banter.

According to Gwen's mother, Mr. Culver was a very nice gentleman. From her life experience, which she had gained in various "business houses", the good woman had adopted an ideal of gentlemanliness in her retirement, as displayed by the guests of private saloon bars. Mr. Culver approached this ideal; he actually achieved it.

"Of course we'll take care of your furniture, mother," Gwen had remarked.

The hostel should be abandoned. It seems that it would not make sense to continue with this. It would have been too much trouble for Mr. Culver. It would not have been convenient for his other business. He did not say what his business was; but after his engagement to Gwen he took the trouble to get up before noon, go down the cellar steps, and make himself comfortable with Gwen's mother in the breakfast-room downstairs, where she kept her motionless nature. He stroked the cat, stoked the fire and had his lunch served there. He left the slightly stuffy coziness with obvious reluctance, but stayed outside until the night was well under way.He never offered Gwen to go to the tHelmser like such a nice gentleman should have done. His evenings were busy. His work is political in a way, he once said to Gwen. She would, he warned her,

And with her straight, inscrutable look, she replied that of course she would.

How much more he told her about his job Gwen's mother couldn't figure out. The couple took over with the furniture. The mean sight of the store surprised her. Moving from Belgravian Square to the narrow street in Soho had a negative impact on her legs. They reached an enormous size. On the other hand, she experienced total liberation from material worries. Her son-in-law's stern good nature gave her a sense of absolute security. Her daughter's future seemed secure, and she didn't even have to worry about her son Willie. She hadn't been able to hide from herself that he was a terrible liability, poor Willie.But given Gwen's affection for her frail brother and Mr. Culver's kind and generous manner, she felt that the poor boy was quite safe in this rough world. And in her heart she might not have been displeased that the Culvers had no children. As Mr. Culver seemed completely indifferent to this fact and Gwen found in her brother an object of quasi-motherly affection, perhaps that was good for poor Willie as well.

Because it was difficult to get rid of him, this boy. He was petite and, in a frail way, handsome too, save for the empty, drooping bottom lip. Under our excellent compulsory education system he had learned to read and write, notwithstanding the unfavorable appearance of his lower lip. But as an errand boy he was not very successful. He forgot his messages; He was easily swayed by the attraction of stray cats and dogs, which he followed down narrow alleys into unsavory courtyards; through the street comedies he pondered open-mouthed, to the detriment of his employer's interests;or through the dramas of fallen horses, whose pathos and violence sometimes caused him to yell piercingly at a crowd unperturbed by sounds of distress in their quiet enjoyment of the national spectacle. When he was led away by a stern and protective police officer, poor Willie often turned out to have forgotten his address - at least for a while. A harsh question made him stutter so hard he almost choked. When startled by something confusing, he blinked terribly. However, he never had seizures (which was encouraging);and from his father's natural outbursts of impatience throughout his childhood he could always seek refuge behind his sister Gwen's short skirts. On the other hand, he could have been suspected of hiding a fund of ruthless bad habits. At the age of fourteen, when he was a friend of his late father, a representative of a foreign canned milk company, who had offered him a job as an office boy, he was discovered one foggy afternoon in the absence of his boss. I was busy setting off fireworks on the stairs. He fired off a series of fierce missiles, angry Catherine wheels and loudly exploding primers in quick succession - and things could have ended very seriously.A terrible panic spread throughout the building. With wild eyes and gagging employees, the employees trudged through the smoky corridors, you could see silk hats and older business people rolling down the stairs on their own. Willie didn't seem to get any personal satisfaction from what he had done. His motives for this act of originality were difficult to ascertain. Only later did Gwen receive a nebulous and confused confession from him. It appears that two other clerks in the building had worked his feelings through stories of injustice and oppression until they had brought his compassion to the height of this frenzy. But his father's friendOf course, he dismissed him out of hand because he would ruin his business. After this altruistic feat, Willie was assigned to help wash dishes in the basement kitchen and shine the boots of gentlemen visiting the Belgravia mansion. Such work obviously had no future. The gentlemen gave him a shilling tip every now and then. Mr. Culver proved to be the most generous lodger. But all in all it did not bring much in terms of profit or prospects; When Gwen announced her engagement to Mr. Culver, her mother had to sigh and glance at the scullery wondering what would become of poor Stephen.and to blacken the boots of the lords who oversee Belgravian Manor. Such work obviously had no future. The gentlemen gave him a shilling tip every now and then. Mr. Culver proved to be the most generous lodger. But all in all it did not bring much in terms of profit or prospects; When Gwen announced her engagement to Mr. Culver, her mother had to sigh and glance at the scullery wondering what would become of poor Stephen. and to blacken the boots of the lords who oversee Belgravian Manor. Such work obviously had no future. The gentlemen gave him a shilling tip every now and then.Mr. Culver proved to be the most generous lodger. But all in all it did not bring much in terms of profit or prospects; When Gwen announced her engagement to Mr. Culver, her mother had to sigh and glance at the scullery wondering what would become of poor Stephen.

It appeared that Mr. Culver was ready to take it on, along with his wife's mother and the furniture, which represented the family's entire visible fortune. Mr. Culver gathered everything that reached his broad, good-natured chest. The furniture was optimally distributed throughout the house, but Mrs Culver's mother was confined to two back rooms on the first floor. The hapless Willie slept in one of them. By this time a thin, fluffy growth of hair had blurred the sharp line of his small lower jaw like a golden mist. He assisted his sister in her domestic duties with blind love and docility. Mr. Culver believed that employment would do him good.In his free time, he used a compass and pencil to draw circles on a piece of paper. He devoted himself to this pastime with great diligence, elbows outstretched and bent low over the kitchen table. Through the open door of the drawing-room at the back of the store, Gwen, his sister, looked at him with motherly watchfulness from time to time.

CHAPTER II

This was the house, household and business which Mr. Culver left behind on his way west at ten-thirty in the morning. It was unusually early for him; his whole body radiated the charm of almost dewy freshness; he wore his blue cloth coat unbuttoned; his boots gleamed; his freshly shaven cheeks had a kind of glow; and even his heavy-lidded eyes, refreshed from a night's peaceful sleep, sent out glances of comparative alertness.Through the park fences, those eyes saw men and women riding in line, couples galloping by in harmony, others advancing at a leisurely pace, groups of three or four loitering, solitary riders who seemed unsociable, and solitary women, those in large A groom followed at a distance, with a cockade on his hat and a leather belt over his close-fitting coat. Carriages passed, mostly broughams in pairs, with here and there a victoria with the skin of a wild beast in it and a woman's face and hat sticking out over the folded hood. And a peculiar London sun - about which there was nothing to be said except that it looked bloodshot - glorified all this by its gaze.It hung at a moderate height over Hyde Park Corner and exuded a punctuality and benevolent alertness. Even the pavement under Mr. Culver's feet had a dull golden glow in that diffused light, in which neither wall, nor tree, nor beast, nor man cast a shadow. Mr. Culver walked west through a shadowless town in an atmosphere of powdered scrap gold. On the roofs of the houses, on the corners of the walls, on the panels of the carriages, even on the cloaks of the horses, and on the broad back of Mr. Culver's cloak, red, coppery glints could be seen. where they created a matte rust effect. But Mr. Culver was not the least bit aware that he was rusty.He looked appreciatively through the park railings at the evidence of the city's opulence and luxury. All these people had to be protected. Protection is the first necessity for opulence and luxury. They had to be protected; and their horses, carriages, houses, and servants had to be protected; and the source of their wealth had to be protected in the heart of the city and in the heart of the country; The entire social order conducive to their hygienic idleness had to be protected from the superficial envy of unsanitary work. It had to be done - and Mr. Culver would have rubbed his hands contentedly if he hadn't been innately averse to any superfluous exertion.His doing nothing was not hygienic, but he liked it very much. He devoted himself to her with a sort of lazy fanaticism, or perhaps more of a fanatical laziness. Born to industrious parents who lived busy lives, he had embraced sloth with an impulse as profound as it was inexplicable, and as imperative as the impulse that determines one man's fondness for one woman in thousands. He was too lazy even for a mere demagogue, for a workers' orator, for a workers' leader. It was too much trouble. He needed a more perfect form of lightness;or it could be that he was the victim of a philosophical disbelief in the effectiveness of any human effort. Such a form of inertia requires, by implication, a certain amount of intelligence. Mr. Culver was not lacking in intelligence - and he might have winked at the thought of a threatened social order had he not bothered to show that sign of skepticism. His large, bulging eyes weren't good for blinking. They were more of the sort that solemnly lulls to sleep with majestic effect.

Pointy and burly in the style of a fat pig, Mr. Culver continued on his way, without rubbing his hands in satisfaction or winking skeptically at his thoughts. He lumbered along the sidewalk in his shiny boots and his general attire resembled that of a wealthy self-employed mechanic. He could have been anything from a picture frame maker to a locksmith; a small-scale employer. But he also had an indescribable charisma about him that no mechanic could have acquired in the practice of his trade, however dishonestly practiced: the charisma common to human beings, that of vices, follies, or base fears of humanity live;the atmosphere of moral nihilism inherent in the keepers of gambling dens and disorderly homes; to private detectives and investigators; to drink vendors and, I would say, to invigorating electro-belt vendors and to inventors of patented drugs. But I'm not sure about the latter as I haven't researched that deeply yet. As far as I know, the facial expressions of these latter could be downright devilish. I shouldn't be surprised. What I would like to reiterate is that Mr. Culver's expression was not at all devilish.

Before he reached Knightsbridge, Mr. Culver turned left and left the busy thoroughfare, where the traffic of swaying omnibuses and plodding vans raged in the almost silent, swift stream of wagons. Beneath his hat, which he wore slightly tilted back, his hair was carefully brushed to a respectful straightness; for his business was connected with a message. And Mr. Culver now marched, calm as a rock - a soft rock - down a road that could in good conscience be described as private. In its breadth, emptiness, and expanse it had the majesty of inorganic nature, matter that never dies.The only reminder of mortality was a doctor's carriage, held near the curb in sublime solitude. The polished door knockers shone as far as the eye could see, the clean windows shone with a dark, opaque glow. And everything was still. But a milk wagon rattled noisily across the distant perspective; A butcher boy, driving with the noble ruthlessness of an Olympic charioteer, whizzed around the corner high above a pair of red wheels. A guilty-eyed cat, emerging from under the stones, ran ahead of Mr. Culver for a while, and then sprang into another cellar;and a stout police officer, who seemed to be devoid of all emotion, as if he too were part of some inorganic nature, who seemed to be emerging from a lamp-post, paid no heed to Mr. Culver. Mr. Culver turned left and continued down a narrow lane which ran alongside a yellow wall which for some inexplicable reason had 'No. 1 Chesham Square'. Chesham Square was at least two hundred feet away and Mr. Culver, cosmopolitan enough not to be fooled by London's topographical mysteries, stood his ground without a sign of surprise or indignation.Eventually, with matter-of-fact persistence, he reached the square and walked diagonally towards the number 10. This belonged to an imposing carriage gate in a high, clean wall between two houses, one reasonably numbered 9 and the other numbered 37; The fact that the latter belonged, however, to Porthill Street, a street well-known in the neighborhood, was proclaimed by an inscription affixed above the ground-floor windows, by whatever highly efficient authority charged with the task of keeping track of the scattered to keep houses of London.Why no powers are required of Parliament (a brief act would suffice) to force these buildings to return to where they belong is one of the mysteries of local government.

It was so early that the embassy porter rushed out of his box, still struggling with the left sleeve of his livery coat. His vest was red and he was wearing knickers, but his expression was nervous. Mr. Culver, aware of the onslaught on his flank, fended him off by simply holding out an envelope bearing the embassy's coat of arms and moved on. He also showed the same talisman to the servant who opened the door and stepped back to let him into the hall.

A clear fire burned in a tall fireplace and an elderly man in evening dress and with a chain around his neck stood with his back to it, looking up from the newspaper which he held in both hands, spread out in front of his calm and serious face. He didn't move; But another footman in brown trousers and a hammer coat with a thin yellow cord approached Mr. Culver, heard his name murmured, turned on his heel in silence, and began to walk without even looking back. Mr. Culver, being thus ushered down a first-floor corridor to the left of the large carpeted staircase, was suddenly invited into a rather small room furnished with a heavy desk and a few chairs.The servant closed the door and Mr. Culver was left alone. He didn't sit down. Hat and cane in one hand, he looked around

Another door opened noiselessly, and when Mr. Culver looked in that direction, all he saw at first was black clothing, a bald head and a drooping dark gray mustache on either side of two wrinkled hands. The person who had entered held a stack of papers in front of his eyes and approached the table with rather sheepish steps while he turned the papers over. State Councilor Wurmen, , was rather short-sighted. When this deserving official placed the papers on the table, a face of pasty complexion and melancholy ugliness revealed itself, surrounded by a great deal of fine, long, dark gray hair, which was held back by thick, bushy eyebrows.He placed a pair of black-framed pince-nez on a blunt and shapeless nose and seemed impressed by Mr. Culver's appearance.

He made no sign of greeting; neither did Mr. Culver, who knew his place well; But a subtle change in the general outlines of his shoulders and back suggested a slight curvature of Mr. Culver's spine beneath the vast surface of his cloak. The effect was unassuming deference.

"I have some of your reports here," the bureaucrat said in an unexpectedly soft and weary voice, forcibly pressing the papers with the tip of his index finger. He stopped; and Mr. Culver, who had recognized his own handwriting very well, waited in almost breathless silence. "We're not very happy with the attitude of the police here," the other continued, appearing mentally exhausted.

Mr. Culver's shoulders, without actually moving, suggested a shrug. And for the first time since leaving home that morning, his lips parted.

"Every country has its police force," he said philosophically. But as the embassy official continued to blink at him steadily, he felt compelled to add, "Allow me to state that I have no power to take action against the police here."

"What is desired," said the paper's man, "is the occurrence of something specific that should awaken their alertness." That's within your purview, isn't it?"

Mr. Culver made no reply save with a sigh, which he couldn't help but try to keep his face serene. The officer blinked doubtfully, as if struck by the dim light in the room. He repeated vaguely.

"The vigilance of the police - and the severity of the judges. The general leniency of the judicial process and the complete absence of any repressive measures are a scandal for Europe. What is desired right now is the intensification of the restlessness - the ferment which is undoubtedly present -"

'No doubt, no doubt,' Mr. Culver interrupted in a deep, respectful bass of an eloquent quality, so different from the tone in which he had spoken earlier that his interlocutor was left utterly surprised. “It exists on a dangerous scale. My reports over the last twelve months make it sufficiently clear.”

“Your reports of the last twelve months”, State Councilor Wurmen began in his gentle and sober tone, “were read by me. I couldn't figure out why you wrote them in the first place."

There was a sad silence for a while. Mr. Culver seemed to have swallowed his tongue and the other stared at the papers on the table. Finally he gave them a little push.

“It is understood that the facts you present there are the first requirement for your employment. What is needed right now is not the writing, but the uncovering of a clear, significant fact – I would almost say a worrying fact.”

'Needless to say, all my efforts will be directed towards this end,' said Mr. Culver, with confident modulations in his hoarse conversational tone. But the feeling of being watchfully blinked at from behind the blind glitter of those glasses on the other side of the table bothered him. With a gesture of absolute devotion, he stopped. The useful, hard-working, if unknown, member of the embassy seemed impressed by a newly born thought.

"You are very portly," he said.

This observation, which was essentially psychological and made with the modest hesitation of an official more familiar with ink and paper than the demands of active life, pained Mr. Culver like a rude personal remark. He took a step back.

"Ah? What were you pleased to tell us?” he cried with hoarse resentment.

Chancellor d'Ambassade, in charge of conducting this interview, seemed to find it too much for him.

"I think," he said, "that you should go to Mr. William." Yes, I think you should definitely see Mr. William. Be so kind as to wait here,” he added, and walked out with small steps.

Immediately Mr. Culver ran his hand over his hair. A light sweat had broken out on his forehead. He let the air out of his pursed lips like a man blowing out a spoonful of hot soup. But when the manservant in brown appeared silently at the door, Mr. Culver had not moved an inch from the seat he had occupied throughout the interview. He stood motionless, as if snared around him.

He walked down a corridor lit by a solitary jet of gas, then up a spiral staircase and through a glassed and cheery corridor on the first floor. The footman opened a door and stepped aside. Mr. Culver's feet felt a thick carpet. The room was large and had three windows; and a young man with a shaved, large face, seated in a spacious armchair in front of a huge mahogany desk, said in French to the Chancellor d'Ambassade, who went out, papers in hand:

"You are absolutely right, my dear. He is fat – the animal.”

Mr. William, First Secretary, had a reputation in the salon as a pleasant and entertaining man. He was something of a favorite in society. His wit consisted in discovering whimsical connections between contradictory ideas; and when he spoke in this tension he would sit a good distance in front of his seat, his left hand raised as if showing his merry demonstrations between thumb and forefinger, while his round, clean-shaven face wore an expression of cheerful confusion.

But there was no trace of happiness or confusion in the way he looked at Mr. Culver. He lay far back in the deep chair, elbows out and one leg thrown over a fat knee, and his smooth and rosy face had the air of a preternaturally blooming baby who wouldn't take any nonsense from anyone.

"You understand French?" he said.

Mr. Culver hoarsely declared that was the case. His whole massive body was leaning forward. He was standing on the carpet in the center of the room, hat and cane in one hand; the other hung lifeless at his side. He quietly muttered something somewhere deep in his throat about doing his military service in the French artillery. Immediately, with contemptuous perversity, Mr. William changed languages ??and began to speak idiomatic English without the slightest trace of a foreign accent.

"Ah! Yes. Of course. Let's see. How much did you get paid for getting the improved breech block design for your new field gun?"

'Five years of strict confinement,' answered Mr. Culver, unexpectedly but without a trace of emotion.

"They got away without any problems," was Mr. William's comment. "And it certainly did you right that you let yourself be caught. What made you decide to do something like this?

There was Mr. Culver's hoarse chattering voice, speaking of his youth, of his fatal infatuation with an unworthy man -

"Aha! "Cherchez la femme", Mr. William condescended, adamantly but without interrupting kindness; in his condescension, on the contrary, there was a touch of grimness. "How long have you been employed here at the embassy?" he asked.

"Since the time of the late Honorable Scott-Weber," Mr. Culver replied in a low voice, sadly pursing out his lips in a sign of mourning for the late diplomat. The First Secretary observed this game of physiognomy constantly.

"Ah! since. So! What do you have to say about your own opinion?" he asked sharply.

Mr. Culver replied with some surprise that he was unaware that he had anything in particular to say. He had been summoned by a letter - and he busily put his hand in the side pocket of his coat, but before Mr. William's mocking, cynical vigilance decided to leave it there.

'Bah!' said the latter. "What do you mean getting out of that state like that? You don't even have the physique for your job. You - a member of a starving proletariat - never! You – a desperate socialist or anarchist – what is that?”

"Anarchist," declared Mr. Culver in a low voice.

"Bosh!" Mr. William continued without raising his voice. “You frightened old Wurmen yourself. You wouldn't fool an idiot. They all are, by the way, but you just seem impossible to me. So you started your connection with us by stealing the French weapon designs. And you got caught. That must have made our government very uncomfortable. You don't seem very smart."

Mr. Culver tried hoarsely to apologize.

"As I have observed before, a fatal infatuation with an unworthy—"

Mr. William raised a large, white, thick hand. "Ah yes. The unfortunate bond - of your youth. She confiscated the money and then sold you to the police - what?"

The sad change in Mr. Culver's physiognomy, the momentary slackening of his whole personality, betrayed that this was an unfortunate event. Mr. William's hand gripped the ankle resting on his knee. The sock was of dark blue silk.

"Look, that wasn't very smart of you. Maybe you are too vulnerable.”

Mr. Culver indicated in a throaty, veiled murmur that he was no longer young.

"Oh! "That's a mistake that age doesn't heal," observed Mr. William with uncanny familiarity. "But no! You're too fat for that. You couldn't have looked like that if you were even susceptible. I'll tell you what I think is going on: you're a lazy guy. How long have you been receiving salary from this embassy?”

"Eleven years," was the reply after a moment of sullen hesitation. “I was charged with several missions to London while His Excellency Honorable Scott-Weber was still Ambassador to Paris. Then, on His Excellency's orders, I settled in London. I am English."

"You are! Are you? Uh?"

'British by birth,' said Mr. Culver quietly. "But my father was French and so-"

"Don't mind explaining," the other interrupted. "I suppose you could legally have been a Marshal of France and a Member of Parliament in England - and then you would indeed have been of use to our embassy."

That soaring elicited something of a faint smile on Mr. Culver's face. Mr. William maintained an unshakable seriousness.

'But like I said, you're a lazy fellow; You don't take your chances. At the time of Honorable Scott-Weber we had many soft-headed people leading this message. You've caused people like you to have a misconception about the nature of an intelligence fund. It's my job to correct that misunderstanding by telling you what the Secret Service is not. It is not a philanthropic institution. I had you called here on purpose to tell you that.”

Mr. Wladimir noticed the forced look of confusion on Culver's face and smiled sarcastically.

"I see that you understand me perfectly. I assume you are intelligent enough for your job. What we want now is activity – activity.”

As he repeated that last word, Mr. William placed a long white forefinger on the edge of the desk. Any trace of hoarseness vanished from Culver's voice. The nape of his coarse neck turned crimson above the velvet collar of his cloak. His lips trembled before parting wide.

"If you would be so kind as to look up my files," he boomed in his big, clear, eloquent bass, "you will see that only three months ago I issued a warning on the occasion of the visit of the Grand Duke Romuald to Paris, that of telegraphed to the French police from here, and—”

"Do, do!" Mr. William burst out with a frowning grimace. "The French police had no use for your warning. Don't yell like that. what the hell do you mean?”

With an air of proud humility, Mr. Culver apologized for forgetting himself. His voice, famous for years at open-air meetings and at workers' gatherings in large halls, he said, contributed to his reputation as a good and trustworthy Colleague. It was therefore part of its usefulness. It had inspired confidence in his principles. "I have always been invited by the Heads of State and Government to speak at critical moments," said Mr. Culver with visible satisfaction. There was no riot he couldn't make himself heard about, he added; and suddenly he made a demonstration.

"Allow me," he said. With lowered brow, without looking up, he crossed the room to one of the French windows, quickly and clumsily. As if yielding to an uncontrollable impulse, he opened it slightly. Astonished, Mr. William jumped up from the depths of the armchair and looked over his shoulder; and below, on the other side of the embassy courtyard, far beyond the open gate, one could see the broad back of a policeman lazily watching as a rich baby's magnificent pram was solemnly pushed across the square.

"Police officer!" said Mr. Culver, with no greater effort than to whisper; and Mr. William burst out laughing as he saw the policeman turn around as if struck by a sharp object. Mr. Culver quietly closed the window and returned to the center of the room.

"With a voice like that," he said, stepping on the hoarse conversation pedal, "of course I was trusted. And I also knew what to say.”

Mr. William, straightening his tie, watched him in the glass over the mantelpiece.

"I take it you have a good enough command of social-revolutionary jargon," he said contemptuously. "Vox et. . . You've never learned Latin, have you?"

'No,' growled Mr. Culver. "You didn't expect me to know. I belong to the million. Who knows Latin? Just a few hundred idiots unable to take care of themselves.”

For about thirty seconds, Mr. William looked in the mirror at the fleshy profile, the gross bulk of the man behind him. And at the same time he had the advantage of seeing his own face, clean-shaven and round, with rosy gills, and with the thin, sensitive lips precisely formed for the uttering of those delicate jokes which had made him so endeared to the world's highest society . Then he turned and entered the room with such determination that the ends of his old-fashioned bow tie seemed bristling with unspeakable threats. The movement was so rapid and violent that when Mr. Culver cast a sideways glance he trembled inwardly.

'Aha! You dare to be impertinent,' Mr. William began in an astonishingly guttural tone that was not only utterly un-English but utterly un-European, baffling even Mr. Culver's experience of cosmopolitan slums. 'Don't you dare ! Well, I'll speak to you in plain English. voting is not enough. We don't need your vote. We don't want a vote. We want facts – startling facts – damn it,” he added directly into Mr. Culver's face with a sort of wild discretion.

"Don't try to dupe me with your Hyperborean manners," Mr. Culver defended hoarsely, looking down at the carpet. His interlocutor, who smiled mockingly at the shaggy bow of his tie, then switched the conversation to French.

“You're posing as an 'agent provocateur'. The real business of an agent provocateur is to provoke. As far as I can gather from your records on file, you have not done anything to earn your living for the last three years.”

"Nothing!" cried Culver, without moving a limb and without raising his eyes, but with the tone of sincere feeling in his tone. "I prevented several times what might have been -"

"There is a saying in this country that prevention is better than cure," interrupted Mr. William, throwing himself into the armchair. "By and large, it's stupid. There is no end to prevention. But it is characteristic. They don't like finality in this country. Don't be too English. And don't be absurd in this particular case. The evil is already there. We don't want prevention - we want healing.”

He paused, turned to the desk, turned over some papers lying there, and spoke in a changed businesslike tone, without looking at Mr. Culver.

"You know, of course, about the International Conference that took place in Milan?"

Mr. Culver indicated in a hoarse voice that he was in the habit of reading the daily newspapers. To another question he replied that of course he understood what he was reading. Mr. William then smiled slightly at the documents, which he was still going through one by one, and murmured, "As long as it's not in Latin, I suppose."

'Or Chinese,' added Mr. Culver undeterred.

"Hmm. Some of the outpourings of your revolutionary friends are written in a charabia that is as unintelligible as Chinese..." Mr. William contemptuously dropped a gray sheet of printed matter, a gavel, a pen and a torch crossed? What is this FP?" Mr. Culver approached the imposing desk.

"The future of the proletariat. "It's a society," he explained, standing ponderously by the chair, "not anarchist in principle, but open to all shades of revolutionary opinion."

"Are you in?"

"One of the Vice-Presidents," exhaled Mr. Culver heavily; and the first secretary of the embassy lifted his head to look at him.

"Then you should be ashamed," he said succinctly. “Is your society capable of nothing but printing this prophetic bastard in dull script on this dirty paper, is it? Why don't you do something? Look here. I have this matter in my hands now and I'm telling you clearly that you have to make your money. The good old Scott-Weber days are over. No work, no wages.”

Mr. Culver felt a strange weakness in his strong legs. He took a step back and blew his nose loudly.

He was actually startled and worried. The rusty London sunshine fought its way out of the London fog and spread a lukewarm brightness in the First Secretary's private room. and in the stillness, against a windowpane, Mr. Culver heard the faint buzzing of a fly - his first fly that year - which, better than any swallow, heralded the approach of spring. The useless excitement of this tiny energetic organism had an unpleasant effect on this great man, whose inertia was threatened.

During the break, Mr. William mentally formulated a series of derogatory remarks about Mr. Culver's face and figure. The guy was unexpectedly vulgar, clumsy, and outrageously unintelligent. He looked unusually like a master plumber presenting his bill. The first secretary of the embassy, ??on his occasional forays into American humor, had developed a particular notion of this class of mechanics as the embodiment of fraudulent laziness and incompetence.

This was then the famous and trusted secret agent, so secret that he was never referred to in the official, semi-official, and confidential correspondence of the late Honorable Scott-Weber other than by the symbol [Delta]; the famous agent [Delta] whose warnings had the power to alter the plans and dates of royal, imperial and grand ducal voyages, and sometimes even to cause them to be postponed altogether! This guy! And Herr Wladimir fell into an enormous and mocking fit of merriment, partly to his own astonishment, which he thought naïve, but mainly at the expense of the universally deplored Honorable Scott-Weber.His late Excellency, who had bestowed the sublime favor of his imperial lord as ambassador on several reluctant foreign ministers, was known in his lifetime for his owlish, pessimistic credulity. His Excellency had the social revolution in mind. He envisioned himself as a diplomat assigned by special clearance to witness the end of diplomacy and almost the end of the world in a horrific democratic upheaval. His prophetic and sad dispatches had been the joke of the Foreign Office for years. He is said to have exclaimed on his deathbed (visited by his imperial friend and lord): 'Unhappy Europe!You will perish from the moral insanity of your children!' He was destined to be the victim of the first crook who appeared, thought Mr. William, smiling vaguely at Mr. Culver. His prophetic and sad dispatches had been the joke of the Foreign Office for years. He is said to have exclaimed on his deathbed (visited by his imperial friend and lord): 'Unhappy Europe! You will perish from the moral insanity of your children!' He was destined to be the victim of the first crook who appeared, thought Mr. William, smiling vaguely at Mr. Culver. His prophetic and sad dispatches had been the joke of the Foreign Office for years.He is said to have exclaimed on his deathbed (visiting his imperial friend and master): "Unhappy Europe! You will perish from the moral insanity of your children!' He was destined to be the victim of the first crook who appeared, thought Mr. William, smiling vaguely at Mr. Culver.

"You should venerate the memory of Honorable Scott-Weber," he exclaimed suddenly.

Mr. Culver's lowered physiognomy expressed a gloomy and weary irritation.

"Allow me to tell you," he said, "that I came here because I was summoned by an obligatory letter. I've only been here twice in the last eleven years and certainly not at eleven in the morning. It's not very smart to call me like that. There is only a chance to be seen. And that would not be a joke for me.”

Mr. William shrugged his shoulders.

"It would destroy my usefulness," the other continued Helms.

"That's your business," Mr. William murmured with gentle brutality. "If you stop being useful, you will have no more employment. Yes. At first attempt. abbreviate. You should –” Mr. William frowned, paused, finding the expression insufficiently idiomatic, and instantly beamed with a grin of beautifully white teeth. "You'll be kicked out," he ground out angrily.

Once again Mr. Culver had to fight with all the strength of his will, the faint feeling in his legs that had once earned a poor devil the happy expression: 'My heart sank into my boots.' Mr. Culver, feeling the feeling, lifted his head.

Mr. William endured the inquiring gaze with complete composure.

"We want to give the conference in Milan a boost," he said lightly. “Your reflections on international measures to suppress political crime do not seem to lead to any results. England lags behind. This country is absurd in its sentimental respect for individual liberty. It's unbearable to think that all your friends just have to drop by to-"

'That way I can keep an eye on them all,' Mr. Culver interrupted hoarsely.

“It would make a lot more sense to keep them all under wraps. England must be brought into line. The imbecile bourgeoisie of this country are complicit in the very people who aim to drive them from their homes and starve in the ditches. And they still have political power if they had the brains to use it to preserve it. I take it you agree that the middle class is stupid?”

Mr. Culver agreed hoarsely.

"They are."

"You have no imagination. They are blinded by an idiotic vanity. What they want right now is a really good scare. This is the psychological moment to put your friends to work. I called you here to present my idea to you.”

And Mr. William developed his idea from above, with contempt and condescension, while at the same time exhibiting a degree of ignorance of the true aims, thoughts and methods of the revolutionary world that filled the taciturn Mr. Culver with inner dismay. He confused causes with effects more than was excusable; the most important propagandists with impulsive bomb throwers; assumed organization where it could not naturally exist; For a moment he spoke of the Social Revolutionary Party as if it were a perfectly disciplined army in which the word of the chiefs was paramount, and then again as if it were the loosest association of desperate bandits ever camped in a mountain ravine.Once Mr. Culver had opened his mouth to protest, but the raising of a shapely, large white hand caught him. Very soon he was so horrified that he didn't want to protest at all. He listened in a silence of fear that resembled the immobility of deep attention.

“A number of crimes,” Mr. William continued calmly, “committed here in this country; not only planned here - that wouldn't work - they wouldn't mind. Your friends could set fire to half the continent without swaying public opinion here in favor of universal repressive legislation. You won't be looking beyond your backyard here."

Mr. Culver cleared his throat, but his heart failed him and he said nothing.

"These crimes don't have to be particularly bloodthirsty," Mr. William continued, as if giving a scientific lecture, "but they must be sufficiently spectacular and effective." Target buildings, for example. What is the fetish of the hour that the whole bourgeoisie knows—isn't it, Mr. Culver?”

Mr. Culver opened his hands and shrugged slightly.

"You are too lazy to think," Mr. William commented on this gesture. "Pay attention to what I say. Today's fetish is neither royalty nor religion. Therefore, the palace and the church should be left alone. Do you know what I mean, Mr. Culver?'

Mr. Culver's dismay and contempt found expression in an attempt at frivolity.

"Perfect. But what about the embassies? "A series of attacks on the various embassies," he began; but he couldn't resist the First Secretary's cold, wary gaze.

"I understand you can be joking," he remarked nonchalantly. "That's fine. It can enliven your oratory at socialist congresses. But this room is not the place for it. It would be infinitely safer for you if you followed carefully what I say. Since you are required to provide facts rather than Tall stories, you'd better try and take advantage of what I'm trying to tell you. Today's untouchable fetish is science. Why don't you persuade some of your friends to play that wooden-fronted panjandrum? It's not Part of these institutions that need to be swept away before the FP comes?”

Mr. Culver said nothing. He was afraid to part his lips so he wouldn't miss a moan.

"That's what you should try. An assassination attempt on a crowned head or a president is sensational enough in a way, but not as much as it used to be. It has entered the common notion of the existence of all heads of state. It's almost conventional - especially since so many presidents have been assassinated. Now let's commit a crime against - let's say - a church. Undoubtedly terrible enough at first glance, and yet not as effective as a sane person might think. No matter how revolutionary and anarchist it might be, there would be enough fools who would give such a crime the character of a religious rally.And that would detract from the particular alarming significance we wish to attach to the act. An assassination attempt on a restaurant or a tHelmser would suffer equally from the suggestion of apolitical passion: a hungry man's desperation, an act of social revenge. All this is used up; As a visual example of revolutionary anarchism, it is no longer instructive. Every newspaper has ready-made formulations to explain such phenomena. I will now explain to you the philosophy of bomb-throwing from my point of view; From the point of view, you pretend to have been in office for the last eleven years. I'll try not to talk over your head.The sensitivity of the class you are attacking will soon be blunted. Property appears to them as an indestructible thing. They cannot long rely on their feelings of pity or fear. Now, to have any impact on public opinion, a bombing must go beyond revenge or terrorism. It has to be purely destructive. It has to be that, and that only, beyond the slightest inkling of any other object. You anarchists should make it clear that you are determined to clean up all social creation. But how do you get this appallingly absurd notion into the minds of the middle class so that there is no mistake? That is the question.The answer is to direct your blows at something that lies outside of mankind's ordinary passions. Of course there is art. A bomb in the National Gallery would make noise. But it wouldn't be serious enough. Art was never her fetish. It's like smashing a couple of back windows in a man's house; On the other hand, if you really want to raise it, you must at least try to raise the roof. Of course there was some screaming, but from whom? Artists - art critics and the like - people of no importance. Nobody cares what they say. But there is learning – science. Every idiot who has an income believes in it.He doesn't know why, but he thinks it's kind of important. It is the untouchable fetish. All damn professors are radicals at heart. Let them know that their great panjandrum must also go to make way for the future of the proletariat. The howling of all these intellectual idiots will surely advance the work of the Milan conference. They will write in the newspapers. Their indignation would be beyond suspicion, since no material interests are openly at stake, and they would alarm any class selfishness that should be impressed. They believe that science is mysteriously the source of their material wealth. they doAnd the absurd savagery of such a demonstration will hit them harder than the destruction of an entire street - or a tHelmser - full of their kind. At that conclusion, they can always say, “Oh! It's just class hatred.' But what is to be said of an act of destructive ferocity so absurd as to be incomprehensible, inexplicable, almost unthinkable? indeed crazy? Madness alone is truly terrifying, since it cannot be appeased by threats, persuasion, or bribery. Besides, I'm a civilized man. I would never dream of instructing you to set up a mere butcher's shop, even if I expect the best results from it.But I wouldn't expect the desired result from a butcher's shop. Murder is always with us. It's almost an institution. The demonstration must be directed against learning - science. But not all science is enough. The attack must have the shocking futility of baseless blasphemy. Since bombs are your means of expression, it would be really instructive if you could throw a bomb in pure math. But that is impossible. I tried to educate you; I have presented to you the higher philosophy of your usefulness and suggested some useful arguments. You are particularly interested in the practical application of my teaching.But from the moment I set out to interview you, I also paid some attention to the practical aspect of the question. What do you think about studying astronomy?” I was trying to educate you; I have presented to you the higher philosophy of your usefulness and suggested some useful arguments. You are particularly interested in the practical application of my teaching. But from the moment I set out to interview you, I also paid some attention to the practical aspect of the question. What do you think about studying astronomy?” I was trying to educate you;I have presented to you the higher philosophy of your usefulness and suggested some useful arguments. You are particularly interested in the practical application of my teaching. But from the moment I set out to interview you, I also paid some attention to the practical aspect of the question. What do you think about getting involved in astronomy?”

For some time now Mr. Culver's immobility beside the chair had resembled a state of collapsed coma - a kind of passive unconsciousness punctuated by mild seizures such as might be seen in a pet dog having a nightmare on the mantelpiece. And with a restless dog growl he repeated the word:

"Astronomy."

He had not yet fully recovered from the state of confusion caused by the effort to follow Mr. William's quick, concise utterance. It had overcome its power of assimilation. It had made him angry. This anger was complicated by disbelief. And suddenly he realized that this was all an elaborate joke. Mr. William smiled, baring his white teeth, dimpled on his round, full face, which posed with a smug tilt over the bristly bow of his tie. The favorite of the women of intelligent society had assumed his salon posture and accompanied the recitation of delicate jokes.He sat hunched over, white hand raised, seeming to carefully grasp the subtlety of his suggestion between thumb and forefinger.

"There couldn't be anything better. Such outrage combines the utmost respect for humanity with the most alarming display of cruel stupidity. I defy the ingenuity of journalists in persuading their public that any member of the proletariat can have a personal grievance against astronomy. Hunger itself could hardly be drawn into this – could it? And there are other advantages. The whole civilized world has heard of Greenwich. The shoeshine boys in the basement of Charing Cross station know something about it. See?"

So well known in high society for his urbane humor, Mr. William's features shone with a cynical self-satisfaction that would have amazed the intelligent women whom his wit so brilliantly entertained. "Yes," he continued with a sneer, "blasting the first meridian is bound to evoke a cry of irritation."

'A difficult matter,' murmured Mr. Culver, believing that was the only sure thing.

"What's the matter? Don't you have the whole gang under your hand? The election from the basket? That old terrorist Yount is here. I see him walking through Piccadilly in his green Havelock almost every day. And Michaels, the farewell apostle - you want Don't say you don't know where he is? Because if you don't, I can tell you," Mr. William continued threateningly. "If you think you're the only one on the secret fund list, you're wrong."

This totally unfounded suggestion caused Mr. Culver to shuffle his feet slightly.

“And the whole crowd in Lausanne – what? Didn't they flock here at the first sign of the Milan conference? This is an absurd country.”

'It will cost money,' said Mr. Culver instinctively.

"That cock won't fight," Mr. William replied in a surprisingly genuine English accent. “You get your bolt every month and nothing more until something happens. And if nothing happens very soon, you won't even get that. What is your supposed occupation? What are you supposed to live on?”

'I run a business,' replied Mr. Culver.

"A deal! What deal?"

"Stationery, newspapers. My wife-"

"Your what?" interrupted Mr. William with his guttural Central Asian tones.

"My wife." Mr. Culver raised his hoarse voice slightly. "I am married."

"That's damn it," cried the other in undisguised amazement. "Married! And you're also a self-confessed anarchist! What bloody nonsense is this? But I suppose it's just a way of talking. Anarchists don't marry. It's well known. They can't. It would be apostasy ."

'My wife isn't one of them,' mumbled Mr. Culver pouting. "Besides, it's none of your business."

"Oh yes, it is," Mr. William snapped. "I am beginning to believe that you are not at all the right man for the job you are hired to do. You must have completely discredited yourself in your own world by getting married. Couldn't have done without it? That's your virtuous bond, isn't it? With one type of bond or another, you destroy your usefulness.”

Mr. Culver puffed out his cheeks, let the air out violently, and that was all. He had armed himself with patience. It shouldn't be tried much longer. The First Secretary suddenly became very curt, distant, and final.

"You can go now," he said. “An explosive outrage must be provoked. I'll give you a month. The sessions of the conference are adjourned. Before it puts itself back together, something must have happened here, or your connection with us will end.”

With unprincipled versatility, he changed tone once more.

'Consider my philosophy, sir - sir - Culver,' he said with a sort of wry condescension, gesturing towards the door. “Go to the first meridian. You don't know the middle class as well as I do. Your sensitivity is dulled. The first meridian. Nothing better and nothing easier, I should think.”

He had risen and, with a humorous twitch of thin, sensitive lips in the glass over the mantelpiece, he watched as Mr. Culver, hat and cane in hand, lumbered from the room. The door closed.

The servant in trousers, who suddenly appeared in the corridor, let Mr. Culver out another way and through a small door in the corner of the courtyard. The doorman standing at the gate completely ignored his exit; and Mr. Culver traced the path of his morning pilgrimage as if in a dream—an angry dream. So complete was this detachment from the material world that, although the mortal shell of Mr. Culver had not been unduly scurried about the streets, that part of him which it would be unjustifiably rude to refuse immortality suddenly found himself at the shop door, as if carried on the wings of a great wind from West to East. He went straight behind the counter and sat down on a wooden chair that was there.Nobody seemed to disturb his solitude. Willie, now clad in a green cloth apron, was sweeping and dusting the top. purposeful and conscientious, as if playing with it; and Mrs Culver, who had been warned in the kitchen by the clatter of the cracked bell, had merely gone to the glassed-in door of the sitting-room, pushed the curtain aside a little, and peered into the gloomy shop. When she saw that her husband was sitting there, shadowy and massive, his hat laid back on his head, she had immediately returned to her hearth.An hour or more later she took off her brother Willie's green apron and instructed him to wash his hands and face, in the authoritative tone she had used on this subject for some fifteen years - ever since she had actually given up taking care of the boy's hands and looking at himself. She looked away from her plate at Willie's face and hands as he approached the kitchen table. offered her approval with an air of confidence that hid a constant remnant of fear.Father's wrath used to be the most effective sanction of these rites, but Mr. Culver's composure in domestic life would have made any mention of anger implausible, even to poor Willie's nervousness. The theory was that Mr. Culver would have suffered untold grief and shock at any lack of cleanliness at mealtimes. Gwen found great comfort after her father's death in knowing that she no longer had to tremble for poor Willie. She couldn't bear to see the boy hurt. It drove her crazy. As a little girl she had often faced the irascible charlatan who defended her brother with glowing eyes.Nothing about Mrs Culver's appearance suggested that she was capable of passionate demonstration.

She finished dishing up. The table was laid in the parlor. Going to the foot of the stairs, she screamed out "Mother!" Then opening the glazed door leading to the shop, she said quietly “Rudolph !” Mr. Culver had not changed his position; he apparently had not stirred a limb for an hour and a half. He got up heavily, and came to his dinner in his overcoat and with his hat on, without uttering a word. His silence in itself had nothing startlingly unusual in this household, hidden in the shades of the sordid street seldom touched by the sun, behind the dim shop with its wares of disreputable rubbish. Only that day Mr. Culver's taciturnity was so obviously thoughtful that the two women were impressed by it. They sat silent themselves, keeping a watchful eye on poor Willie, lest he should break out into one of his fits of loquacity. He faced Mr. Culver across the table, and remained very good and quiet, staring vacantly. The endeavor to keep him from making himself objectionable in any way to the master of the house put no inconsiderable anxiety into these two women's lives. "That boy," as they alluded to him softly between themselves, had been a source of that sort of anxiety almost from the very day of his birth. The late licensed victualler's humiliation at having such a very peculiar boy for a son manifested himself by a propensity to brutal treatment; for he was a person of fine sensibilities, and his sufferings as a man and a father were perfectly genuine. Willie had to be kept from making himself a nuisance to the single gentlemen lodgers, who are themselves a queer lot, and are afterwards easily aggrieved. And there was always the anxiety of his mere existence to face. Visions of a workhouse infirmary for her child had haunted the old woman in the basement breakfast-room of the decayed Belgravian house. "If you had not found such a good husband, my dear," she used to say to her daughter, "I don't know what would have become of that poor boy."

Mr. Culver expressed as much appreciation to Willie as a man who does not particularly like animals can give to his wife's beloved cat; and that recognition, benevolent and superficial, was essentially of the same quality. Both women admitted that not much more could reasonably be expected. It was enough to earn Mr. Culver the old woman's reverential gratitude. At first the rigors of friendless life had made her skeptical, and she would sometimes ask anxiously, 'Don't you think, dear, that Mr. Culver is tired of showing Willie about?' To which Gwen gave his usual nod of the head in reply .Once, however, she replied with rather grim boldness, "He'll have to tire of me first." There was a long silence. The mother, her feet propped up on a stool, seemed to be trying to fathom this answer: whose feminine profundity had struck her utterly. She had never really understood why Gwen had married Mr. Culver. That was very sensible of her and had obviously worked out for the best, but of course her girl would have hoped to find someone of a more suitable age.There had been a faithful young lad down the next street, a butcher's only son, who had helped his father in the shop and with whom Gwen had evidently walked out enthusiastically. True, he was dependent on his father; but business was good and his prospects excellent. On several evenings he went to the tHelmser with her friend. Then, just as she was beginning to dread hearing of their engagement (for what could she have done with that big house alone, with Willie in her hands), that romance ended abruptly and Gwen looked around very bored. But Mr. Culver, By the time he got, fortunately, to the front bedroom on the first floor, there was no more talk of the young butcher.It was clearly providential.

CHAPTER III

" . . . Every idealization makes life poorer. Beautifying it means stripping it of its character of complexity - it means destroying it. Leave that to the moralists, my boy. History is made by men, but they don't make it in their heads. The ideas that are born in their consciousness play an insignificant role in the course of events. History is dominated and determined by tools and production - by the power of economic conditions. Capitalism created socialism, and the property laws made by capitalism are responsible for anarchism.No one can say what social organization will look like in the future. Then why indulge in prophetic fantasies? At best, they can only interpret the thoughts of the Prophet and have no objective value. Leave that pastime to the moralists, my boy.”

Michaels, the leave-of-absence apostle, spoke in an even voice, a voice that panted as if dulled and oppressed by the layer of fat on his chest. He came out of an extremely hygienic prison, round as a tub, with a huge belly and puffed-up cheeks, of pale, semi-transparent complexion, as if the servants of an outraged society had for fifteen years made a point of stuffing him with fattening groceries in a damp and lightless cellar . And since then he hadn't managed to lose even one gram of weight.

It was said that a very wealthy old lady had sent him for three seasons to take a cure in Mariánské Lázn? - where he once wanted to share public curiosity with a crowned head - but the police on that occasion ordered him to leave within twelve hours . His ordeal was continued by being forbidden any access to the healing waters. But he had now resigned.

Since his elbow didn't look like a joint, but looked more like a bend in a doll's limb thrown over the back of a chair, he leaned forward slightly over his short and huge thighs to spit into the grate.

"Yes! I've had time to think about it a little," he added without emphasis. "Society has given me a lot of time to meditate."

Across the fireplace, in the horsehair chair in which Mrs Culver's mother was generally privileged to sit, Kevin Yount giggled grimly and with the faint black grimace of a toothless mouth. The terrorist, as he called himself, was old and bald, and a narrow, snow-white goatee hung limply from his chin. An extraordinary expression of insidious malevolence remained in his dead eyes. As he struggled to his feet, the forward thrust of a scrawny, groping hand, deformed by gouty swellings, suggested the exertion of a doomed murderer using all his remaining strength for one last stab. He leaned on a thick stick that trembled under his other hand.

"I have always dreamed," he said vehemently, "of a group of men absolutely determined to cast aside all scruples in their choice of means, strong enough to openly call themselves destroyers, and free from the taint of resignation. ' Pessimism that rots the world. No pity for anything on earth, not even for yourself, and death forever and all in the service of humanity – I would have liked to see that.”

His small bald head quivered, giving the wisp of his white goatee a comical vibration. His pronunciation would have been almost entirely incomprehensible to a stranger. His exhausted passion, which resembled in its impotent violence the excitement of a senile hedonist, was ill-served by a parched throat and toothless gums that seemed to be caught in the tip of his tongue. Mr. Culver, sitting in the corner of the sofa at the far end of the room, gave two hearty grunts of agreement.

The old terrorist slowly rolled his head back and forth on his scrawny neck.

"And I could never gather as many as three such men. So much for your depraved pessimism,” he growled at Michaels, who spread his thick, cushion-like legs and abruptly slipped his feet under his chair in a show of desperation.

He's a pessimist! Absurd! He yelled that the accusation was outrageous. He was so far from pessimism that he already saw the end of all private property logically and inevitably coming through the mere development of its inherent evil. The possessions not only had to face the awakened proletariat, but also had to fight among themselves. Yes. Struggle and war were the condition of private property. It was deadly. Ah!He relied not on emotional excitement to sustain his faith, no declamations, no anger, no visions of waving blood-red flags or metaphorical glaring suns of vengeance rising over the horizon of a doomed society. Not him! Cold reason, he boasted, was the basis of his optimism. Yes, optimism –

His labored panting stopped, then after a breath or two he added:

"Don't you think that if I hadn't been the optimist that I am, in fifteen years I couldn't have found a way to cut my throat? And in the latter case, there were always the walls of my cell to bang my head against.”

The shortness of breath took any fire, any liveliness from his voice; his large, pale cheeks hung down like full sacks, motionless, un-trembling; But in his blue eyes, which were squinted as if peering, was the same look of confident wisdom, a little mad in its rigidity, that they must have had when the indomitable optimist sat in his cell at night, thinking. Kevin Yount stopped in front of him, one wing of his faded greenish lock of hair carelessly tossed over his shoulder.Colleague Adjepong, a former medical student and chief author of the FP leaflets, sat in front of the fireplace, stretching out his strong legs and keeping the soles of his boots turned up to meet the glow of the fire. A tuft of frizzy yellow hair covered his ruddy, freckled face with a flattened nose and bulging mouth cast in the rough mold of the negro type. His almond-shaped eyes stared lazily over high cheekbones. He wore a gray flannel shirt, the loose ends of a black silk tie hung over the buttoned chest of his serge coat;With his head resting on the back of his chair and his throat mostly bared, he held a cigarette in a long wooden tube to his lips and blew streams of smoke straight up to the ceiling.

Michaels pursued his idea—the idea of ??his solitary reclusion—the thought vouchsafed to his captivity and growing like a faith revealed in visions. He talked to himself, indifferent to the sympathy or hostility of his hearers, indifferent indeed to their presence, from the habit he had acquired of thinking aloud hopefully in the solitude of the four whitewashed walls of his cell, in the sepulchral silence of the great blind pile of bricks near a river, sinister and ugly like a colossal mortuary for the socially drowned.

He was not good at arguments, not because any number of arguments could shake his faith, but because the mere fact of hearing another voice distressed him painfully and immediately confused his thoughts—those thoughts that he had lived in mental solitude for so many years Barren than a waterless desert, no living voice had ever fought, commented, or agreed against it.

No one interrupted him now, and he reaffirmed his faith and mastered it irresistibly and completely like an act of grace: the mystery of destiny discovered in the material side of life; the economic state of the world, which is responsible for the past and shapes the future; the source of all history, of all ideas, which directs the spiritual development of mankind and the very impulses of its passion -

A harsh laugh from Colleague Adjepong ended the tirade with a sudden faltering of the tongue and a confused uneasiness in the apostle's slightly raised eyes. He closed them slowly for a moment as if to collect his thoughts. There was silence; But because of the two gas nozzles above the table and the glowing grate, the little drawing-room behind Mr. Culver's shop had grown terribly hot. Mr. Culver, getting up from the sofa with clumsy reluctance, opened the kitchen door to get more air, thus revealing the innocent Willie sitting very calmly and quietly at a fir-wood table, drawing circles, circles, circles; innumerable circles, concentric, eccentric;a sparkling vortex of circles that through their intricate multitude of repetitive curves, regularity of form and confusion of intersecting lines suggested a representation of cosmic chaos, the symbolism of a mad art that attempts the unimaginable . The artist never turned his head; and for all his soul's devotion to the task, his back trembled, his thin neck, sunken in a deep hollow at the base of his skull, seemed about to snap.

Mr. Culver returned to the sofa after a grunt of disapproval and surprise. Eric Adjepong stood up, tall in his battered blue serge suit under the low ceiling, shook off the stiffness of long immobility, and sauntered into the kitchen (down two steps) to look over Willie's shoulder. He came back and proclaimed oracularly: “Very good. Very distinctive, totally typical.”

'What is very good?' grunted Mr. Culver inquiringly, settling back into the corner of the sofa. The other explained his opinion casually, with a touch of condescension and nodded towards the kitchen:

"Typical of this form of degeneration - I mean these drawings."

'You would call this fellow degenerate, wouldn't you?' murmured Mr. Culver.

Colleague Eric Adjepong – nickname “Doctor”, former undocumented medical student; then traveling lecturer for workers' associations on socialist aspects of hygiene; Author of a popular quasi-medical study (in the form of a cheap pamphlet promptly confiscated by the police) entitled The Corrosive Vices of the Middle Class; Special delegate of the more or less mysterious Red Committee, together with Kevin Yount and Michaels for the work of literary propaganda - turned to the obscure familiar of at least two messages, that gaze of unbearable, hopelessly dense frugality that nothing but the frequenting of science can do give something to the dullness of mere mortals.

"You could call it scientific. Overall also a very good type of this degenerate strain. A look at his earlobes is enough. If you read Lombroso—”

Mr. Culver, moody and sprawled on the sofa, continued to look at the row of his waistcoat buttons; but his cheeks blushed slightly. Lately, even the mere derivation of the word science (an inherently harmless term with an indefinite meaning) has had the curious power to evoke a definitely offensive mental vision of Mr. William in his body while he was alive, with an almost supernatural clarity. And this phenomenon, rightly considered one of the wonders of science, triggered an emotional state of fear and despair in Mr. Culver, which resulted in violent abuse. But he said nothing. It was Kevin Yount who was heard, relentlessly until his last breath.

"Lombroso is an ass."

Colleague Adjepong met the shock of this blasphemy with a terrible expressionless look. And the other, whose dead, un-lustered eyes blackened the deep shadows beneath the great bony forehead, murmured, catching the tip of his tongue between his lips at every other word, as if chewing it furiously:

"Have you ever seen such an idiot? For him, the criminal is the prisoner. Very simple, isn't it? What about those who locked him in there - forced him in there? Exactly. Forced him there. And what is crime? Does he know that, this idiot who has made his way in this world full of fools by looking at the ears and teeth of many poor hapless devils? Teeth and ears mark the criminal? Do they? And what of the law that marks it even more—the pretty branded instrument invented by the overfed to protect themselves from the starving?Red-hot applications on their hideous skin – hey? Can't you smell and hear people's thick skin burning and sizzling from here? This is how criminals are created for your Lombrosos to write their silly things about.”

The pommel of his cane and his legs trembled with passion, while the torso, cloaked in the havelock's wings, maintained its historical defiance. He seemed to sniff the depraved atmosphere of social cruelty and set his ear to the vile noises. There was an extraordinary power of suggestion in this attitude. The near-dying veteran of the Dynamite Wars had been a great actor in his day - actor on panels, at secret meetings, in private interviews. The famous terrorist had never personally raised a finger against the fabric of society in his life. He was not a man of action;He was not even an orator of exuberant eloquence, rousing the masses in the roaring noise and foam of great enthusiasm. With a more subtle intent, he took on the role of an unabashed and poisonous conjurer of dark impulses that lurk in the blind envy and angry vanity of ignorance, in the sorrow and misery of poverty, in all the hopeful and noble illusions of righteous rage, pity and revolt. The shadow of his evil gift still clung to him like the odor of a deadly drug in an old poison vial, now emptied and useless, ready to be thrown on the heap of disused things.

Michaels, the apostle of the holiday card, smiled vaguely with his glued lips; his doughy moon face sagged under the weight of melancholy approval. He had been a prisoner himself. His own skin had burned under the glowing fire, he murmured softly. But Colleague Adjepong, also called "Doctor", had gotten over the shock in the meantime.

"You don't understand," he began scornfully, but stopped abruptly, intimidated by the dead blackness of the cavernous eyes on his face, which slowly turned to stare blindly at him, as if guided only by the sound. He ended the discussion with a slight shrug.

Willie, used to moving unnoticed, had gotten up from the kitchen table and was carrying his drawing to bed. He had reached the salon door in time to fully feel the shock of Kevin Yount's eloquent images. The sheet of paper covered with the circles fell from his fingers and he continued to stare at the old terrorist as if he had suddenly stopped dead in his pathological terror and fear of physical pain. Willie knew very well that hot iron applied to the skin was very painful. His frightened eyes shone with indignation: it would hurt terribly. His mouth fell open.

By staring unblinking into the fire, Michaels had regained the sense of isolation necessary for his thought continuity. His optimism began to pour from his lips. He saw capitalism doomed from the cradle, born with the poison of competition in its system. The big capitalists devour the small capitalists, concentrate power and the means of production en masse, perfect industrial processes and, in the madness of self-aggrandizement, prepare, organize, enrich and prepare only the rightful heritage of the suffering proletariat.Michaels uttered the big word 'patience' - and his clear blue gaze, fixed on the low ceiling of Mr. Culver's drawing room, had the character of seraphic trustworthiness. As Willie stood in the doorway, he seemed reassured and sunk in hysterics.

Colleague Adjepong's face twitched in desperation.

"Then there's no point in doing anything - no point at all."

"I'm not saying that," Michaels protested gently. His vision of truth had become so intense that the sound of a strange voice couldn't dispel it this time. He kept looking down at the red coals. It was necessary to prepare for the future, and he was willing to concede that perhaps the great change would come in the form of a revolution. But he argued that revolutionary propaganda was delicate work of high conscience. It was the training of the masters of the world. It should be as careful as the education of kings.He wants it to advance its principles cautiously, even timidly, in our ignorance of the impact that any given economic shift can have on the happiness, morals, intellect, and history of mankind. Because history is made with tools, not ideas; and everything is changed by economic conditions - art, philosophy,

The coals in the grate settled with a soft crack; and Michaels, the hermit of visions in the wilderness of a penitentiary, rose impetuously. Round as an inflated balloon, he opened his short, thick arms like a pathetic, hopeless attempt at embracing and cradling a self-regenerating universe. He gasped with excitement.

"The future is as certain as the past - slavery, feudalism, individualism, collectivism. This is the statement of a law, not an empty prophecy.”

The contemptuous pout on Colleague Adjepong's thick lips emphasized the Negro type of his face.

"Nonsense," he said quietly. “There is no law and no certainty. The teaching propaganda is changed. What the people know doesn't matter, no matter how accurate their knowledge is. The only thing that matters to us is the emotional state of the masses. Without emotion there is no action.”

He paused, then added with modest certainty:

"I'm speaking to you scientifically now - scientifically - am I not? What did you say, Culver?'

'Nothing,' growled Mr. Culver from the sofa, who had merely mumbled 'Damn', provoked by the hideous noise.

There was the venomous stuttering of the old toothless terrorist.

"Do you know how I would describe the nature of the current economic situation? I would call it cannibalistic. That's it! They feed their greed on the trembling flesh and warm blood of the people - nothing else."

Willie swallowed the horrific statement in one audible gulp and immediately slumped as if it had been quick poison, limply in a sitting position on the kitchen door steps.

Michaels gave no indication that he had heard anything. His lips seemed glued together forever; no quiver ran across his heavy cheeks. With worried eyes he looked for his round hard hat and put it on his round head. His round and fat body seemed to float low between the chairs under the sharp elbow of Kevin Yount. The old terrorist raised an unsteady, claw like hand and proudly tilted a black felt sombrero, shading the hollows and wrinkles of his wasted face. He started walking slowly, banging his cane on the ground with every step.It was more of a matter of getting him out of the house because he would pause every now and then as if to think, not agreeing to move on until urged by Michaels. The gentle apostle took his arm with brotherly solicitude; and behind them, hands in pockets, sturdy Adjepong yawned indistinctly. A blue cap with a patent-leather brim set far back in his tuft of yellow hair gave him the look of a Norwegian sailor bored with the world after a thunderous excursion. Mr. Culver accompanied his guests on leaving the premises. He accompanied her bareheaded, his heavy coat hanging open, his eyes fixed on the ground.

With restrained force he closed the door behind her back, turned the key and bolted it. He wasn't happy with his friends. Given Mr. William's bomb-throwing philosophy, they seemed hopelessly pointless. Since Mr. Culver's role in revolutionary politics was to observe, he could not take the initiative to act at once, either in his own home or in larger gatherings. He had to be careful.Moved by the justified indignation of a man well over forty, who was threatened in what he loved most - his peace and security - he asked himself contemptuously what could be said of so many, this Kevin Yount, this Michaels - this Adjepong , could have expected otherwise .

Pausing to turn off the gas burner in the middle of the shop, Mr. Culver plunged into the abyss of moral reasoning. With the insight of a kindred temper he pronounced his verdict. A lazy bunch - this Kevin Yount, who was being tended to by a bleary-eyed old woman, a woman he had lured away from a friend of his years before and tried more than once to shake off into the gutter afterwards. Lucky for Yount that she insisted on coming upstairs, otherwise there would have been no one left to help him off the bus at the railings of Green Park, where this ghost made its rounds every fine morning.When that indomitable, snarling old hag died, so must the boastful specter—the fiery Kevin Yount would be an end. And Mr. Culver's morale was hurt, too, by the optimism of Michaels, annexed by his wealthy old lady, who had lately sent him to a cottage she had in the country. The former prisoner could spend days strolling through the shady alleys together in a delicious and humanitarian idleness. As for Adjepong, the beggar would surely want for nothing as long as there were stupid girls with savings books in the world. And Mr. Culver, identical in temperament to his colleagues, drew subtle distinctions in his mind on the basis of insignificant differences.He drew them with a certain smugness, because the instinct of conventional seriousness was strong in him and was overcome only by his distaste for all kinds of recognized work—a temperamental flaw he shared with much of the revolutionary reformer of a particular welfare state. Because obviously people are not rebelling against the advantages and possibilities of this state, but against the price that has to be paid for it in the form of accepted morality, self-control and effort. The majority of revolutionaries are above all the enemies of discipline and weariness. There are also people for whose sense of justice the demanded price seems enormously high, abominable, oppressive, disturbing, humiliating, extortionate, unbearable.Those are the fanatics. The remaining part of the social rebels is vanity, the mother of all noble and base illusions, the companion of poets, reformers, charlatans, prophets and arsonists. The majority of revolutionaries are above all the enemies of discipline and weariness. There are also people for whose sense of justice the demanded price seems enormously high, abominable, oppressive, disturbing, humiliating, extortionate, unbearable. Those are the fanatics. The remaining part of the social rebels is vanity, the mother of all noble and base illusions, the companion of poets, reformers, charlatans, prophets and arsonists.The majority of revolutionaries are above all the enemies of discipline and weariness. There are also people for whose sense of justice the demanded price seems enormously high, abominable, oppressive, disturbing, humiliating, extortionate, unbearable. Those are the fanatics. The remaining part of the social rebels is vanity, the mother of all noble and base illusions, the companion of poets, reformers, charlatans, prophets and arsonists.

Lost in the abyss of meditation for a full minute, Mr. Culver did not reach the depth of these abstract reflections. Maybe he wasn't able to. In any case, he didn't have time. The sudden memory of Mr. Wladimir, another of his associates whom he could judge correctly because of subtle moral affinities, shook him painfully. He considered him dangerous. A tinge of envy crept into his mind. Lounging was all right for these fellows, for they didn't know Mr. William and had wives to fall back on; while he had a wife to take care of –

At this point, through a simple mind link, Mr. Culver was confronted with the need to go to bed sometime in the evening. So why not go now - right away? He sighed. The need wasn't usually as comfortable as it should have been for a man of his age and temperament. He feared the demon of insomnia that he believed had made him his own. He raised his arm and shut off the flickering jet of gas overhead.

A bright streak of light fell through the parlor door into the part of the store behind the counter. This allowed Mr. Culver to see at a glance how many silver coins were in the till. There were only a few; and for the first time since opening his shop he made a commercial appraisal of its value. This survey was unfavorable. He had entered the trade for no commercial reason. In choosing this particular line of business, he had been guided by an instinctive liking for shady deals where it was easy to make money. Moreover, it hasn't taken him out of his own sphere - the sphere that's being monitored by the police.On the contrary, it gave him a public reputation in the field and, as Mr. Culver had unacknowledged connections which made him familiar with the police but nevertheless ruthless towards them, such a situation was a distinct advantage.

He took the cash box out of the drawer and turned to leave the store. As he did so, he realized that Willie was still downstairs.

What the hell is he doing there? wondered Mr. Culver. What do these antics mean? He looked at his brother-in-law doubtfully, but didn't ask him for any information. Mr. Culver's intercourse with Willie was limited to a casual murmur one morning after breakfast: 'My boots', and even that was a communication of need rather than a direct command or request. Mr. Culver remarked with some surprise that he didn't really know what to say to Willie. He stopped in the middle of the living room and silently looked into the kitchen. He also didn't know what would happen if he said something.And that seemed very odd to Mr. Culver, considering he suddenly had to look after this chap too. He had never given a single thought to that aspect of Willie's existence before.

He certainly didn't know how to talk to the boy. He watched as he gestured and mumbled in the kitchen. Willie prowled around the table like an excited animal in a cage. A hesitant "Wouldn't you like to go to bed now?" had no effect at all; and Mr. Culver, abandoning the stony contemplation of his brother-in-law's conduct, wearily crossed the drawing-room, cash-box in hand. Since the general lassitude he felt climbing the stairs was of a purely mental nature, he was troubled by its inexplicable character. He hoped he wasn't getting sick. He paused on the dark landing to examine his sensations.But a faint and sustained sound of snoring piercing the darkness marred her clarity. The noise came from his mother-in-law's room. One more thing to take care of, he thought - and with that thought he went into the bedroom.

Mrs Culver had fallen asleep with the lamp (there was no gas upstairs) on the table by the bed full on. The light thrown from the screen glared on the white pillow, which had sagged under the weight of her head and rested with closed eyes and dark hair braided in several pigtails for the night. She awoke to the sound of her name in her ears and saw her husband standing over her.

"Gwen! Gwen!"

At first she didn't move, lying very still and looking at the cash box in Mr. Culver's hand. But when she realized that her brother was "frolicking downstairs," she swung herself onto the edge of the bed with a sudden movement. Her bare feet, as if poking through the bottom of an unadorned calico sack with sleeves buttoned tightly at the neck and wrists, groped across the carpet for the slippers as she gazed up at her husband's face.

'I don't know how to deal with him,' declared Mr. Culver morosely. "Leaving him alone with the lights downstairs isn't enough."

She said nothing, quickly gliding across the room and the door closed behind her white form.

Mr. Culver placed the cashbox on the bedside table and began undressing, throwing his coat onto a chair in the distance. His coat and waistcoat followed. He paced the room on stockinged feet, his stocky frame, hands nervously gripping his throat, traipsing the long strip of mirrors in the door of his wife's closet.Then, removing his braces from his shoulders, he forcibly pulled up the blinds and rested his forehead against the cold windowpane—a fragile film of glass stretched between him and the intense cold, black, wet, mud, and inhospitable mass of brick , slate and stone, things that are inherently ugly and unfriendly to man.

Mr. Culver sensed the latent unkindness that reigned outside with a force that bordered on physical agony. There is no profession that fails a man more utterly than that of a secret police agent. It's as if your horse suddenly dropped dead beneath you in the midst of an uninhabited and thirsty plain. The comparison came to Mr. Culver because he had been on various army horses at the time and now felt a fall was about to take place. The view was as black as the windowpane against which he rested his forehead. And suddenly Mr. William's face, clean-shaven and witty, appeared in the glow of his rosy complexion like a kind of pink seal imprinted in the deadly darkness.

This luminous and mutilated vision was so physically horrid that Mr. Culver walked away from the window and let down the blinds with a loud clatter. Distraught and speechless at the fear of more such visions, he saw his wife re-enter the room and go to bed in a calm, businesslike manner that made him feel hopelessly lonely in the world. Mrs Culver expressed her surprise at seeing him awake already.

"I'm not feeling very well," he murmured, rubbing his hands over his damp forehead.

"Dizziness?"

"Yes. Not good at all."

Mrs Culver, with the composure of an experienced wife, expressed a confident opinion of the cause and suggested the usual remedies; but her husband, shaking dead in his tracks in the middle of the room, sadly shook his head.

"If you stand there, you're going to catch a cold," she stated.

Mr. Culver made every effort to undress to the end and get into bed. Down the quiet, narrow street, measured footsteps approached the house, and then faded away, unhurried and steady, as if the passer-by had begun in a night without end to stride from gas-lamp to gas-lamp for all eternity; and the sleepy ticking of the old clock on the landing could be clearly heard in the bedroom.

Mrs Culver, lying on her back staring at the ceiling, remarked.

"The income is very low today."

Mr. Culver, in the same position, cleared his throat as if to make an important statement, but merely asked:

"Did you turn off the gas downstairs?"

"Yes; I have," Mrs Culver answered faithfully. "That poor boy is in a very excited state tonight," she murmured after a pause that lasted three ticks of the clock.

Mr. Culver paid no heed to Willie's excitement, but he felt terribly awake and dreaded the darkness and stillness that would follow the lamp's extinguishing. This fear prompted him to comment that Willie had ignored his suggestion that he go to bed. Mrs Culver fell into the trap and began to demonstrate at length to her husband that this was not "impudence" but merely "excitement". There was not a young man of his age in London more willing and docile than Stephen, she assured her; no one was more loving and ready to please, and even more useful, as long as people didn't upset his poor head.Mrs Culver turned to her reclining husband, propped herself on her elbows and bent over him, worried he might think Willie a useful member of the family. The zeal to protect compassion, morbidly heightened by the misery of another child in her childhood, colored her pale cheeks with a faint somber blush and made her large eyes gleam under dark lids. Mrs Culver looked younger then; She looked as young as Gwen used to look, and far livelier than Gwen from the Belgravian Villas would ever have let on to gentlemen's lodgers. Mr. Culver's fears had prevented him from making any sense of what his wife was saying.It was like her voice speaking on the other side of a very thick wall. It was the sight of her that reminded him of himself. and much livelier than the Gwen of the Belgravian mansion days had ever allowed herself to appear before gentlemen's lodgers. Mr. Culver's fears had prevented him from making any sense of what his wife was saying. It was like her voice speaking on the other side of a very thick wall. It was the sight of her that reminded him of himself. and much livelier than the Gwen of the Belgravian mansion days had ever allowed herself to appear before gentlemen's lodgers.Mr. Culver's fears had prevented him from making any sense of what his wife was saying. It was like her voice speaking on the other side of a very thick wall. It was the sight of her that reminded him of himself.

He appreciated this woman, and the feeling of that appreciation, evoked by the display of some kind of emotion, only added to his anguish. When her voice trailed off, he stirred uneasily and said:

"I haven't been feeling well the past few days."

He might have meant this as an opening to full trust; but Mrs Culver laid her head back on the pillow, looked up, and continued:

“This boy hears too much of what is being said here. If I had known they were coming tonight, I would have made sure he went to bed at the same time as me. He was mad because he had heard about eating human flesh and drinking blood. What's the use of talking like that?"

There was a note of indignant contempt in her voice. Mr. Culver was now fully responsive.

"Ask Kevin Yount," he growled angrily.

Ms Culver, with great determination, called Kevin Yount "a disgusting old man". She openly declared her affection for Michaels. She said nothing at all about the sturdy Adjepong, in whose presence she always felt uncomfortable behind an attitude of stony reserve. And we continue to speak of this brother who had been an object of concern and anxiety for so many years:

"He is unable to hear what is being said here. He believes everything is true. He doesn't know any better. He kindles his passions about it.”

Mr. Culver made no comment.

"As I walked downstairs he glared at me like he didn't know who I was. His heart was beating like a hammer. He can't help but be excited. I woke my mother and asked her to sit with him until he went to sleep. It is not his fault. He's no problem if you leave him alone."

Mr. Culver made no comment.

'I wish he had never been to school,' Mrs Culver began gruffly again. "He always takes the newspapers from the window to read them. He gets a red face while poring over them. We're not going to get rid of a dozen numbers in a month. They only take up space in the front window. And Mr. Adjepong brings in a stack of these FP tracts every week to sell for half a penny each. I wouldn't give half a penny for the whole thing. It's a silly read - that's it. There is no sale for it. Willie got one the other day and it told the story of a German officer who ripped off half a recruit's ear and was not harmed for it.The brute! I couldn't relate to Willie that afternoon. The story was enough to make your blood boil. But what is the use of printing such things? We are here, thank God, no German slaves.

Mr. Culver made no reply.

'I had to take the carving knife from the boy,' continued Mrs Culver, now a little sleepy. "He screamed and stomped and sobbed. He cannot bear the thought of cruelty. He would have caught this official like a pig if he had seen him at the time. It's true too! Some people don't deserve much mercy.' Mrs Culver's voice trailed off and the expression in her still eyes became more and more thoughtful and misty during the long pause. "Comfortable, love?" she asked in a faint, distant voice. "Shall I turn off the light now?"

The bleak conviction that there was no sleep for him kept Mr. Culver mute and hopelessly indolent in his fear of the dark. He tried very hard.

"Yes. Erase it," he finally said in a hollow voice.

CHAPTER IV

Most of the thirty or so small tables, covered with red cloth patterned with white, stood at right angles to the dark brown paneling of the subterranean hall. Bronze chandeliers with many spheres hung from the low, slightly vaulted ceiling, and the frescoes ran flat and dull around the windowless walls, depicting scenes of chase and open-air festivities in medieval costume. Squires in green doublets brandished hunting knives and sat on tall mugs of foaming beer.

"Unless I'm very much mistaken, you're the man who knows the insides of this darned affair," said the sturdy Adjepong, leaning forward, elbows wide on the table and feet fully tucked under his chair. His eyes stared with wild eagerness.

An upright half-grand piano by the door, flanked by two potted palms, suddenly played a Valse tune of its own accord with aggressive virtuosity. The noise it made was deafening. When it stopped just as abruptly as it had started, the bespectacled, scruffy little man facing Adjepong from behind a heavy glass tankard full of beer calmly let out what sounded like a general suggestion.

"Basically, what one of us does or does not know about a particular fact cannot be the subject of investigation by the others."

"Certainly not," Colleague Adjepong agreed in a low undertone. "Basically."

With his large, flushed face between his hands, he continued to stare intently while the scruffy little man in the glasses took a cool sip of beer and set the glass mug back on the table. His flat, large ears stuck out far from the sides of his skull, which looked so fragile Adjepong could crush it between thumb and forefinger; the curve of the forehead seemed to rest on the rim of the glasses; The flat cheeks had a greasy, unhealthy complexion and were only smeared with the miserable poverty of a thin, dark whisker. The deplorable inferiority of the whole body was ridiculed by the supremely self-assured demeanor of the individual.His speech was brief and his manner of silence was particularly impressive.

Adjepong muttered again between his hands.

"Have you been out a lot today?"

"NO. "I stayed in bed all morning," the other replied. "Why?"

"Oh! Nothing," said Adjepong, looking serious and inwardly trembling with the desire to find out, but obviously intimidated by the little man's overwhelming insouciance. When speaking to this Colleague - which was seldom - the great Adjepong suffered a feeling of moral and even physical insignificance. However, he asked another question. "Did you go down here?"

"NO; 'Omnibus,' the little man answered readily. He lived far away in Islington, in a small house on a shabby street strewn with straw and dirty paper, where outside of school hours a motley crowd of children ran and shouted loudly He rented his only back room, which featured an extremely large closet, furnished by two spinsters, seamstresses of a humble sort, whose clientele was mostly maids, and had a heavy padlock put on the closet , but otherwise he was an exemplary lodger who caused no problems and required practically no care.His oddities were that he insisted on being present when his room was swept and that when he went out he locked the door and took the key with him.

Adjepong had a vision of those round, black-rimmed glasses cruising the streets on the roof of a bus, their confident glitter falling here and there on the walls of houses or being lowered onto the heads of the unconscious stream of people on the sidewalk. The hint of a sickly smile changed Adjepong's plump lips as he thought of the walls nodding and people running for their lives at the sight of those glasses. If only they had known! What a panic! He mumbled questioningly, "Have you been sitting here long?"

"An hour or more," the other replied nonchalantly, taking a sip of dark beer. All his movements - the way he picked up the mug, the drink, the way he put down the heavy glass and crossed his arms - had a firmness, a sure precision that bespoke the large and muscular Adjepong that was with staring eyes bent forward, protruding lips look like a picture of eager indecision.

"An hour," he said. "Then you may not have heard the news I just heard on the street. Do you have any?"

The little man shook his head slightly in the negative. But showing no sign of curiosity, Adjepong ventured to add that he had heard it right there. A newsboy had yelled that right in his face, and as he was unprepared for something like that, he was very startled and upset. He had to come in there with a dry mouth. "I never thought I'd find you here," he added, mumbling quietly while resting his elbows on the table.

"I come here sometimes," said the other, maintaining his provocative coolness.

"It's wonderful that you of all people didn't hear about it," continued the great Adjepong. His eyelids twitched nervously when he saw the bright eyes. "You of all people," he repeated hesitantly. This apparent reluctance was a testament to the big guy's incredible and inexplicable shyness towards the quiet little man, who again raised the glass tankard, drank and set it down with a gruff and sure movement. And that's all.

After waiting for something, a word or a sign that didn't come, Adjepong tried to display a kind of indifference.

"Will you," he said, lowering his voice even more, "give your things to someone who would like to ask you for them?"

"My absolute rule is never to refuse anyone - as long as I have a trick on me," the little man replied firmly.

"Is that a principle?" commented Adjepong.

"It's a principle."

"And you think it's healthy?"

The large round glasses that gave the pale face an expression of rigid self-confidence faced Adjepong like sleepless, blinking bullets that flashed a cold fire.

"Perfect. Always. Under all circumstances. What could stop me? Why shouldn't I? Why should I think twice about it?"

Adjepong gasped discreetly, so to speak.

"Are you saying that if one came and asked for your goods, you would give it to a 'teck'?"

The other smiled weakly.

"Let her come and try it on and you'll see," he said. “They know me, but I also know each and every one of them. They won't come near me - not her."

His thin, pale lips pressed together tightly. Adjepong began to argue.

“But they could send someone to sell you a plant. Don't you understand? Get the stuff from you that way and then arrest them with the evidence in their hands.”

"Proof of what? Perhaps trading in explosives without a license.” This was intended as a sneer, although the expression of the thin, sickly face remained unchanged and the utterance was careless. "I don't think any of them are anxious to make this arrest. I don't think they could get any of them to apply for a warrant. I mean one of the best. Not one."

"Why?" asked Adjepong.

"Because they know it very well, I make sure I never give away the last handful of my goods. I always have it with me.” He lightly touched the chest of his coat. "In a thick glass bottle," he added.

"I was told so," Adjepong said with a hint of wonder in his voice. "But I didn't know if—"

"You know," the little man interrupted curtly, leaning against the straight back of the chair that towered higher than his fragile head. "I will never be arrested. The game isn't good enough for a single cop. To deal with a man like me takes sheer, naked, inglorious heroism.” Again, his lips closed in a confident snap. Adjepong suppressed a movement of impatience.

"Or recklessness - or just ignorance," he replied. "You just have to find someone for the job who doesn't know you've got enough stuff in your pocket to blow yourself and everything within a hundred yards around you to pieces."

"I never said I couldn't be eliminated," replied the other. “But that would not be an arrest. Besides, it's not as easy as it looks.”

"Bah!" Adjepong disagreed. "Don't be too sure about that. What's to keep half a dozen of them from behind you on the street? You couldn't do anything with your arms tied at your side - could you?"

"Yes; I could. "I'm rarely on the street after dark," the little man said listlessly, "and never very late. I always walk with my right hand closed around the rubber ball I keep in my pocket. Squeezing this ball activates an igniter in the bottle I carry in my pocket. It's the principle of instantaneous pneumatic shutter for a camera lens. The tube goes up—"

With a quick, revealing gesture, he gave Adjepong a glimpse of a rubber tube resembling a slender brown worm that emerged from the armhole of his vest and dove into the inside breast pocket of his jacket. His clothes were a nondescript brown mix, worn and stained, dusty in the folds and with frayed buttonholes. "The detonator is part mechanical, part chemical," he explained with casual condescension.

"It's instant, of course?" murmured Adjepong with a slight shudder.

"Far from it," the other admitted with a reluctance that seemed to twist his mouth painfully. "It has to be twenty seconds from the moment I hit the ball until it explodes."

"Phew!" Adjepong whistled in complete shock. "Twenty seconds! Horror! Are you saying you could take it? I should go mad-"

"Wouldn't matter if you knew. That, of course, is the weak point of this particular system, which is for my own use only. The worst thing is that the way we explode is always our weak point. I'm trying to invent a fuze that adapts to all conditions of use and even to unexpected changes in conditions. A variable and yet absolutely precise mechanism. A truly intelligent detonator.”

"Twenty seconds," Adjepong murmured again. "Ouch! And then-"

With a slight turn of the head, the glitter of the glasses seemed to estimate the size of the beer salon in the basement of the renowned Silenus restaurant.

"No one in this room could hope to escape," was the result of that survey. "Not yet that couple going up the stairs now."

The piano at the foot of the stairs sounded through a mazurka with brazen impetuosity, as if a vulgar and impudent spirit were showing off. The keys mysteriously descended and rose. Then everything went quiet. For a moment, Adjepong imagined the overlit place turning into a horrible black hole, spewing horrible fumes choked with horrible garbage from shattered masonry and mutilated corpses. He had such a keen sense of decay and death that he shuddered again. The other remarked with an air of calm frugality:

"Ultimately, it's the character alone that keeps you safe. There are very few people in the world whose character is as strong as mine.”

"I wonder how you managed that," Adjepong growled.

"Personality," said the other without raising his voice; And that statement came out of the mouth of this obviously wretched organism, causing the sturdy Adjepong to bite his lower lip. "Personality," he repeated with deliberate calm. “I have the ability to make myself deadly, but that alone, as you understand, is absolutely no protection. What is effective is these people's belief in my will to use the means. That's her impression. It is absolute. That's why I'm deadly.”

"There are also personalities with character among this group," Adjepong murmured menacingly.

"Possibly. But of course it's a matter of degree, since I'm not impressed with them, for example. That's why they're inferior. They can't be otherwise. Their character is based on conventional morality. It's based on social order. Mine is free from everything artificial. They are bound by all sorts of conventions. They depend on life, which in this context is a historical fact surrounded by all sorts of limitations and considerations, a complex organized fact that is open to attack at any moment; whereas I on commanded death, which knows no control and cannot be attacked. My superiority is evident."

"It's a transcendental way of saying it," Adjepong said, watching the cold glint of the round glasses. "I heard Kevin Yount say almost the same thing not long ago."

“Kevin Yount,” the other murmured scornfully, “the delegate of the International Red Committee has been a posing shadow all his life. There are three of you delegates, aren't you? I won't define the other two since you are one of them. But what you say means nothing. You are the worthy delegates of revolutionary propaganda, but the problem is not only that you are as incapable of independent thought as any respected grocer or journalist of all, but that you have no character at all.”

Adjepong could not contain his indignation.

"But what do you want from us?" he called out in a muffled voice. "What are you after?"

"A perfect detonator," was the energetic reply. "What are you making that face for? You see, you can't even bear to mention anything conclusive.”

"I am not making a face," growled the annoyed Adjepong bearishly.

“You revolutionaries,” the other continued with leisurely confidence, “are the slaves of social convention that fears you; They are slaves to it, as are the police who work to defend this convention. Obviously you are, because you want to revolutionize it. It, of course, governs your thinking as well as your actions, and therefore neither your thinking nor your actions can ever be conclusive.” He paused, calmly, with an air of endless silence, then almost immediately moved on. "You are no better than the forces that are against you - like the police, for example. The other day I suddenly ran into Chief Detective Helms on the corner of Tottenham Court Road.He looked at me very hard. But I didn't look at him. Why should I give him more than one look? He thought of many things - of his superiors, of his reputation, of the courts, of his salary, of newspapers - a hundred things. But all I could think of was my perfect detonator. He meant nothing to me. He was as insignificant as - I can't think of anything insignificant enough to compare him to - except maybe Kevin Yount. Like to like. The terrorist and the policeman both come from the same basket. Revolution, Legality - countermoves in the same game; basically identical forms of doing nothing.He's playing his little game - so are you propagandists. But I don't play; I work fourteen hours a day and sometimes go hungry. Every now and then my experiments cost money, and then I have to go without food for a day or two. you look at my beer Yes. I've already had two glasses and will drink another one soon. This is a small holiday and I celebrate it alone. Why not? I have the courage to work alone, all by myself, all by myself. I worked alone for years.”

Adjepong's face had turned dark red.

"The perfect detonator - what?" He sneered, very softly.

"Yes," replied the other. "That's a good definition. You couldn't find anything even remotely precise to define the nature of your work with all your committees and delegations. I am the true propagandist.”

"We will not discuss this point," Adjepong said, with an air of overriding personal considerations. "But I'm afraid I'll have to spoil your holiday. A man was blown up in Greenwich Park this morning.”

"How do you know?"

"Since two o'clock they have been shouting the news on the street. I bought the newspaper and just walked in here. Then I saw you sitting at this table. I have it in my pocket now.”

He pulled out the newspaper. It was a big pink sheet, as if permeated with the warmth of his own optimistic beliefs. He scanned the pages quickly.

"Ah! Here it is. Bomb in Greenwich Park. Not much so far. Half past eleven. Foggy morning. The effects of the blast were felt as far away as Romney Road and Park Place. Huge hole in the ground under a tree filled with smashed roots and broken branches. Fragments of a man's body blown to pieces all around. That's all. The rest is mere newspaper articles. No doubt a malicious attempt to blow up the observatory, they say. Hm. That's hardly believable."

He looked at the paper in silence for a while, then handed it to the other, who, after absentmindedly examining the imprint, put it aside without comment.

It was Adjepong who spoke first - still upset.

“The fragments of just one man, you notice. Ergo: blew himself up. It spoils your day off, doesn't it? Did you expect such a move? I hadn't the faintest idea, not the faintest idea that anything like this could happen here in this country. In the current circumstances, it is downright criminal.”

The little man raised his thin black eyebrows with dispassionate disdain.

"Criminal! What is that? What is crime? What can such a claim mean?”

"How should I express myself? "You have to use the actual words," Adjepong said impatiently. “The significance of this allegation is that this deal could have a very negative impact on our position in this country. Is crime not enough for you? I'm sure you've been giving away some of your stuff lately."

Adjepong stared at him. The other slowly lowered and raised his head without batting an eyelid.

"You have!" blurted out the editor of the FP leaflets in an intense whisper. "NO! And are you really going to give it to the first fool that comes along like that?"

"Just like that! The damned social order wasn't built on paper and ink, and I don't think a combination of paper and ink will ever put an end to it, whatever you may think. Yes, I would every man, every woman or give the stuff with both hands to any fool who'd like to come along. I know what you're thinking. But I don't take my cue from the Red Committee. I wouldn't bat an eye to see you all chased out of here or arrested - or also decapitated. What happens to us as individuals has not the slightest consequence."

He spoke carelessly, without Helms, almost without feeling, and Adjepong, secretly very upset, tried to imitate this detachment.

"If the police here knew what they were doing, they'd poke guns through you or try to sandbag you from behind in broad daylight."

The little man, in his dispassionate, confident way, seemed to have already considered that point of view.

"Yes," he agreed with the utmost willingness. “But for that they would have to face their own institutions. Do you see? That requires unusual courage. Courage of a special kind.”

Adjepong blinked.

"I think that's what would happen to you if you set up your lab in the US. They are not into ceremonies there with their institutions.”

"I probably won't go and check. Otherwise your remark is fair,” the other admitted. “They have more character there and their character is essentially anarchistic. Fertile soil for us, the States - very good soil. The great republic has the root of destructive matter within itself. The collective temperament is lawless. Excellent. They might shoot us, but..."

"You are too transcendental for me," Adjepong growled with somber concern.

"Of course," protested the other. “There are different kinds of logic. That's the enlightened way. America is fine. It is this country, with its idealistic notion of legality, that is dangerous. The social spirit of these people is mired in ruthless prejudice, and that is fatal to our work. They talk about England being our only haven! Even worse. Capua! What do we want with shelters? Here people talk, print, plot and do nothing. I suppose it comes in very handy for those Kevin Younts.”

He shrugged slightly, then added with the same leisurely certainty, "Our aim should be to break superstition and worship of legality." Nothing would please me more than to see Detective Helms and his ilk us shoot down in broad daylight with the consent of the public. Then half our battle would be won; the decay of the old morality would have begun in their temple itself. That's what you should aim for. But you revolutionaries will never understand that. They plan for the future, lose themselves in daydreams about economic systems that are derived from the existing;What is desired, on the other hand, is a clean breakthrough and a clear start for a new view of life. Such a future will take care of itself if you just make room for it. So I'd shovel my stuff in heaps on street corners if I had enough for it; And since I haven't done that yet, I'm doing my best by perfecting a really reliable detonator."

Adjepong, who had mentally swum in deep waters, took the last word as if it were a lifesaver.

"Yes. Your detonators. I wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't one of your detonators that swept the man clean in the park."

A hint of irritation darkened the determined, pale face that faced Adjepong.

“My difficulty lies precisely in experimenting practically with the different species. After all, they have to be tried. Next to-"

Adjepong interrupted him.

"Who could this guy be? I assure you that in London we were not aware of it. Couldn't you describe the person you gave the stuff to?"

The other trained his glasses on Adjepong like a pair of searchlights.

"Describe him," he repeated slowly. “I don't think there can be the slightest objection now. I will describe him to you in one word – Culver.”

Adjepong, who had been raised a few inches from his seat by curiosity, fell back as if he'd been punched in the face.

"Culverk! Impossible."

The self-possessed little man nodded once slightly.

"Yeah. He's the person. You can't say that in this case I gave my things to the first idiot who walked by. As far as I know, he was a prominent member of the group."

"Yes," said Adjepong. "Prominent. No, not really. It was the center for general intelligence and usually received Colleagues who came here. More useful than important. man with no ideas. Years ago he spoke at meetings - in France, I think. However, not very well. Men like Latorre, Moser and everyone else trusted him. The only talent he really showed was his ability to somehow elude police attention. Here, for example, he didn't seem to be well looked after. He was married regularly, you know. I assume he started this place with her money.Seems to have been worth it too.”

Adjepong stopped abruptly and muttered to himself, "I wonder what this woman is going to do now?" and fell into thought.

The other waited with demonstrative indifference. His parentage was unclear and he was generally known only by his nickname, Professor. His title to this designation was that he had once worked as an assistant chemistry demonstrator at a technical institute. He quarreled with the authorities over unfair treatment. He then got a job in the laboratory of a dye factory. There, too, repulsive injustice had been done to him.His struggles, his hardships, his hard work to better himself in society, had imbued him with such an overbearing conviction of his merits that it was exceedingly difficult for the world to treat him with justice—the standard of that notion hung so very dependent on the patience of the individual. The professor was brilliant, but he lacked the great social virtue of resignation.

"Intellectually nothing," Adjepong proclaimed loudly, suddenly abandoning inward contemplation of the grieving person and Mrs Culver's business. "A fairly ordinary personality. You are wrong if you no longer keep in touch with your Colleagues, Professor,” he added reproachfully. 'Did he tell you anything - give you any idea of ??his intentions? I hadn't seen him for a month. It seems impossible that he's gone."

"He told me it would be a demonstration against a building," the professor said. “I needed to know this much to prepare the rocket. I pointed out to him that my amount was barely enough to produce a completely destructive result, but he urged me to do my best. Since he wanted something that you could carry openly in your hand, I suggested using an old 1-gallon copal lacquer can that I happened to have on me. He was delighted with the idea. This gave me some trouble as I had to cut out the bottom first and then solder it back on.When the jar was prepared for use, it contained a wide-mouthed, well-corked jar of thick glass, wrapped in some damp clay, and containing 16 ounces of X2 green powder. The igniter was connected to the screw cap of the can. It was awesome - a combination of time and shock. I explained the system to him. It was a thin tin tube with a... inside.

Adjepong's attention had wandered.

"What do you think happened?" he cut him off.

"I can not say it. Screw the lid tightly to connect, then forget about time. It was set for twenty minutes. On the other hand, once contact was made, a violent shock would immediately set off the explosion. Either he didn't let the time go, or he just dropped the thing. The contact came about in order, that's clear to me at least. The system worked perfectly. Yet one would think that an ordinary fool in a hurry would be far more likely to forget to make contact at all. I was particularly worried about this type of failure. But there are more types of fools to beware of.A detonator cannot be expected to be absolutely foolproof.”

He waved to a waiter. Adjepong sat rigid, with the distracted gaze of mental exertion. After the man walked away with the money, he stood up with an expression of deep dissatisfaction on his face.

"It's extremely uncomfortable for me," he mused. “Kevin has been in bed with bronchitis for a week. Chances are he'll never get up again. Michaels is having fun somewhere in the country. A fashion publisher offered him five hundred pounds for a book. It will be a terrible failure. You know, he lost the habit of thinking consecutively in prison.”

The professor on his feet, buttoning his coat, looked around with complete indifference.

"What are you going to do?" asked Adjepong wearily. He feared the guilt of the Central Red Committee, an institution which had no permanent seat and whose members he did not know exactly. If this affair were to result in the cessation of the modest subsidies for the publication of the FP booklets, he would indeed have to regret Culver's inexplicable folly.

"Solidarity with the most extreme form of action is one thing, silly recklessness is another," he said with a kind of moody brutality. 'I don't know what came after Culver. There's a secret. However, he is gone. You can take it however you like, but under the circumstances the only policy of the militant revolutionary group is to deny you any connection with that damn freak. It bothers me how to make the disclaimer convincing enough.”

The little man on his feet, buttoned up and ready to go, was no taller than the seated Adjepong. He aimed his glasses directly at his face.

“You could ask the police for a certificate of good behavior. They know where each of you slept last night. If you asked them, they might agree to an official statement being released.”

"No doubt they know very well that we have nothing to do with this," Adjepong murmured bitterly. "What they will say is another matter." He remained thoughtful, ignoring the small, owlish, shabby figure that stood at his side. “I have to lay hands on Michaels immediately and get him to speak from the bottom of his heart at one of our meetings. The public has a certain sentimental appreciation for this guy. His name is known. And I'm in touch with some reporters from the major dailies. What he would say would be absolute nonsense, but he has an idiom that gets lost anyway.”

"Like syrup," the professor interjected rather quietly, maintaining an impassive expression.

The bewildered Adjepong continued to talk to himself, half audibly, in the manner of a man pondering in utter solitude.

"Damn ass! Leaving such a stupid matter to me. And I don't even know if..."

He sat there with pursed lips. The idea of ??bringing news straight to the store lacked appeal. His guess was that Culver's shop might already have been turned into a police trap. They will certainly make some arrests, he thought with a sort of virtuous indignation, for the smooth course of his revolutionary life was threatened through no fault of his own. And yet, if he didn't go there, he ran the risk of remaining ignorant of what might be very important to him. Then he reflected that the man in the park could not have been identified if he had been torn to pieces as badly as the evening papers said.And if so, the police could have no particular reason to monitor Culver's shop more closely than any other place known to be frequented by marked anarchists - no more reason, really, than to monitor the doors of the Silenus. There would be crowds of viewers wherever he went. Quiet-

"I wonder what I should do better now?" he murmured, consulting himself.

A raspy voice beside him said with quiet contempt:

"Attach yourself to the woman with all she can."

After saying those words, the professor moved away from the table. Adjepong, surprised at this realization, winced in vain and stood with a helpless look as if he were nailed to the seat of his chair. The lone piano, without even a music stool to assist, boldly strummed a few chords, began a selection of national songs and finally played it out to the tune of the Blue Bells of Scotland. The painfully detached notes faded behind his back as he slowly walked up the stairs, down the hall, and onto the street.

In front of the grand entrance, a desolate line of newspaper vendors, standing off the sidewalk, handed out their wares from the gutter. It was a rough, gloomy early spring day; and the filthy sky, the mud of the streets, the rags of the filthy men harmonized beautifully with the outburst of the damp, filthy, ink-stained sheets of paper. The dirt-stained posters adorned the curb like tapestries. The afternoon paper trade was brisk, but compared to the fast, steady flow of foot traffic it seemed like indifference, an unnoticed distribution. Adjepong hastily looked both ways before stepping into the countercurrent, but the professor was already out of sight.

CHAPTER V

The professor had turned left down a street and was walking with his head erect in a crowd almost every one of whom his stunted stature towered over. It was useless to convince himself that he wasn't disappointed. But that was just a feeling; The stoicism of his thinking could not be disturbed by this or any other failure. The next time, or the one after that, a decisive blow would come—something truly terrifying—a blow likely to open the first crack in the imposing front of the great edifice of legal conception that houses the terrible injustices of society.He came from a humble background and appeared so mean that it thwarted his considerable natural abilities. His imagination was fired early on by the stories of men rising from abject poverty to positions of authority and wealth. The extreme, almost ascetic purity of his thought, coupled with an astonishing ignorance of worldly affairs, had set him a goal of power and prestige which he could attain without the medium of art, grace, tact, and wealth—by sheer weight alone his merits. From this perspective he saw himself a claim to undisputed success.His father, a delicate, dark, slanting enthusiast, had been an itinerant and stirring preacher of an obscure but rigid Christian sect—a man perfectly sure of the privileges of his righteousness. In the end, individualistic by temperament, this moral attitude turned into a raging puritanism of ambition after the science of the colleges had entirely replaced the faith of the conventicles. He cultivated it as something secularly sacred. Seeing it thwarted opened his eyes to the true nature of the world, whose morality was artificial, corrupt, and blasphemous.Even the most defensible revolutions are paved the way by personal impulses camouflaged in creeds. The professor's indignation found in itself an ultimate cause that absolved him from the sin of turning to destruction as an agent of his ambition. The destruction of public faith in legality was the imperfect formula of his pedantic fanaticism; But the subconscious belief that the framework of an established social order can only be effectively destroyed by some form of collective or individual violence was precise and correct. He was a moral agent - he had realized that.By exercising his agency with ruthless defiance, he gave himself the appearance of power and personal prestige. There was no denying that, despite his vengeful bitterness. It calmed his anxiety; and in their own way the most zealous revolutionaries may be doing nothing more than striving with the rest of mankind for peace - the peace of vanity appeased, lusts appeased, or perhaps conscience appeased.

Lost in the crowd, miserable and undersized, he confidently meditated on his power, hand in left trouser pocket and lightly grasping the rubber ball, the supreme guarantee of his sinister freedom; but after a while he felt uncomfortable with the sight of the street crowded with vehicles and the sidewalk crowded with men and women. He was on a long, straight street populated by only a fraction of a huge crowd; But all around him, ever further, even to the limits of the horizon obscured by huge heaps of bricks, he felt the immense mass of humanity.They swarmed in numbers like locusts, industrious like ants, mindless like a force of nature, they pushed ahead blindly and orderly and absorbed, impervious to emotion, logic, maybe terror.

This was the form of doubt he feared most. Impervious to Fear! Often on walks abroad, when he also happened to get out of himself, he experienced such moments of terrible and reasonable distrust of humanity. What if nothing could move her? Such moments are experienced by all people whose ambition aims to grasp humanity directly - artists, politicians, thinkers, reformers or saints. This is a despicable emotional state against which loneliness strengthens a superior character;and with deep jubilation the professor thought of the refuge of his room with the padlocked cupboard, lost in a wilderness of poor houses, the hermitage of the perfect anarchist. In order to get to the point where he could catch his omnibus more quickly, he turned abruptly from the busy street into a narrow, gloomy alleyway paved with flagstones. On one side the low brick houses in their dusty windows had the sightless, dying sight of incurable decay - empty shells awaiting demolition. On the other hand, life wasn't quite gone yet.Opposite the only gas lantern yawned a second-hand furniture dealer's den, where deep in the gloom of a kind of narrow avenue winding through a bizarre forest of wardrobes with a tangle of table-legs in the undergrowth, stood a tall pillared glass shimmering like a pool of water in one Forest. Outside was an unfortunate, homeless couch, accompanied by two unrelated chairs. The only person using the alley besides the professor, who came steadfast and upright from the opposite direction, suddenly slowed his swinging pace. On the other hand, life wasn't quite gone yet.Opposite the only gas lantern yawned a second-hand furniture dealer's den, where deep in the gloom of a kind of narrow avenue winding through a bizarre forest of wardrobes with a tangle of table-legs in the undergrowth, stood a tall pillared glass shimmering like a pool of water in one Forest. Outside was an unfortunate, homeless couch, accompanied by two unrelated chairs. The only person using the alley besides the professor, who came steadfast and upright from the opposite direction, suddenly slowed his swinging pace. On the other hand, life wasn't quite gone yet.Opposite the only gas lantern yawned a second-hand furniture dealer's den, where deep in the gloom of a kind of narrow avenue winding through a bizarre forest of wardrobes with a tangle of table-legs in the undergrowth, stood a tall pillared glass shimmering like a pool of water in one Forest. Outside was an unfortunate, homeless couch, accompanied by two unrelated chairs. The only person using the alley besides the professor, who came steadfast and upright from the opposite direction, suddenly slowed his swinging pace. a tall pillar glass shimmered like a pool of water in a forest.Outside was an unfortunate, homeless couch, accompanied by two unrelated chairs. The only person using the alley besides the professor, who came steadfast and upright from the opposite direction, suddenly slowed his swinging pace. a tall pillar glass shimmered like a pool of water in a forest. Outside was an unfortunate, homeless couch, accompanied by two unrelated chairs. The only person using the alley besides the professor, who came steadfast and upright from the opposite direction, suddenly slowed his swinging pace.

"Hello!" he said, standing a little to one side, wary.

The professor had already stopped and made a half turn that brought his shoulders very close to the other wall. His right hand fell lightly on the armrest of the sofa, his left deliberately buried deep in his pocket, and the curve of his heavy glasses gave his moody, unperturbed face an owlish quality.

It was like meeting in a side corridor of a mansion full of life. The brave man wore a buttoned dark coat and an umbrella. His hat, which was tilted back, revealed a large part of his forehead, which looked very white in the twilight. The eyeballs shimmered penetratingly in the dark patches of the eye sockets. Long drooping mustaches, the color of ripe corn, tipped the square block of his shaved jawline.

"I'm not looking for you," he said curtly.

The professor didn't move an inch. The mingled sounds of the vast city dropped to an inarticulate, low murmur. Chief Detective Helms of Special Crimes changed his tone.

"Aren't you in a hurry to get home?" he asked with mocking simplicity.

Silently exulting in possession of personal prestige, the unwholesome-looking little moral agent of destruction held this man in check, armed with the defense mandate of a threatened society. Happier than Caligula, who wished for the better gratification of his cruel lusts that the Roman Senate had but one head, he saw in that one man all the forces he had opposed: the power of law, property, oppression, and injustice . He saw all his enemies and faced them all fearlessly in the supreme satisfaction of his vanity. They stood helplessly before him as before a terrible omen.He inwardly rejoiced at the chance that this meeting would affirm his superiority over all of humanity.

It was actually a chance encounter. Chief Detective Helms had had an uncomfortably busy day since his department received the first telegram from Greenwich just before eleven in the morning. First, the fact that the act of violence was committed less than a week after he had assured a senior official that no outbreak of anarchist activity was to be feared was sufficiently galling. If he ever felt safe making a statement, it was. He had made this statement to himself with great satisfaction, for it was clear that the high official had a great desire to hear just that.He had assured us that nothing of the sort could be thought of without the department being informed within twenty-four hours; and he had said this knowing that he was the great expert in his field. He had even gone so far as to utter words that true wisdom would have withheld. But Chief Detective Helms wasn't very wise - at least not really. True wisdom, which is certain of nothing in this world of contradictions, would have prevented him from attaining his present position. It would have alarmed his superiors and ruined his chances for advancement. His promotion was very quick.

"There isn't a single one of them, sir, that we can't get our hands on at any hour of the day or night. We know what each of them does hour after hour," he had explained. And the high official had designed to smile. That was so obviously correct for an officer of Chief Detective Helms's reputation that it was entirely gratifying. The high official believed the explanation, which corresponded to his idea of ??the correctness of things.His wisdom was official, otherwise he might have pondered a matter based not on theory but on experience, namely that in the tightly knit relations between conspirators and police there are unexpected breaks in continuity and sudden holes in space and time . A particular anarchist can be observed inch by inch and minute by minute, but there always comes a moment when somehow all sight and touch of him is lost for a few hours and in the time something more or less deplorable (generally an explosion ) happens.But the high official, carried away by his sense of the rightness of things, had smiled, and now the memory of that smile was very galling to Chief Detective Helms, the chief expert on anarchist procedure.

This was not the only circumstance whose memory marred the eminent specialist's customary composure. There was another one that only went back to that morning. The thought that he could not contain his astonishment when he was called urgently to his deputy commissioner's private room was downright disturbing. His instinct to be a successful man had long ago taught him that reputation generally rests on behavior as well as performance. And he felt his manner when confronted with the telegram had not been impressive. He had his eyes wide open and exclaimed, "Impossible!"In so doing he exposed himself to the unanswerable reply of a finger being forcefully placed on the telegram which the deputy commissioner, after reading it aloud, had thrown on the desk. Being crushed, so to speak, under the tip of an index finger was an uncomfortable experience. Also very harmful! Furthermore, Chief Detective Helms was aware that he had not improved matters by allowing himself to express his conviction.

"I can tell you one thing right away: none of us had anything to do with it."

He had the integrity of a good detective, but he now realized that an impenetrable reserve about this incident would have served his reputation better. On the other hand, he admitted that it was difficult to protect one's reputation when high-ranking outsiders were interfering in the business. Outsiders are the bane of the police as well as other professions. The tone of the deputy Detective's remarks had been sour enough to make one's teeth clench.

And Chief Detective Helms hadn't been able to get anything to eat since breakfast.

He immediately began his on-site investigation and had swallowed a fair amount of raw, unhealthy fog in the park. Then he had gone to the hospital; and by the time the Greenwich investigation was finally over, he had lost his taste for food. Not used to examining the mutilated remains of human beings like doctors do, he was shocked to see a waterproof tarpaulin being lifted from a table in a certain apartment in the hospital.

Spread across the table was another waterproof cloth in the manner of a tablecloth, the corners poking upwards over a mound of sorts - a heap of singed and bloodstained rags, half hiding what might have been an accumulation of raw material for a... cannibal feast. It took considerable mental strength not to shrink from the sight. Chief Detective Helms, an efficient officer in his department, stood firm but got no further for a full minute. A local policeman in uniform glanced sideways and said with quiet simplicity:

"He's all there. Every bit of him. It was a job."

He was the first man on site after the explosion. He mentioned the fact again. He had seen something like a strong flash in the fog. At this point he was standing at the door of King William Street Lodge conversing with the porter. The concussion made him tingle all over. He ran through the trees to the observatory. "As fast as my legs would carry me," he repeated twice.

Chief Detective Helms, leaning cautiously and horrified across the table, let him go on. The hospital porter and another man folded back the corners of the sheet and stepped aside. The Chief Detective's gaze sought out the grisly details of this heap of assorted things that seemed to be collected in rubble and rag shops.

"You used a shovel," he remarked, noting a scattering of small gravel, tiny bits of brown bark, and splintered wood particles as fine as needles.

"Had to be in one place," said the stuffy policeman. "I sent an attendant to get a spade. When he heard me scraping it across the ground, he leaned his forehead against a tree and got sick as a dog.”

The chief Detective, leaning cautiously across the table, fought the uncomfortable feeling in his throat. The shattering violence of the destruction that had turned this body into a heap of nameless fragments touched his feelings with a sense of ruthless cruelty, though his wits told him the effect must have been instantaneous. The man, whoever he was, had died instantly; and yet it seemed impossible to believe that a human body could have reached this state of dissolution without enduring the pangs of unimaginable torment.Not a physiologist, and certainly not a metaphysician, Chief Detective Helms rose above the vulgar notion of time by the power of compassion, which is a form of fear. Immediately! He remembered everything he had ever read in popular publications about long and terrible dreams he had dreamed the moment he woke up; of the entire past life lived by a drowning man with terrifying intensity while his doomed head bobs up in tears for the last time.The inexplicable mysteries of conscious existence preoccupied Chief Detective Helms until he developed the terrifying notion that centuries of excruciating pain and mental torture could lie between two consecutive blinks of an eye. And meanwhile the chief Detective went on, looking down at the table with a calm face and the slightly worried attention of a penniless customer bending over what might be called the by-products of a butcher's shop in the hope of a cheap Sunday meal. His trained skills as an excellent investigator, scorning no opportunity for information, followed the complacent,

"A blond guy," the last one remarked calmly and paused. "The old woman who was talking to the sergeant noticed a blond guy coming out of Maze Hill Station." He stopped. "And he was a blond guy. She noticed two men coming out of the station after the up train had moved on,” he continued slowly. "She couldn't tell if they were together. She didn't pay much attention to the tall one, but the other one was a handsome, slender fellow, holding a tin can of paint in one hand.” The policeman stopped.

"Do you know the woman?" murmured the Chief Detective, his eyes fixed on the table and a vague idea in his mind of an investigation now about to take place into a person who would likely remain forever unknown.

"Yes. "She's a housekeeper for a retired innkeeper and sometimes attends the chapel at Park Place," the policeman said gravely, pausing with another oblique glance at the table.

Then suddenly, "Well, here he is - I could see all of him." Fair. Light - light enough. Look at that foot there. I picked up the legs first, one by one. He was so distracted it was hard to know where to start.”

The policeman stopped; The faintest hint of an innocent, self-praising smile gave his round face an infantile expression.

"Stumbled," he announced positively. “I stumbled once myself and fell on my head while starting. The roots stick out everywhere. I tripped on a tree root and fell and the thing he was carrying must have come off right under his chest I assume.”

The echo of the words "person unknown", repeated in his inner consciousness, greatly disturbed the chief Detective. For his own information, he would have liked to trace this matter back to its mysterious origin. He was professionally curious. He would have liked to demonstrate the effectiveness of his department in front of the public by establishing the identity of this man. He was a faithful servant. However, that seemed impossible. The first term of the problem was illegible - lacking any suggestion save that of abominable cruelty.

Chief Detective Helms overcame his physical reluctance, reached out without conviction to salve his conscience, and picked up the least dirty rag. It was a narrow strip of velvet with a larger triangular piece of dark blue fabric hanging from it. He held it before his eyes; and the policeman spoke.

"Velvet collar. Funny that the old woman should have noticed the velvet collar. Dark blue coat with a velvet collar, she told us. He was the guy she saw, and no doubt about it. And here it is complete, collar and all. I don't think I've missed a single piece the size of a postage stamp."

By this point, the Chief Detective's trained skills were no longer listening to the officer's voice. He went to one of the windows for better light. His face turned away from the room expressed a startled, intense interest as he closely examined the triangular piece of cloth. With a sudden jerk he took it off, and only after putting it in his pocket did he turn into the room and throw the velvet collar back on the table—

"Cover up," he ordered the servants curtly without looking again, and, greeted by the policeman, hastily carried his loot away.

A comfortable train took him to the city alone and thoughtful in a third-class compartment. This scorched piece of cloth was incredibly valuable and he couldn't help but be amazed at the fortuitous manner in which it had come into his possession. It was as if fate had given him the clue. And in the manner of the average man whose ambition is to command events, he began to distrust such superfluous and accidental success - simply because it seemed forced upon him. The practical value of success depends not least on the way you look at it. But fate sees nothing. There is no discretion.He no longer found it terribly desirable to establish publicly, with such terrible completeness, the identity of the man who had blown himself up that morning. However, he wasn't sure what position his department would take. A department, to those it employs, is a complex personality with its own ideas and even fashion trends. It depends on the loyal devotion of its servants, and the devoted loyalty of trusted servants is coupled with a degree of affectionate contempt that makes it sweet, so to speak. By a benevolent provision of nature, no man is a hero to his servant, otherwise the heroes would have to brush their clothes themselves.Likewise, no department seems to be totally considerate of the intimacy of their employees. A department does not know as much as some of its employees. Being a dispassionate organism, it can never be perfectly informed. It would not be good for efficiency to know too much. Chief Detective Helms emerged in a state of thoughtfulness entirely devoid of disloyalty.

In this state of mind, physically very empty but still sick from what he had seen, he had encountered the professor. In these conditions, which incite anger in a sane, normal man, this meeting was particularly unwelcome for Chief Detective Helms. He hadn't thought of the professor; He hadn't thought of a single anarchist at all. The complexity of the case had somehow forced upon him the general notion of the absurdity of human affairs, sufficiently vexing in the abstract for an unphilosophical temperament, and insufferably exasperating in concrete cases.Earlier in his career, Chief Detective Helms had dealt with the more vigorous forms of theft. He had earned his spurs in the field and of course stuck with it, a feeling not far from affection after his promotion to another department. Theft was not a mere absurdity. It was a form of human diligence, perverse, but diligence nonetheless exercised in a busy world; It was work done for the same reason as work in potteries, in coal mines, in fields, and in tool shops.It was work whose practical difference from the other forms of work was the nature of its risk, which lay not in ankylosis, lead poisoning, firedamp, or gritty dust, but in what can be briefly defined in its own special idiom as "Sifting years hard". Chief Detective Helms, of course, was unaware of the seriousness of moral differences. But neither were the thieves he'd taken care of.

Chief Detective Helms believed these to be his fellow citizens who had been misled because of their lack of education; but considering this difference, he could understand the mind of a burglar, for indeed the mind and instincts of a burglar are of the same kind as the mind and instincts of a policeman. Both know the same conventions and have an in-depth knowledge of each other's methods and the routine of their respective professions. They understand each other, which is mutually beneficial and creates a kind of comfort in their relationships.Products of the same machine, one deemed useful and the other harmful, take the machine for granted in different ways, but with essentially the same seriousness. Chief Detective Helms's mind was impervious to rebellious ideas. But his thieves were not rebels. His physical strength, cool, inflexible manner, courage and fairness had earned him much respect and some admiration in the realm of his early successes. He had felt honored and admired.And Chief Detective Helms, arrested just six paces from the anarchist nicknamed "Professor," thought of the world of thieves - sane, free of morbid ideals, practiced, respectful of established authorities, free from every tinge of hatred and despair.

After paying this tribute to what is normal in society's constitution (for the thought of stealing seemed as normal to his instincts as the thought of property), Chief Detective Helms was very angry with himself for quitting because he didn't understand it at all because it was a shortcut from the train station to headquarters. And he spoke again in that great commanding voice which, when moderated, had a menacing quality.

"You're not wanted, I tell you," he repeated.

The anarchist didn't move. An inner mocking laugh bared not only his teeth but also his gums, shaking his whole body without the slightest sound. Chief Detective Helms had to add against his better judgment:

"Not yet. If I want you, I'll know where to find you."

Those were perfectly correct words, in keeping with tradition and befitting his character as a police officer addressing one of his special friends. But the reception they received deviated from tradition and decency. It was outrageous. The stunted, frail figure before him finally spoke.

“I have no doubt that the newspaper would then give you an obituary notice. You know best what that would be worth to you. I think you can easily imagine what kind of stuff would be printed. But you may have the inconvenience of being buried with me, although I suppose your friends would try to enlighten us as much as possible."

For all his healthy disdain for the spirit that dictates such speeches, the cruel innuendo of the words left their mark on Chief Detective Helms. He had too much insight and too much accurate information to dismiss it as rot. The twilight of this narrow alley took on an eerie hue as the dark, frail little figure stood with his back to the wall and spoke in a faint, confident voice. To the Chief Detective's energetic, persistent vitality, the physical misery of this being so obviously unviable was ominous; for it seemed to him that had he been unlucky enough to be such a wretched object, he would not have cared how soon he would die.Life had such a grip on him that a new wave of nausea broke out and light sweats formed on his forehead. The murmur of city life, The muffled rattle of wheels in the two invisible streets right and left, through the curve of the filthy alley, penetrated to his ears with precious familiarity and appealing sweetness. He was human. But Chief Detective Helms was a man too, and he couldn't let such words get away.

"It's all good for scaring kids," he said. "I'll still have you."

It was said very well, without contempt, with an almost stern silence.

"No doubt," was the reply; “But there is no time like this, believe me. For a man of genuine conviction, this is a good opportunity for self-sacrifice. You may not find anyone else so benevolent, so human. There's not even a cat anywhere near us, and those demolished old houses would make a good pile of bricks where you stand. You will never get me at such a small price for life and property that you are being paid to protect."

"You don't know who you're talking to," Chief Detective Helms said firmly. "If I put my hands on you now, I wouldn't be any better than you."

'Ah! The game!'

"You can be sure that our team will win in the end. It might still be necessary to fool people into believing that some of you should be shot like mad dogs on sight. Then this will be the game. But I'll be damned if I know what yours is. I don't think you know it yourself. You'll never get any of that."

"Now it's you who gets some of it - until now. And you get it easy too. I won't talk about your salary, but didn't you make a name for yourself simply because you didn't understand what we want?"

"Then what do you want?" Chief Detective Helms asked with contemptuous haste, like a man in a hurry who realizes he is wasting his time.

The perfect anarchist answered with a smile that didn't open his thin, colorless lips; and the celebrated chief Detective felt a sense of superiority that caused him to raise a warning finger.

"Give it up - whatever it is," he said in a cautionary tone, but not so kindly as to offer a crack of good advice. "Give it up. You'll find we're too many for you."

The fixed smile on the professor's lips faltered, as if the mocking spirit within him had lost its confidence. Chief Detective Helms continued:

"You don't believe me, do you? Well, you just have to look around. We are. And anyway, you're not doing well. You always make a mess out of it. If the thieves didn't know their job better, they would starve."

The suggestion of an invincible crowd behind this man's back caused a deep indignation in the professor's chest. He no longer smiled his enigmatic and mocking smile. The resilience of numbers, the unassailable stubbornness of a great crowd, was the nagging fear of his dark loneliness. His lips trembled for some time before he managed to say in a choked voice:

"I do my job better than you do yours."

"That's enough now," Chief Detective Helms interrupted hastily; and the professor laughed out loud this time. Still laughing, he walked on; but he didn't laugh long. It was a sad, wretched little man who stepped out of the narrow passageway into the bustling activity of the broad thoroughfare. He walked with the unnerved gait of a tramp, walking on and on, indifferent to rain or sun, in a dark detachment from the aspects of heaven and earth.Chief Detective Helms, however, after observing him for a while, stepped out with the single-minded agility of a man who, while ignoring the inclemency of the weather, is aware that he has an authorized mission on this earth and the moral support has its kind . All the inhabitants of the vast city, the population of the whole country, and even the teeming millions who fight on the planet were with him - even the thieves and beggars. Yes, the thieves themselves would certainly accompany him in his current work. Awareness of universal support in his general activity encouraged him to grapple with the particular problem.

The problem the chief Detective immediately faced was managing the deputy commissioner of his department, his immediate superior. This is the constant problem of trustworthy and loyal servants. Anarchism gave it its special face, but nothing more. To be honest, Chief Detective Helms didn't think much of anarchism. He didn't put too much stock in it and could never bring himself to think about it seriously. It had more the character of disorderly behavior; messy without the human excuse of drunkenness, which in any case presupposes a good feeling and an amiable disposition to party.As criminals, anarchists were clearly no class - no class at all. And remembering the professor, Chief Detective Helms, not breaking his spirited pace, murmured through his teeth:

"Crazy."

Catching thieves was another matter altogether. It had that seriousness inherent in any form of open sport, where the best man wins by perfectly understandable rules. There were no rules for dealing with anarchists. And the Chief Detective hated that. It was all stupidity, but this stupidity excited public opinion, affected people in high positions and affected international relations. A hard, merciless contempt spread across the Chief Detective's face as he walked on. His thoughts passed over all the anarchists in his flock. None of them had half the guts of this or that burglar he knew.Not half - not a tenth.

At headquarters, the chief Detective was immediately admitted to the deputy Detective's private room. He found him, pen in hand, hunched over a large paper-covered table as if worshiping a giant bronze and crystal double inkwell. Speaking tubes resembling snakes had their heads tied to the back of the assistant Detective's wooden chair, and their gaping mouths seemed ready to bite his elbows. And in this position he only raised his eyes, the lids of which were darker than his face and very wrinkled. The reports had come in: every anarchist was accurately recorded.

Having said this, he lowered his eyes, quickly signed two separate sheets, only then put down his pen, leaned far back and directed a questioning look at his famous subordinate. The chief Detective held it well, respectful but inscrutable.

'I assume you were right,' said the deputy commissioner, 'when you first told me the London anarchists had nothing to do with it. I appreciate the excellent guard of your men. On the other hand, this amounts to no more than an admission of ignorance for the public.”

The deputy commissioner's speech was leisurely, somewhat cautious. His thought seemed to rest on one word before moving on to another, as if words had been the stepping stones for his intellect to find its way across the waters of error. "Unless you brought something useful from Greenwich," he added.

The Chief Detective immediately began presenting his investigation in a clear, factual manner. His supervisor swiveled his chair slightly, crossed his thin legs, propped himself up on his elbows, and shaded his eyes with one hand. There was a kind of angular and sad grace to his listening posture. Shimmers like highly polished silver played on the sides of his ebony head as he slowly tilted it at last.

Chief Detective Helms waited, appearing to be going over everything he had just said in his head, but actually considering whether it might be prudent to say more. The deputy commissioner broke off his hesitation.

"Do you think it was two men?" he asked without opening his eyes.

The chief Detective thought it more than likely. In his opinion, the two men had separated within a hundred yards of the observatory walls. He also explained how the other man could have left the park quickly and unobserved. The fog wasn't very dense, but in his favor. It seemed as if he had accompanied the other to the site and then left him there to do the work alone.When the old woman saw the two leaving Maze Hill Station and when the explosion was heard, the Chief Detective concluded that the other man may indeed have been at Greenwich Park Station, ready to face the next to catch train, at the moment when his Colleague destroyed himself so thoroughly.

"Very thorough - what?" the deputy commissioner murmured under the shadow of his hand.

The chief Detective described in a few emphatic words the sight of the remains. "The coroner's jury will be pleased," he added grimly.

The deputy commissioner opened his eyes.

"We won't have anything to say to them," he remarked lazily.

He looked up and observed his chief Detective's decidedly noncommittal attitude for a while. His nature was not easily amenable to illusion. He knew that a department is at the mercy of its subordinate officers, who have their own ideas of loyalty. His career had started in a tropical colony. He liked his work there. It was police work. He had been very successful in tracking down and disbanding certain nefarious native secret societies. Then he took his long vacation and got married quite spontaneously.It was a good fit from a secular point of view, but his wife formed an unfavorable opinion of the colonial climate based on hearsay. On the other hand, she had influential connections. It was an excellent game. But he didn't like the work he had to do now. He felt dependent on too many subordinates and too many masters. The immediate presence of this strange emotional phenomenon called public opinion weighed on his mood and troubled him with its irrational nature. No doubt out of ignorance he exaggerated the power of good and evil—especially evil;and the harsh easterly winds of the English spring (which agreed with his wife) increased his general distrust of the men's motives and the efficiency of their organization. The futility of office work horrified him, especially on those days that were so taxing on his sensitive liver. No doubt out of ignorance he exaggerated the power of good and evil—especially evil; and the harsh easterly winds of the English spring (which agreed with his wife) increased his general distrust of the men's motives and the efficiency of their organization. The futility of office work horrified him, especially on those days that were so taxing on his sensitive liver.No doubt out of ignorance he exaggerated the power of good and evil—especially evil; and the harsh easterly winds of the English spring (which agreed with his wife) increased his general distrust of the men's motives and the efficiency of their organization. The futility of office work horrified him, especially on those days that were so taxing on his sensitive liver.

He stood up, unfolded to his full height, and moved across the room to the window with a heavy stride remarkable for such a slender man. The windows were pouring with rain, and the short street he was looking down on was wet and empty, as if a great flood had suddenly swept it clean. It has been a very tiring day, initially choked with heavy fog and now engulfed in cold rain. The flickering, hazy flames of the gas lamps seemed to dissolve into a watery atmosphere. And the high claims of a humanity oppressed by the wretched indignities of the weather appeared as colossal and hopeless vanity, deserving of contempt, wonder, and pity.

"Terrible, horrible!" thought the deputy commissioner to himself, with his face close to the windowpane. “We've had something like this for ten days now; no, a fortnight—a fortnight.” He stopped thinking altogether for a while. The complete stillness of his brain lasted about three seconds. Then he said casually, "You've been investigating on foot to track down this other man down the line?"

He had no doubt that everything necessary had been done. Chief Detective Helms, of course, knew all about manhunting. And those were also the routine steps that even the beginner would take for granted. A few inquiries of the ticket collectors and porters at the two small stations would provide more details as to the two men's appearance; Checking the collected tickets would immediately show where they came from that morning. It was elementary and could not be neglected. Accordingly, the chief Detective replied that all this happened right after the old woman gave her statement. And he mentioned the name of a station."That's where they came from, sir," he continued. “The porter who took the tickets at Maze Hill remembers two guys responding to the description and going through the barrier. To him, they were two respectable high-class workers - sign painters or house decorators. The tall man backed out of a third-class compartment, carrying a light-colored tin can. On the platform he gave it to the handsome young lad who followed him to carry it. This all agrees exactly with what the old woman told the police sergeant in Greenwich.”

The deputy Detective, still facing the window, expressed his doubts that these two men had anything to do with the crime. This whole theory was based on the remarks of an old cleaning lady who almost got knocked out by a man in a hurry. Not very substantial authority, indeed, unless based on a sudden intuition that could hardly be sustained.

"Honestly, could she have really been inspired?" he asked with grave irony, covering his back to the room as if fascinated by the contemplation of the city's colossal forms, half lost in the night. He didn't even look around when he heard the word "Providence" murmured by the chief subordinate of his department, whose name, sometimes printed in the newspapers, was known to the general public as that of one of his zealous and hard-working officials. working protectors. Chief Detective Helms raised his voice a little.

"Stripes and bits of light pewter were clearly visible to me," he said. "That's a pretty good endorsement."

"And these men came from this little land station," the deputy commissioner mused aloud, wondering. He was told that that name was on two out of three tickets handed in at Maze Hill on that train. The third person to get off was a Gravesend street vendor well known to the porters. The Chief Detective conveyed this information with a tone of finality and a certain malevolence, as loyal servants would, knowing their loyalty and the value of their loyal efforts. And still the deputy Detective did not turn away from the darkness outside, which was as big as a sea.

"Two foreign anarchists are coming from there," he apparently said to the window pane. "It's pretty inexplicable."

"Yes. But it would be even more inexplicable if Michaels didn't live in a cabin in the neighborhood."

At the sound of that name, the deputy commissioner unexpectedly threw himself into this tiresome affair, brusquely dismissing the vague memory of his daily whist party at his club. It was the most reassuring habit of his life to show off his skills successfully for the most part without the help of a subordinate. He entered his club to play from five to seven before going home for supper, and for those two hours forgot everything that made him uncomfortable in his life, as if the game were a beneficial drug to relieve the pangs of moral dissatisfaction to alleviate. His partners were the darkly humorous editor of a famous magazine; a taciturn, elderly lawyer with evil little eyes;and a most belligerent, gullible old colonel with nervous brown hands. It was just his club acquaintances. He didn't meet her anywhere but at the card table. But they all seemed to approach the game in the spirit of fellow sufferers, as if it were actually a drug against the secret ills of existence; and every day, as the sun went down over the innumerable rooftops of the city, a gentle, pleasant impatience, resembling the impulse of a secure and deep friendship, eased his professional work.And now that comfortable feeling left him with what resembled physical shock, and was replaced by a particular interest in his Social Security work — an improper interest that's best defined as a sudden and wary distrust of the gun in his hand. It was the impulse of a secure and deep friendship that made his professional work easier. And now that comfortable feeling left him with what resembled physical shock, and was replaced by a particular interest in his Social Security work — an improper interest that's best defined as a sudden and wary distrust of the gun in his hand.It was the impulse of a secure and deep friendship that made his professional work easier. And now that comfortable feeling left him with what resembled physical shock, and was replaced by a particular interest in his Social Security work — an improper interest that's best defined as a sudden and wary distrust of the gun in his hand.

CHAPTER VI

The Patroness of Michaels, the Apostle of Humanitarian Hopes on leave, was one of the most influential and respected connections of the Deputy Commissioner's wife, whom she called Annie, and still tended to treat her as an unwise and totally inexperienced young girl. But she had agreed to befriend him, which was far from the case with all of his wife's influential connections. She was young and splendidly married in a distant era, and had for a time had a keen eye on great affairs and even on some great men. She herself was a great woman.Old for her years now, she had an extraordinary temperament, defying time with contemptuous disregard as if it were some rather vulgar convention to which the masses of inferior humanity submit. Many other conventions are more easily cast aside, Ah! She failed to gain their approval, even for temperamental reasons - either because they bored her or because they got in the way of her contempt and sympathy. Admiration was an emotion unfamiliar to her (it was one of her noblest husband's secret grievances against her)—first, as always, more or less tinged with mediocrity, and second, because it was in a way an admission of inferiority.And to be honest, both were unimaginable for her nature. It was easy for her to fearlessly speak her mind, judging solely from the standpoint of her social position. She was equally unrestricted in her actions; and as her tact proceeded from genuine humanity, her physical strength remained remarkable, and her superiority serene and hearty, three generations had admired her immensely, and the last thing she was likely to see had proclaimed her a wonderful woman.Intelligent now, with a kind of sublime simplicity, and curious at heart, but unlike many women who focus only on social gossip, she amused her old age by captivating everyone by the power of her great, almost historic, social standing, what surpassed them was the dead plane of humanity, rightful or wrongful, by position, wit, daring, fortune or misfortune. Royal Highnesses, artists, men of science, young statesmen, and charlatans of all ages and positions, who, insubstantial and light, bobbing up and down like corks, best show the direction of the surface currents, had been welcomed in this house, were heard , penetrated, understood, judged, for their own edification.In her own words, she enjoyed watching the world unfold. And having a practical mind, her judgment of people and things, though based on particular prejudices, was seldom entirely wrong and almost never wrong. Her saloon was probably the only place in the whole world where an assistant commissioner of police could meet a convict released on a furlough for reasons other than professional and official. The deputy Detective did not remember exactly who had brought Michaels there one afternoon.He had a hunch that it must have been a certain MP of illustrious lineage and unconventional sympathies, which was the perennial quip of comic book newspapers. The personalities and even the simple celebrities of the time brought each other freely into the temple of an old woman's not unworthy curiosity.

Michaels had been the subject of a revulsion in popular sentiment, the same mood that had years before lauded the cruelty of the life sentence handed down to him for complicity in a rather insane attempt to rescue some prisoners from a police car. The conspirators' plan was to shoot down the horses and overwhelm the escort. Unfortunately, one of the police officers was also shot. He left a wife and three young children, and the death of that man sparked an outpouring of angry outrage and anger from unrelenting pity for the victim throughout the empire for whose defense, welfare, and glory men of duty die. Three ringleaders were hanged.Michaels, young and slender, a locksmith by trade and a frequent night school attendee, didn't even know anyone had been killed. His task, together with some others, was to force open the door at the rear of the special transport vehicle. When he was arrested he had a bunch of keys in one pocket, a heavy chisel in the other, and a short crowbar in his hand: neither more nor less than a burglar. But no burglar would have received such a high penalty. The policeman's death had made him unhappy at heart, but so had the conspiracy's failure. He concealed none of these feelings from his armed countrymen, and that sort of remorse seemed appallingly imperfect to the crowded court.The judge expressed his sentiments about the depravity and callousness of the young prisoner as he passed the sentence. and a short crowbar in hand: neither more nor less than a burglar. But no burglar would have received such a high penalty. The policeman's death had made him unhappy at heart, but so had the conspiracy's failure. He concealed none of these feelings from his armed countrymen, and that sort of remorse seemed appallingly imperfect to the crowded court. The judge expressed his sentiments about the depravity and callousness of the young prisoner as he passed the sentence. and a short crowbar in hand: neither more nor less than a burglar.But no burglar would have received such a high penalty. The policeman's death had made him unhappy at heart, but so had the conspiracy's failure. He concealed none of these feelings from his armed countrymen, and that sort of remorse seemed appallingly imperfect to the crowded court. The judge expressed his sentiments about the depravity and callousness of the young prisoner as he passed the sentence.

That made up the groundless glory of his conviction; The glory of his release was given no better reason by people who wanted to exploit the sentimental aspect of his imprisonment either for their own ends or for some incomprehensible purpose. He allowed them to do so in the innocence of his heart and the simplicity of his mind. Nothing that happened to him individually had any meaning. He was like those holy men whose personality is lost in the contemplation of their faith. His ideas did not have the character of convictions. They were inaccessible to reason.In all their contradictions and obscurities they constituted an invincible and humanitarian creed which, with dogged gentleness and a smile of peaceful certainty, he professed rather than preached. and his open blue eyes were lowered because the sight of faces disturbed him. His inspiration developed in solitude. In this characteristic pose, pathetic in his grotesque and incurable obesity, which he had to drag like the bullet of a galley slave to the end of his days, the deputy police commissioner saw the apostle with leave card sitting in a privileged armchair on screen.He sat there at the head of the old lady's sofa, soft-spoken and calm, no more insecure than a very small child, and with a little childish charm - the enchanting charm of trustworthiness. Trusting in the future whose secret ways had been revealed to him within the four walls of a well-known prison, he had no reason to view anyone with suspicion.

A certain simplicity of thought is common to serene souls at both ends of the social scale. The great lady was simple in her own way. There was nothing about his views and beliefs to shock or frighten her, as she judged them from the standpoint of her high position. In fact, her sympathies for such a man were easily accessible. She wasn't an exploitative capitalist herself; it stood, so to speak, above the game of economic conditions.And she had a great pity for the more obvious forms of everyday human misery precisely because they were so utterly alien to her that she had to translate their imagination into terms of mental suffering before she could grasp the imagination of their cruelty. The deputy commissioner remembered the conversation between these two very well. He had listened in silence. In a way it was something as exciting and even touching in its predictably futileness as the efforts at moral intercourse between the denizens of far-flung planets. But this grotesque incarnation of humanitarian passion somehow captured the imagination.Finally Michaels rose, took the great lady's outstretched hand, shook it, held it for a moment in his large, padded palm with impudent kindness, and then turned with his broad and square back to the semi-private corner of the drawing room. and bloated under the short tweed jacket. He looked around with calm goodness and waddled among the other visitors to the far door. The murmur of conversation fell silent as he passed. He smiled innocently at a tall, beaming girl whose eyes happened to meet his, and walked out, unaware of the looks that followed him across the room.Michaels' first appearance in the world was a success - a success of appreciation that was not marred by a single mocking murmur. The interrupted conversations were resumed in the right tone, serious or light-hearted. Only one well-set, leggy, active-looking man of forty, conversing with two ladies by a window, remarked aloud and with an unexpected depth of feeling, "Eighteen stone, I'd say, and not six feet." Poor fellow ! It's awful – awful.” with an unexpected depth of feeling: “Eighteen stone, I'd say, and not one seventy.” Poor fellow! It's awful – awful.”with an unexpected depth of feeling: "Eighteen stone, I'd say, and not one seventy." Poor fellow! It's awful – awful.”

The lady of the house gazed absently at the Deputy Detective left alone with her on the private side of the screen, and seemed to reorganize her mental impressions behind the thoughtful stillness of a handsome old face. Men with gray mustaches and full, healthy, slightly smiling faces approached and circled the screen. two mature women with a matronly air and graceful determination; a clean-shaven person with sunken cheeks and gold-rimmed glasses on a wide black band with an old-fashioned Gdansk effect.There was a moment of respectful but restrained silence, and then the great lady called out, not with resentment but with a sort of protesting indignation:

"And that's supposed to be officially revolutionary! What nonsense." She looked intently at the Deputy Commissioner, who mumbled apologetically:

"Maybe not dangerous."

“Not dangerous – actually I don't think so. He's just a believer. It's a saint's temper,” the tall lady stated firmly. “And they kept him locked up for twenty years. One shudders at the stupidity of it. And now they let him out, everyone who belonged to him has gone somewhere or is dead. His parents are dead; the girl he was supposed to marry died while he was in prison; he has lost the skills necessary for his trade. He told me all this himself with the sweetest patience; but on the other hand, he said, he also had enough time to think things up himself.Nice compensation! If that's the stuff revolutionaries are made of, maybe some of us will bow to them,” she continued, voice slightly joking, while the banal society smiles on the worldly faces that turned to her with conventional deference. "The poor creature is obviously unable to take care of himself. Someone needs to take care of him a little bit.”

"He should be advised to undergo some kind of treatment," came the soldierly voice of the active-looking man from afar, advising him earnestly. He was in a rosy condition for his age, and even the texture of his long frock coat had the character of elastic firmness, as if it were living tissue. "The man is practically a cripple," he added with unmistakable emotion.

Other voices murmured, as if glad of the disclosure, hastily sympathetic. "Quite frightening," "Monstrous," "Extremely painful to look at." The gaunt man with wide-banded glasses uttered the word "Grotesque" wryly, the accuracy of which was appreciated by those who stood near him. They smiled at each other.

The Deputy Commissioner did not express an opinion then or later, as his position made it impossible for him to express an independent opinion about a parole convict. But in truth he shared the view of his wife's friend and benefactor that Michaels was a humanitarian sentimentalist, a little mad but generally incapable of intentionally harming a fly. When that name popped up in this annoying bombshell affair, he recognized the great danger it posed to the holiday apostle, and his mind immediately returned to the old lady's well-known infatuation. Her arbitrary goodness would not tolerate any interference with Michaels' freedom.It was a deep, quiet, confident infatuation. Not only had she found him harmless, she had said so: which, through the bewilderment of her absolutist mind, became a kind of irrefutable demonstration. It was as if she had been fascinated by the man's monstrosity, with his sincere child eyes and wide angelic smile. She had almost believed his theory of the future since it did not contradict her prejudices. She did not like the new element of plutocracy in the social complex, and industrialism as a method of human development struck her as particularly repulsive because of its mechanical and callous nature.The humanitarian hopes of the mild Michaels were not aimed at complete destruction, but only at the complete economic ruin of the system. And she didn't really see what the moral damage was. It would eliminate the whole horde of "parvenus" she disliked and distrusted. not because they got anywhere (she denied that), but because of their profound unintelligence in the world, which was the main reason for the coarseness of their perceptions and the dryness of their hearts. With the destruction of all capital they too would disappear; but universal ruin (assuming it were universal as revealed to Michaelmas) would leave societal values ??untouched.The disappearance of the last piece of money could not affect the respected people. For example, she couldn't imagine how this might affect her position. She had presented these discoveries to the Deputy Detective with all the easy-going fearlessness of an old woman who had escaped the plague of indifference. He had made it a rule to receive everything of this kind with a silence which, out of politics and inclination, he did not allow to be insulting. He harbored an affection for the aged student of Michaels, a complex emotion that depended a little on her reputation and personality, but mostly on an instinct of flattered gratitude. He felt very liked in her house.She was kindness personified. And she was practically wise, too, in the manner of experienced women. She made his married life much easier than it would have been without her generous and full recognition of his rights as Annie's husband. Her influence on his wife, a woman consumed by all sorts of petty selfishness, petty envy, petty jealousy, was excellent. Unfortunately, both her kindness and wisdom were unreasonably complexioned, decidedly feminine, and difficult to manage. She remained a perfect woman all her life, and not what some of you become - sort of a raunchy, raunchy woman. pestilential old man in petticoats.And as a woman he thought of her--the most exquisite incarnation of the feminine, in which the tender, sincere, and savage bodyguard is recruited for all manner of men speaking under the influence of some emotion, true or deceitful; for preachers, seers, prophets or reformers.

The deputy commissioner valued his wife's respected and good friend and himself in this way, and was concerned about the possible fate of the convict Michaels. After the man was arrested on suspicion of involvement in some, albeit remote, form in this atrocity, the man could hardly avoid being sent back to at least serve out his sentence. And that would kill him; he would never get out alive. The Deputy Commissioner made a most unworthy remark about his official position without really boasting about his humanity.

"If the guy gets caught again," he thought, "she'll never forgive me."

The frankness of such a secretly expressed thought would not be possible without mocking self-criticism. No man doing work he does not like can maintain many saving illusions about himself. The dislike and lack of glamor extends from profession to personality. It is only when, by some fortunate coincidence, our planned activities appear to obey the peculiar seriousness of our temperament, that we can enjoy the comfort of utter self-deception. The deputy commissioner did not like his work at home.The policing he was engaged in in a distant part of the world had the saving grace of irregular warfare, or at least the risk and excitement of an open-air sport. His true skills, being mainly administrative in nature, were combined with an adventurous disposition. Tied to a desk in the midst of four million men, he saw himself as the victim of an ironic fate – no doubt the same one that had led, among other limitations, to his marriage to a woman extraordinarily sensitive to the colonial climate, a testament to the delicacy of their nature – and of their taste.Though he sardonically judged his concern, he didn't push the inappropriate thought out of his mind. The instinct of self-preservation was strong in him. On the contrary, he repeated it mentally with profane emphasis and even more precisely: "Damn! If this hell of a Helms has its way, the guy will die in prison, choking on his fat, and she will never forgive me.” This had led to his marriage to a woman who was extraordinarily sensitive about the colonial climate, alongside other limitations that testified to the delicacy of her nature—and her taste. Though he sardonically judged his concern, he didn't push the inappropriate thought out of his mind.The instinct of self-preservation was strong in him. On the contrary, he repeated it mentally with profane emphasis and even more precisely: "Damn! If this hell of a Helms has its way, the guy will die in prison, choking on his fat, and she will never forgive me.” This had led to his marriage to a woman who was extraordinarily sensitive about the colonial climate, alongside other limitations that testified to the delicacy of her nature—and her taste. Though he sardonically judged his concern, he didn't push the inappropriate thought out of his mind. The instinct of self-preservation was strong in him. On the contrary, he repeated it mentally with profane emphasis and even more precisely: "Damn!If this hell of a Helms has its way, the guy will die in prison, choking on his fat, and she'll never forgive me." He repeated it mentally with profane emphasis and more precisely: "Damn! If this hell of a Helms has its way, the guy will die in prison, choking on his fat, and she'll never forgive me." He repeated it mentally with profane emphasis and more precisely: "Damn! If this hell of a Helms has its way, the guy will die in prison, choking on his fat, and she'll never forgive me."

His black, slender figure, with the white band of the collar beneath the silver glints on the close-cropped hair at the back of his head, remained motionless. The silence had lasted so long that Chief Detective Helms dared to clear his throat. This noise unfolded its effect. The eager and intelligent officer was asked by his superior, who had his back steadfastly turned:

"You connect Michaels with this affair?"

Chief Detective Helms was very positive but cautious.

"Well sir," he said, "we've got plenty of reasons to go on. A man like that has nothing to do with being at large anyway.”

"You're going to need conclusive evidence," came the murmured remark.

Chief Detective Helms raised his eyebrows at the black, narrow back that stubbornly displayed his intelligence and eagerness.

"There will be no difficulty in getting enough evidence against him," he said with virtuous complacency. "You can trust me on that, sir," he added wholeheartedly, completely unnecessarily; for it seemed to him an excellent thing to have this man in his hands, to be accused in public, when in that case it would be proper to roar with particular indignation. Whether it would roar or not couldn't be said yet. Ultimately, of course, that depended on the newspaper press. But in any case, Chief Detective Helms, a prison contractor by trade and a man with legal acumen, logically believed that imprisonment was the right fate for any declared enemy of the law.Because of this belief, he made a mistake in tact. He allowed himself a little smug laugh and repeated:

"Trust me, sir."

It was too much for the forced silence with which the deputy commissioner had concealed his annoyance with the system and his office's subordinates for more than eighteen months. Like a square stake stuck in a round hole, he had felt, like a daily indignation, that long-established smooth curve into which a man of less sharp-edged forms would, after a shrug or two, have voluntarily fitted himself. What displeased him the most was just the need to rely so much on trust. At the soft chuckle of Chief Detective Helms, he turned quickly on his heels as if he were being ejected from the window pane by an electric shock.He noted not only the appropriate smugness of the occasion lurking beneath the mustache, but also the traces of experimental alertness in the round eyes that were undoubtedly his.

The deputy police commissioner really had some qualifications for his post. Suddenly his suspicions were aroused. It's only fair to say that it wasn't hard to arouse his suspicions about police methods (unless the police were a paramilitary organization that he had organized himself). If it ever slumbered from sheer fatigue, it was only slightly; and his inherently moderate appreciation of Chief Detective Helms's zeal and ability precluded any notion of moral confidence. "He's up to something," he mentally shouted, instantly becoming angry. With overwhelming steps he went to his desk and sat down violently."Here I am stuck in a pile of papers," he mused with unreasonable resentment, "which is supposed to pull all the strings in my hands, and yet I can only hold what is put in my hands and nothing else."

He lifted his head and turned to his subordinate a long, lean face with the defined features of an energetic Don Quixote.

"Now what do you have up your sleeve?"

The other stared. He stared without batting an eyelid, his round eyes completely still, as he was accustomed to staring at the various members of the criminal class when, after they had been duly admonished, they uttered their statements in a tone of offended innocence or false simplicity made sullen resignation. But behind this professional and iron insistence there was also a certain surprise, for Chief Detective Helms, the department's right-hand man, was not used to being addressed in such a tone, which beautifully combined tones of contempt and impatience. He began hesitantly, like a man caught off guard by a new and unexpected experience.

"What do I have against that man, do you mean Michaels, sir?"

The deputy commissioner watched the ball head; the tips of that Nordic rover's mustache, reaching below the line of heavy jaw; the whole full and pale physiognomy, whose determined character was marred by too much flesh; Seeing the intricate wrinkles radiating from the outer corners of his eyes, and in that focused contemplation of the precious and trustworthy officer, he came to such sudden conviction that it touched him like an inspiration.

'I have reason to believe that when you entered this room,' he said in a measured tone, 'Michaels wasn't on your mind; not in principle – maybe not at all.”

"Have you reason to think, sir?" murmured Chief Detective Helms with every semblance of astonishment, which was genuine enough up to a point. He had discovered a thorny and confusing side to the matter, which imposed on the discoverer a certain degree of insincerity - the kind of insincerity which appears under the names of skill, prudence, discretion at one point or another in most human affairs. He was feeling like a tightrope walker at the moment when suddenly, mid-performance, the music hall manager burst out of the manager's reasonable seclusion and started shaking the tightrope.The indignation, the sense of moral insecurity that such a treacherous move evokes, coupled with the immediate fear of having broken his neck, would, to use colloquial language, put him in a state of distress.

"Yes," said the deputy commissioner; "I have. I don't want to say that you didn't think of Michaels at all. But you do highlight the fact that you mentioned what doesn't strike me as entirely sincere, Detective Helms. If that really is the trail of discovery, why didn't you pursue her immediately, either personally or by sending one of your men to that village?'

"Do you think, sir, that I failed to do my duty there?" asked the Chief Detective in a tone that he simply wanted to provoke thought. Unexpectedly forced to concentrate his energies on the task of maintaining his balance, he had seized on the point and faced rebuke; for the deputy commissioner remarked, frowning slightly, that this was a very inappropriate remark.

"But since you made it," he continued coolly, "I can tell you that's not my intention."

He paused and cast a direct look from his deep-set eyes that perfectly matched the unspoken closing phrase, "And you know it." The head of the so-called Special Crimes Unit, prevented by his position from personally going outside to search for secrets hidden in the breasts of the guilty, tended to use his considerable skills to expose incriminating truths to uncover their own subordinates. This peculiar instinct can hardly be called a weakness. It was natural. He was a born detective.It had unconsciously determined his career choices, and if ever in life it had let him down, it might have been in the one extraordinary circumstance of his marriage—which was also natural. Unable to move abroad, it subsisted on the human material brought to it in its official seclusion. We can never stop being ourselves.

Elbows on his desk, thin legs crossed, cheek resting in the palm of his scrawny hand, the deputy commissioner in charge of Special Crimes dealt with the case with growing interest. His chief Detective was, if not necessarily a worthy opponent of his penetration, at least the most worthy of those within his reach. Distrust of established reputations was closely linked to the deputy commissioner's ability as a detector.His memory reminded him of a certain old, fat, and wealthy native chief in the distant colony, whom successive colonial governors had traditionally trusted and cherished as a firm friend and supporter of the order and legality established by white men; However, upon skeptical inquiry, it turned out that he was mainly his own good friend and no one else. Not exactly a traitor, but still a man with many dangerous reservations in his allegiance, caused by a due regard for his own benefit, comfort and security. A fellow of some innocence in his naïve duplicity, but dangerous nonetheless.He needed to find out something. He was also a large man physically, and (taking into account the difference in skin color, of course) Chief Detective Helms's appearance reminded him of the memory of his superior. It wasn't the eyes, nor exactly the lips. It was bizarre. But doesn't Alfred Wallace, in his famous book on the Malay Archipelago, tell how, among the Aru islanders, he discovered in an old, naked, sooty-skinned savage a strange resemblance to a dear friend back home? A fellow of some innocence in his naïve duplicity, but dangerous nonetheless. He needed to find out something.He was also a large man physically, and (taking into account the difference in skin color, of course) Chief Detective Helms's appearance reminded him of the memory of his superior. It wasn't the eyes, nor exactly the lips. It was bizarre. But doesn't Alfred Wallace, in his famous book on the Malay Archipelago, tell how, among the Aru islanders, he discovered in an old, naked, sooty-skinned savage a strange resemblance to a dear friend back home? A fellow of some innocence in his naïve duplicity, but dangerous nonetheless. He needed to find out something.He was also a large man physically, and (taking into account the difference in skin color, of course) Chief Detective Helms's appearance reminded him of the memory of his superior. It wasn't the eyes, nor exactly the lips. It was bizarre. But doesn't Alfred Wallace, in his famous book on the Malay Archipelago, tell how, among the Aru islanders, he discovered in an old, naked, sooty-skinned savage a strange resemblance to a dear friend back home?

For the first time since taking office, the deputy commissioner felt he was doing real work for his salary. And that was a nice feeling. "I'll turn him inside out like an old glove," the deputy Detective thought, while his gaze rested thoughtfully on Chief Detective Helms.

"No, that wasn't my thought," he began again. “There is no doubt that you know your business – no doubt at all; and that's exactly why I …” He paused and changed his tone: “What concrete arguments could you make against Michaels? I mean, apart from the fact that the two suspected men - you're sure there were two - last came from a train station within three miles of the village where Michaels lives now."

"That alone is enough, sir, to get on with this kind of man," said the Chief Detective with returning composure. The slight shake of the deputy commissioner's head in agreement went a long way to allaying the glamor of the famous officer's astonishment. Chief Detective Helms was a kind man, an excellent husband, a devoted father; and the public and departmental trust he enjoyed in responding sympathetically to an amiable nature caused him to be kind to the successive deputy commissioners he had just seen passing through that room. In his time there had been three.The first, a soldierly, gruff, red-faced human with white eyebrows and an explosive temper, was dealt with by a thread of thread. He left the company when he reached retirement age. The second, a consummate gentleman who knows himself and everyone else in minute detail, When he resigned to take up a senior position outside England he was decorated for (really) the services of Detective Helms. Working with him was a pride and a pleasure. The third, more of a shadow horse compared to the first, was still a shadow horse for the department after eighteen months.On the whole, Chief Detective Helms thought he was mostly harmless - odd-looking, but harmless. He spoke now, and the Chief Detective listened with outward deference (which means nothing, since it is a mandatory question) and inward benevolent tolerance. On the whole, Chief Detective Helms thought he was mostly harmless - odd-looking, but harmless. He spoke now, and the Chief Detective listened with outward deference (which means nothing, since it is a mandatory question) and inward benevolent tolerance. On the whole, Chief Detective Helms thought he was mostly harmless - odd-looking, but harmless.He spoke now, and the Chief Detective listened with outward deference (which means nothing, since it is a mandatory question) and inward benevolent tolerance.

"Michaels got in touch before he left London for the country?"

"Yes. He has."

"And what might he be doing there?" continued the deputy commissioner, who was well informed on the point. Michaels sat painfully cramped in an old wooden armchair in front of a worm-eaten oak table on the upper floor of a four-room house with a roof of moss-covered tiles and wrote day and night with a trembling, crooked hand this "Autobiography of a Prisoner", which, like a book of revelation in the history of the humanity should be. The limited space, seclusion and solitude of a small four-room cottage favored his inspiration.It was like prison, except one was never disturbed for the vile purpose of exercising in prison according to the tyrannical regulations of his old home. He couldn't tell if the sun was still shining on the earth or not. The sweat of the literary work ran down his forehead. A delightful enthusiasm drove him on. It was the liberation of his inner life, the letting out of his soul into the wide world. And the zeal of his unsuspecting vanity (first aroused by a publisher's offer of five hundred pounds) seemed something preordained and sacred.

"It would of course be most desirable to be well informed," stressed the deputy commissioner disingenuously.

Chief Detective Helms, once again angered by this display of ruthlessness, said that the district police had been informed of Michaels' arrival the first time and that a full report could be available in a few hours. A telegram to the Superintendent—

So he spoke rather slowly, while his mind seemed to be weighing the consequences. A slight frown was the outward sign of this. But he was interrupted by a question.

"You already sent the telegram?"

"No, sir," he replied, surprised.

The deputy commissioner suddenly opened his legs. The liveliness of this movement contrasted with the casual manner in which he made a proposal.

"For example, would you believe that Michaels had anything to do with the preparation of that bomb?"

The Chief Detective assumed a thoughtful attitude.

"I would not say that. There is no need to say anything at this time. He associates with men considered dangerous. Less than a year after his release on license, he was made a delegate to the Red Committee. A compliment of sorts, I suppose.”

And the chief Detective laughed a little angrily, a little contemptuously. In a man like that, unscrupulousness was an improper, even illegal sentiment. The notoriety Michaels was given when he was released two years ago by some emotional journalists who needed a special copy had stuck in his mind ever since. It was perfectly legal to arrest this man on mere suspicion. At first glance, it was legal and expedient. His two former bosses would have recognized the point immediately; while he sat there, without saying yes or no, as if lost in a dream.Furthermore, Michaels' arrest was not only lawful and expedient, but also resolved a small personal issue that worried Chief Detective Helms somewhat. This difficulty affected his reputation, well-being, and even the efficient performance of his duties. For, if Michaels undoubtedly knew something about this scandal, the chief Detective was pretty sure he didn't know all that much. This also has been good. He knew far less - the chief Detective was sure - than certain other people he had in mind, but whose arrest seemed impractical because of the rules of the game and, moreover, a more complicated matter.The rules of the game didn't protect Michaels, a former convict, that much. It would be foolish not to take advantage of the legal avenue, and the journalists who described him with emotional exuberance would be ready to write him off with emotional outrage. He knew far less - the chief Detective was sure - than certain other people he had in mind, but whose arrest seemed impractical because of the rules of the game and, moreover, a more complicated matter. The rules of the game didn't protect Michaels, a former convict, that much.It would be foolish not to take advantage of the legal avenue, and the journalists who described him with emotional exuberance would be ready to write him off with emotional outrage. He knew far less - the chief Detective was sure - than certain other people he had in mind, but whose arrest seemed impractical because of the rules of the game and, moreover, a more complicated matter. The rules of the game didn't protect Michaels, a former convict, that much. It would be foolish not to take advantage of the legal avenue, and the journalists who described him with emotional exuberance would be ready to write him off with emotional outrage.

That prospect, viewed with confidence, had for Chief Detective Helms the allure of personal triumph. And deep in his impeccable heart as the average married citizen, almost unconscious but nonetheless powerful, spoke a reluctance to let events compel him to interfere with the professor's desperate ferocity. This dislike had been reinforced by the chance encounter in the alley.Meeting Chief Detective Helms did not leave the satisfying sense of superiority that members of the police force feel through the unofficial but intimate side of their dealings with the criminal classes, which appease the vanity of power and the vulgar love of dominating ours Fellow creatures are flattered as worthily as they deserve.

The perfect anarchist was not recognized as a fellow creature by Chief Detective Helms. He was impossible - a mad dog who could be left alone. Not that the Chief Detective was afraid of him; on the contrary, he wanted it one day. But not yet; he intended to attain it at his own pace, properly and effectively according to the rules of the game. The present was not the right time to attempt this feat, not the right time for many reasons, both personal and public.As this was Detective Helms's strong feeling, it seemed fair and right that this matter should be diverted from its dark and uncomfortable path and, God knows where, to a quiet (and rightful) siding called Michaels. And he repeated, as if carefully considering the proposal:

"The bomb. No, I wouldn't say exactly. We may never find out. But it's clear that it's connected in some way, which we can easily find out."

His expression had that look of serious, haughty indifference that the better thieves once knew and feared. Chief Detective Helms was a man, but no smiling animal. But his inner state was one of satisfaction at the deputy commissioner's passively open-minded attitude, who murmured softly:

"And you really think the investigation should go in that direction?"

"I do, sir."

"Are you sure?

"That's me, sir. This is the right line for us.”

The deputy commissioner pulled the rest of his hand from his prone head with a suddenness that, considering his sluggish posture, gave the impression that his whole person was collapsing. But on the contrary, he sat up, extremely wary, behind the large desk on which his hand had fallen with the sound of a sharp thump.

"What I want to know is what's been driving you out of your head so far."

"Get that out of my head," the chief Detective repeated very slowly.

"Yes. Until you were called into this room – you know."

The chief Detective felt as if the air between his clothes and his skin had grown uncomfortably hot. It felt like an unprecedented and incredible experience.

'Of course,' he said, exaggerating the deliberation of his utterance to the limit of possibility, 'if there's a reason I don't know why I didn't get involved in Convict Michaels' business, then maybe there is good thing I didn't." "I won't use county police to pursue him."

It has taken so long to say that the Deputy Commissioner's unflagging attention seemed a wonderful feat of endurance. His answer came without delay.

"No reason I know of. Come on, Chief Detective, these niceties to me are most improper - most improper. And it's unfair too, you know. You shouldn't let me make up such things for myself. I'm really surprised."

He paused, then added softly, "Needless to say, this conversation is completely unofficial."

Those words were anything but soothing to the Chief Detective. The indignation of a betrayed tightrope walker was strong in him. In his pride of being a trusted servant, he felt touched by a display of insolence at the assurance that the rope was not shaken to break his neck. As if anyone were afraid! Deputy commissioners come and go, but a valuable chief Detective is not a short-lived office phenomenon. He wasn't afraid of breaking his neck. That his performance was spoiled was more than enough to create the appearance of genuine outrage.And since thought has no regard for the person, Chief Detective Helms's thinking took on a threatening and prophetic guise. "You, my boy," he said to himself, keeping his round and habitually wandering eyes on the Deputy Detective's face - "you, my boy,

As if daring an answer to that thought, something resembling a gracious smile crossed the Deputy Detective's lips. His manner was easygoing and matter-of-fact as he insisted on shaking the rope again.

"Now let's move on to what you discovered at the scene, Chief Detective," he said.

"A fool and his job will soon be parted," the prophetic thought continued in Chief Detective Helms's mind. But the reasoning that immediately followed was that even if a senior official was "fired" (that was the accurate picture), he still had the time, flying through the door, to nasty kick a subordinate in the shin bones miss . Without significantly softening the basilisk character of his gaze, he said listlessly:

"Coming to that part of my investigation, sir."

"That's right. Well, what did you take away from that?"

The Chief Detective, who was planning to jump off the rope, fell to the ground with a somber frankness.

"I brought an address," he said, unhurriedly pulling a scorched dark blue rag from his pocket. "It's part of the coat the guy who got blown up was wearing. Of course, the coat may not have belonged to him and may even have been stolen. But that's not likely at all, if you look at it."

The Chief Detective went to the table and carefully smoothed down the blue rag. He had picked it up from the repulsive heap in the morgue because a tailor's name can sometimes be found under the collar. It's not often of much use, but still--He only half expected to find something useful, but certainly not expected to find--not under the collar at all, but carefully sewn to the underside of the lapels--a square piece off Cotton with an address written in marker ink.

The Chief Detective removed his smoothing hand.

"I took it without anyone noticing," he said. "I thought it was the best. If necessary, it can be produced at any time.”

The deputy commissioner rose slightly in his chair and pulled the cloth to his side of the table. He sat silently and looked at it. Only the number 32 and the name Brett Street were written in marker ink on a piece of calico a little larger than an ordinary cigarette paper. He was really surprised.

"I can't understand why he was labeled like that," he said, looking up at Chief Detective Helms. "It's something very extraordinary."

"I once met an old gentleman in the smoking room of a hotel who would go into all his coats with his name and address sewn on in case of an accident or sudden illness," said the Chief Detective. "He pretended to be eighty-four years old, but he didn't look his age. He told me he was also afraid of suddenly losing his memory, just like the people he had read about in the newspaper.”

A question from the Deputy Commissioner, who wanted to know what 32 Brett Street was, abruptly interrupted this recollection. The chief Detective, driven to the ground by unfair artifice, had chosen to follow the path of unreserved frankness. While he firmly believed that knowing too much was not good for the department, wise withholding of knowledge was the only thing his loyalty dared to do for the good of the service. Of course, if the deputy commissioner wanted to mismanage this affair, nothing could stop him. But now he saw no reason to show his willingness. So he answered succinctly:

"It's a deal, sir."

The deputy Detective looked down at the blue rag, waiting for more information. Since this was not the case, he attempted to achieve it through a series of questions, which he asked with gentle patience. Thus he got an idea of ??the nature of Mr. Culver's business, of his personal appearance, and finally heard his name. During a pause, the Deputy Detective looked up and saw a certain animation in the Chief Detective's face. They looked at each other in silence.

"Of course," said the latter, "the department has no record of this man."

"Did any of my predecessors know what you have just told me?" asked the deputy commissioner, leaning his elbows on the table and raising his clasped hands in front of his face as if he were about to pray, except his eyes didn't have a pious expression.

"No sir; certainly not. What would have been the object? Such a man could never be brought forth publicly to any good cause. It was enough for me to know who he was and to use him in a way that could be used publicly .”

"And do you think that kind of private knowledge is compatible with the official position you hold?"

"Perfect, sir. I think it's absolutely correct. Allow me to tell you, sir, that it makes me who I am - and that I am seen as a man who knows his job. It's a private matter for me. A personal friend of mine in the French police tipped me off that the guy was an embassy spy. Private friendship, private information, private use of it - that's how I see it."

After noting that the famous Chief Detective's mental state seemed to affect the outline of his lower jaw, as if the vivid sense of his high professional distinction resided in that part of his anatomy, the Deputy Detective dismissed the point of the moment with a calm "I I understand.” Then he rested his cheek on his clasped hands:

"Well then - privately, if you will - how long have you been in private contact with this embassy spy?"

To this request, the Chief Detective's private reply, so confidential that it was never put into audible words, was:

"Long before you were even thought of for your place here."

The public statement, so to speak, was much more precise.

"I saw him for the first time in my life a little over seven years ago when two Imperial Highnesses and the Chancellor were visiting here. I was given responsibility for all care. Honorable Scott-Weber was ambassador at the time. He was a very nervous old gentleman. One evening, three days before the Guildhall banquet, he let me know that he wanted to see me for a moment. I was downstairs and the carriages were at the door to take the Imperial Highnesses and the Chancellor to the Opera. I went upstairs immediately. I found the Honorable pacing his bedroom, hands pressed together, in a pitiable state of desperation.He assured me that he had complete confidence in our police force and in my abilities, but he had a man there who had just come over from Paris whose information could be completely trusted. He wanted me to hear what this man had to say. He immediately led me to the dressing room next door, where I saw a tall guy in a heavy coat sitting in a chair all alone, hat and cane in one hand. The Honorable said to him in French, "Speak, my friend." The light in this room was not very good. I talked to him for maybe five minutes. In any case, he brought me some very startling news.Then the Honorable nervously took me aside to compliment him and when I turned back I found the guy had vanished like a ghost. I suppose I got up and snuck down some back stairs. I didn't have time to chase after him as I had to chase the ambassador down the grand staircase and make sure the party got started safely for the opera. However, I responded to the information that same evening. Whether it was entirely right or not, it looked serious enough. Most likely, it saved us from an ugly trouble on the day of the imperial visit to the city.

"Some time later, about a month after my promotion to Chief Detective, my attention was drawn to a tall, burly man I thought I had seen somewhere before, hurrying out of a jewelry shop on the beach. I followed him as I was on my way to Charing Cross and when I saw one of our detectives there across the road I waved him over and showed him the guy and told him to watch his movements for a couple of days , and then get in touch with me. My husband showed up the next afternoon at the latest and told me that the guy had married his landlady's daughter at the registry office at 11:30 that same day and had gone to Margate with her for a week.Our husband had seen the luggage being loaded into the taxi. There were old Paris labels on one of the pockets. I just couldn't get the guy out of my head, so the next time I had to go to Paris on duty I spoke to my friend from the Paris police about him. My friend said, "From what you tell me, I think you mean a fairly well-known follower and envoy of the Revolutionary Red Committee." He says he is English by birth. "We have a suspicion that he has been a secret agent in one of the foreign embassies in London for a number of years." That completely jogged my memory.He was the disappearing fellow I saw sitting on a chair in Honorable Scott-Weber's bathroom. I told my friend that he was absolutely right. As far as I know, the guy was a secret agent. My friend then went to the trouble of getting this man's full file out for me. I thought I'd better know everything there was to know; but I don't suppose you want to hear his story now, sir?" " From what you tell me I think you must mean a fairly well-known follower and emissary of the Revolutionary Red Committee. He says he was born in England."We have a suspicion that he has been a secret agent in one of the foreign embassies in London for a number of years." That completely jogged my memory. He was the disappearing fellow I saw sitting on a chair in Honorable Scott-Weber's bathroom. I told my friend that he was absolutely right. As far as I know, the guy was a secret agent. My friend then went to the trouble of getting this man's full file out for me. I thought I'd better know everything there was to know; but I don't suppose you want to hear his story now, sir?'"From what you tell me, I think you must mean a fairly well-known follower and emissary of the Revolutionary Red Committee. He says he was born in England. "We have a suspicion that he has been a secret agent in one of the foreign embassies in London for a number of years." That completely jogged my memory. He was the disappearing fellow I saw sitting on a chair in Honorable Scott-Weber's bathroom. I told my friend that he was absolutely right. As far as I know, the guy was a secret agent. My friend then went to the trouble of getting this man's full file out for me. I thought I'd better know everything there was to know;but I don't suppose you want to hear his story now, sir?” He says he's English by birth. "We have a suspicion that he has been a secret agent in one of the foreign embassies in London for a number of years." That completely jogged my memory. He was the disappearing fellow I saw sitting on a chair in Honorable Scott-Weber's bathroom. I told my friend that he was absolutely right. As far as I know, the guy was a secret agent. My friend then went to the trouble of getting this man's full file out for me. I thought I'd better know everything there was to know;but I don't suppose you want to hear his story now, sir?” He says he's English by birth. "We have a suspicion that he has been a secret agent in one of the foreign embassies in London for a number of years." That completely jogged my memory. He was the disappearing fellow I saw sitting on a chair in Honorable Scott-Weber's bathroom. I told my friend that he was absolutely right. As far as I know, the guy was a secret agent. My friend then went to the trouble of getting this man's full file out for me. I thought I'd better know everything there was to know;but I don't suppose you want to hear his story now, sir?” I told my friend he was absolutely right. As far as I know, the guy was a secret agent. My friend then went to the trouble of getting this man's full file out for me. I thought I'd better know everything there was to know; but I don't suppose you want to hear his story now, sir?” I told my friend he was absolutely right. As far as I know, the guy was a secret agent. My friend then went to the trouble of getting this man's full file out for me. I thought I'd better know everything there was to know;but I don't suppose you want to hear his story now, sir?'

The deputy commissioner shook his propped head. "The history of your relationships with this useful personality is the only thing that matters right now," he said, slowly closing his tired, sunken eyes and then quickly opening them with an utterly refreshed look.

"There's nothing official about them," the Chief Detective said bitterly. "One evening I went into his shop, told him who I was and reminded him of the first time we met. He didn't even bat an eyebrow. He said he is now married and settled and all he wants is not to be encroached on his small business. I've made it my business to promise him that the police won't bother him as long as he doesn't do anything blatantly rude.That was worth something to him, because one word from us to the Customs people would have been enough to have some of those packages he gets from Paris and Brussels opened in Dover, with certain confiscation and maybe prosecution, well, on End."

"It's a very precarious business," the deputy commissioner murmured. "Why did he agree to this?"

The chief Detective raised his eyebrows in objective contempt.

"Most likely I have contacts - friends on the continent - with people who deal in such goods. They would be just the kind he would associate with. He's also a lazy dog ??- like the others."

"What do you get from him in return for your protection?"

The Chief Detective was not inclined to emphasize the value of Mr. Culver's services.

"He wouldn't do much good to anyone but me. In order to take advantage of such a man, you need to find out about a good deal beforehand. I can understand the kind of hint he can give. And if I need a hint, he can generally give it to me.”

The Chief Detective suddenly fell into a discreet, pensive mood; and the deputy Detective stifled a smile at the fleeting thought that Chief Detective Helms's reputation might have been due in large part to secret agent Culver.

"Generally speaking, all of our Special Crimes men on duty at Charing Cross and Victoria are under orders to keep a careful watch on anyone they see with him. He often meets the newcomers and keeps track of them afterwards. He seems to have been reprimanded for this kind of duty. If I need an address quickly, I can always get it from him. Of course I know how to manage our relationships. I haven't seen him speak three times in the past two years. I send him an unsigned message and he replies the same way to my home address.”

From time to time the deputy commissioner nodded almost imperceptibly. The Chief Detective added that he did not assume that Mr. Culver enjoyed the confidence of the prominent members of the Revolutionary International Council, but that he was generally trusted, there could be no doubt about that. "Whenever I had reason to believe there was something in the wind," he concluded, "I could always find that he had something worth knowing to tell me."

The Deputy Commissioner made an important remark.

"He let you down this time."

"I haven't heard anything else either," Chief Detective Helms replied. "I didn't ask him anything, so he couldn't tell me anything. He's not one of our men. It's not like he was paid by us.”

"No," the deputy commissioner mumbled. "He's a spy for a foreign government. We could never confess anything to him.”

"I have to do my job my own way," the chief Detective explained. "If it comes to that, I would deal with the devil himself and face the consequences. There are things that not everyone should know.”

"Your idea of ??secrecy seems to be keeping the head of your department in the dark. Maybe that's going a little too far, isn't it? He lives above his shop?”

"Who – Culver? Oh yeah. He lives above his shop. I suspect the woman's mother lives with them."

"Is the house guarded?"

"Oh dear, no. That wouldn't work. Certain people who come there are observed. I don't think he knows anything about this matter."

"How do you explain that?" The deputy Detective nodded at the piece of cloth lying on the table in front of him.

"I can't explain it at all, sir. It's just inexplicable. It cannot be explained by what I know.” The Chief Detective made these admissions with the frankness of a man whose reputation is rock-solid. "At least not in the present moment. I think the man who was most involved will be Michaels.”

"They do?"

"Yes; because I can stand up for everyone else."

"What about the other man who allegedly fled the park?"

"I think he's a long way away now," said the chief Detective.

The deputy Detective looked at him intently and suddenly stood up, as if deciding on a course of action. In fact, at that moment he had succumbed to a fascinating temptation. The chief Detective was dismissed with instructions to meet his supervisor early the next morning to discuss the case further. He listened with an impenetrable face and left the room with measured steps.

Whatever the deputy commissioner's plans may have been, they had nothing to do with this desk work which, by its narrowness and seeming lack of reality, was the bane of his existence. This could not have been the case, otherwise the general willingness exuding from the deputy commissioner would have been inexplicable. As soon as he was alone, he impulsively found his hat and put it on his head. Having done that, he sat down again to think the whole matter over again. But since he had already made up his mind, it didn't last long. And before Chief Detective Helms had gone far on his way home, he too left the building.

CHAPTER VII

The deputy commissioner walked down a short and narrow street that looked like a wet, muddy ditch, then crossed a very wide thoroughfare, entered a public building, and sought an interview with a young private secretary (unpaid) of a great personality.

This blond, smooth-faced young man, whose symmetrically arranged hair gave him the appearance of a tall and well-groomed schoolboy, responded to the deputy Detective's request with a doubtful look and spoke with bated breath.

"Would he see you? I don't know anything about that. He left the House of Representatives an hour ago to speak with the permanent undersecretary and now he's ready to go back. He could have sent for him; But he does it well to train himself a little. That's all the practice he can find time for during this session. I am not complaining; I prefer to enjoy these little walks. He leans on my arm and doesn't open his lips. But I'll say he's very tired and – well – not in the best mood right now.”

"It's related to the Greenwich affair."

"Oh! I say! He's very bitter towards you. But I'll go and see if you insist."

"Do. That's a good guy," said the deputy commissioner.

The unpaid secretary admired this courage. With an innocent face, he opened the door and walked in with the confidence of a kind and privileged child. And soon after, he reappeared and nodded to the deputy commissioner, who passed through the same door that was open to him and found himself in a large room with a great personality.

Of immense mass and stature, with a long white face broadened at the base by a large double chin and appearing ovate in the border of a thin gray mustache, the great personality had the appearance of an expansive man. Regrettably from a tailoring point of view, the transverse creases down the center of a buttoned black coat reinforced the impression that the garment's closures had been tried to the utmost. From the head that sat up on a thick neck, eyes stared haughtily down with swollen lower lids to either side of a hooked, aggressive nose that stood out nobly against the wide, pale girth of the face.A gleaming silk hat and a pair of worn gloves, laid ready at the end of a long table, also looked expansive and huge.

He stood on the hearthrug in big, roomy boots and said not a word of greeting.

"I would like to know if this is the start of another dynamite campaign," he immediately asked in a deep, very soft voice. "Don't go into detail. I do not have time for that."

The figure of the deputy commissioner before that tall and rustic presence had the frail slenderness of a reed addressing an oak. Indeed, the unbroken lineage of this man's lineage surpassed the age of the oldest oak tree in the country by several centuries.

"NO. As far as one can be positive about anything, I can assure you it is not."

"Yes. But your idea of ??assurances over there," said the tall man, waving a hand contemptuously at a window that overlooks the broad thoroughfare, "seems mainly to make the Secretary of State look like an idiot. Less than one Month ago, in this room, I was told with certainty that nothing like that was even possible.”

The deputy commissioner looked calmly at the window.

"Allow me to say, Sir Redethel, that I have not yet had the opportunity to give you any assurances."

The haughty gaze was now directed at the deputy commissioner.

"That's right," the deep, soft voice admitted. “I sent for Helms. You are still more of a newcomer to your new berth. And how are you doing over there?”

"I think I learn something every day."

"Of course, of course. I hope you get on."

"Thank you, Sir Redethel. I learned something today, even in the last hour or so. There is much in this matter that does not catch the eye of a standard anarchist outrage, even when delved into as deeply as possible. That's why I'm here."

The tall man folded his arms at his sides, the backs of his hands resting on his hips.

"Very good. Go on. Just no details, please. Spare me the details."

"You shouldn't worry about it, Sir Redethel," the Deputy Commissioner began with calm and unconcerned certainty. As he spoke, the hands on the face of the clock behind the tall man's back—a heavy, glittering structure of solid scrolls, made of the same dark marble as the mantelpiece and ticking with an eerie, ephemeral ticking—had moved through the span of seven Protocol. He spoke with diligent fidelity and a parenthetical manner into which every little fact—that is, every detail—fitted in with delightful ease. No murmur, not even a movement indicated a break.The great personality might have been the statue of one of his own princely ancestors stripped of a crusader's war armor and donned in an ill-fitting frock coat. The deputy commissioner felt like he could talk for an hour. But he kept his head

"What we encounter under the surface of this affair, otherwise without seriousness, is - at least in this concrete form - unusual and requires special treatment."

Sir Redethel's tone was deeper and full of conviction.

"I think so - it is the ambassador of a foreign power!"

"Oh! The Ambassador!" protested the other, upright and slender, only allowing himself a half smile. "It would be stupid of me to push something like that. And it's totally unnecessary, because if I'm right in my guesses, whether ambassador or porter, it's just a detail."

Sir Redethel opened a wide mouth, like a cave, which the hooked nose seemed anxious to look into; from it came a muffled rolling noise, as if from a distant organ with the taunting stop of indignation.

"NO! These people are too impossible. What do they mean by importing their Crimean Tatar methods here? A Turk would have more decency."

"You forget, Sir Redethel, that, strictly speaking, we don't yet know anything positive."

"NO! But how would you define it? In short?"

"Outrageous boldness that is tantamount to a special kind of childishness."

"We can't stand the innocence of bad little children," said the large and expanded personality, expanding a little, so to speak. The haughty, downcast gaze fell devastatingly on the carpet at the feet of the deputy Detective. "You're going to have to take a hard hit over this matter. We need to be able to: What is your general idea, in short? There is no need to go into detail.”

"No, Sir Redethel. Basically, I should state that the existence of secret agents should not be tolerated as it tends to reinforce the positive dangers of the evil they are used against. It goes without saying that the spy fabricates his information. But in the sphere of political and revolutionary action, partly based on violence, the professional spy has every opportunity to fabricate the facts himself and will spread the double evil of one-way imitation and panic, hasty legislation, unreflective hatred . on the other. However, this is an imperfect world—”

The deep-voiced presence on the hearthrug, motionless and elbows out, said hastily:

"Please be clear."

"Yes, Sir Redethel - an imperfect world. Immediately realizing the nature of this matter, I thought it should be treated with special secrecy, and dared to come here.”

"That's right," the tall personality agreed, looking smugly down over his double chin. "I'm glad there's someone in your business who thinks the Secretary of State can be trusted at times."

The deputy commissioner smiled in amusement.

"I really thought at this point it might be better to replace Helms with..."

"What! Helms? An ass - what?" the tall man exclaimed with evident hostility.

"Not at all. Please, Sir Redethel, do not take my remarks so unfairly."

"Then what? Half smart?"

“Neither nor – at least not usually. I got all the reasons for my suspicions from him. The only thing I found out myself is that he privately exploited this man. Who could blame him? He's an old cop. He practically told me that he must have tools to work with. It occurred to me that rather than remain in Chief Detective Helms's private possession, this tool should be given to the entire Special Crimes Unit. I expand my conception of our departmental duties to include the suppression of the secret agent. But Chief Detective Helms is an old hand in the department.He would accuse me of twisting his morals and attacking his efficiency. He would bitterly define it as protection afforded to the criminal class of revolutionaries. That's exactly what it would mean for him.”

"Yes. But what do you mean?"

“What I mean to say is, first, that there is little consolation in being able to explain that a particular act of violence—damage to property or destruction of life—is not the work of anarchism at all, but of something quite different—some sort of authorized one.” villainy. I suspect this is a lot more common than we think. Second, it is evident that the existence of these people in the pay of foreign governments negates to some extent the effectiveness of our oversight. A spy of this sort can afford to be more ruthless than the most ruthless conspirator. His profession is free of any restrictions.He does not have as much faith as is required for complete negation, and he does not have as much law as there is in lawlessness. Third, the existence of these spies among the revolutionary groups we are here accused of harboring robs us of any certainty. You received a reassuring statement from Chief Detective Helms some time ago. It wasn't groundless by any means — and yet this episode happens. I call it an episode because this affair is, I would like to say, episodic; It's not part of a general plan, no matter how wild. In my opinion, it is precisely the idiosyncrasies that surprise and amaze Chief Detective Helms that determine his character.I keep my distance from details, Sir Redethel.”

The personality on the hearthrug had been listening with great attention.

"Just like that. Be as concise as possible."

The deputy commissioner indicated with a serious, respectful gesture that he was careful to be succinct.

"There is a particular stupidity and weakness in the conduct of this affair that gives me high hopes of figuring it out and finding something other than a lone fanaticism freak there." Because it's undoubtedly a planned thing. The actual perpetrator appears to have been led to the spot by the hand and then hastily left to his own devices. The conclusion is that he was imported from abroad to commit this crime. At the same time, unless one would accept the fantastic theory that he was deaf and dumb, one has to conclude that he didn't know enough English to ask his way. I'm wondering now - but that's pointless. Apparently he self-destructed in an accident.No extraordinary accident. But one extraordinary little fact remains: Even the address on his clothes was discovered by sheer chance. It is an incredible little fact, so incredible that the explanation that will explain it will inevitably get to the bottom of this matter. Rather than directing Helms to proceed with this case, I intend to seek that explanation personally - I mean, within myself - where it can be picked up. That is in a certain shop on Brett Street and in the lips of a certain secret agent, once the confidential and trusted spy of the late Honorable Scott-Weber, Great Power Ambassador to the Court of St. James."

The deputy commissioner paused, then added, "These guys are a perfect nuisance." The person on the mantelpiece gradually tilted his head back to keep his eyes downcast on the speaker's face, giving him a chill expression of extreme arrogance.

"Why don't we leave it to Helms?"

"Because he's an old hand in the department. They have their own morals. To him, my kind of investigation would be a terrible dereliction of duty. For him, the simple duty is to pin the blame on as many prominent anarchists as possible, based on some minor clues he uncovered in the course of his on-the-spot investigations; whereas, he would say, I am determined to justify her innocence. I am trying to be as clear as possible by presenting this obscure matter to you without detail.”

"He would, wouldn't he?" murmured Sir Redethel's proud head from its high elevation.

"I fear so - with an indignation and disgust that you or I can have no idea. He is an excellent servant. We must not unduly strain his loyalty. That's always a mistake. Besides, I want a free hand—a freer hand than might be prudent to give Chief Detective Helms. I have not the slightest desire to spare that man Culver. I imagine that he will be utterly stunned when his connection to this affair, whatever it may be, becomes clear to him so quickly. Scaring him won't be very difficult. But our real goal is somewhere behind him.I want your authority to give him the assurances of his personal safety that I see fit.”

"Certainly," said the personality on the hearthrug. “Find out as much as you can; Find out your own way.

"I have to start this tonight without wasting time," said the deputy commissioner.

Sir Redethel tucked a hand under his coattails and tilted his head back and gazed at him steadily.

"We're going to have a long session tonight," he said. "Come home with your discoveries if we haven't gone home. I will warn Teddy to watch out for you. He will take you to my room.”

The youthful-looking private secretary's numerous family and far-reaching connections gave him hope for a stern and noble fate. Meanwhile, the social sphere he graced in his hours of idleness chose to pet him by the aforementioned moniker. And Sir Redethel, hearing it on the lips of his wife and daughters every day (mostly at breakfast time), had given him the dignity of easy adoption.

The deputy commissioner was extremely surprised and delighted.

"I'll be sure to submit my discoveries to the House when you have the time..."

"I won't have time," the great personality interrupted. "But we'll see each other. I don't have time now - and you're going yourself?"

"Yes, Sir Redethel. I think it's the best way."

The personality had tilted his head so far back that he almost had to close his eyes to keep the deputy Detective under his watch.

"Hm. Ha! And what do you suggest: Do you want to dress up?"

"Hardly a disguise! I will of course change.”

"Of course," the tall man repeated with a sort of absent-minded grandeur. He slowly turned his large head and cast a haughty, slanted look over his shoulder at the heavy marble clock with the sly, faint ticking. The golden hands had taken the opportunity to sneak behind his back for no less than twenty-five minutes.

The deputy commissioner, who couldn't see her, was getting a little nervous in the meantime. But the tall man presented him with a calm and imperturbable face.

"Very good," he said, pausing as if deliberately disregarding the official clock. "But what first brought you in this direction?"

"I always agreed," the deputy commissioner began.

"Ah. Yes! Opinion. That's natural. But the immediate motive?"

"What shall I say, Sir Redethel? A new man's antagonism to old methods. The desire to learn something firsthand. A little impatience. It's my old work but the dishes are different. It did irritate me a bit in one or two sensitive areas.”

"I hope you get on with it over there," the tall man said kindly, extending his hand, which felt soft but broad and strong like a glorified peasant's hand. The deputy commissioner shook it and withdrew.

In the anteroom, Teddy, who had been sitting on the edge of the table, stepped towards him and stifled his natural momentum.

"So? Satisfactory?" he asked with insignificant importance.

"Perfect. You've earned my undying gratitude," replied the deputy Detective, his long face looking wooden in contrast to the other's peculiar seriousness, which seemed ever ready to burst into waves and laughter.

"That's fine. But seriously, you have no idea how irritated he is by the attacks on his fisheries nationalization bill. They call it the beginning of the social revolution. Of course it's a revolutionary measure. But these guys have no decency. The personal attacks—"

"I read the newspapers," remarked the deputy commissioner.

"Abominable? Ah? And you have no idea what a lot of work he has to do every day. He does everything himself. Doesn't seem capable of trusting anyone with these fisheries.”

"And yet he spent a full half hour dealing with my very small sprat," interjected the Deputy Detective.

"Small! Is it? I'm glad to hear that. But then it's a pity you didn't keep your distance. This fight is wearing him down terribly. The man is getting tired. I can feel it by the way he leans on my arm ' as we walk over. And I say, is he safe on the road? Mullins had his men marched here this afternoon. There's a policeman stuck at every lamppost and every other person we meet between that one and Palace Yard is obvious a "technician". It'll get on his nerves soon. I'm saying those foreign scoundrels are unlikely to throw anything at him, are they? It would be a national disaster.The country cannot do without him.”

"Not to mention yourself. He's leaning on your arm," the Deputy Commissioner suggested matter-of-factly. "You would both go."

“Would it be an easy way for a young man to go down in history? Not so many British ministers were murdered that it would be a minor incident. But seriously, now—”

"I'm afraid if you want to go down in history, you have to do something about it. Seriously, the two of you are in no danger other than overwork.”

The likable Teddy greeted this opening with a laugh.

“Fishing will not kill me. "I'm used to late hours," he explained with natural ease. But feeling immediately guilty, he began to adopt a statesmanlike mood, like putting on a glove. “His enormous intellect can withstand any amount of work. It's his nerves I'm scared of. The reactionary gang, headed by that brutal, brutal Cheeseman, insults him every night.”

"If he insists on starting a revolution!" murmured the deputy commissioner.

"The time has come, and he is the only man tall enough for this work," protested the revolutionary Teddy, flaring up under the Deputy Commissioner's calm, thoughtful gaze. Somewhere down a corridor a bell rang urgently, and the young man's ears perked up with devoted alertness at the sound. "He's ready to go now," he whispered, grabbing his hat and disappearing from the room.

The deputy Detective, less resilient, went out through another door. Again he crossed the broad thoroughfare, walked down a narrow street and hurriedly entered his own department building. He maintained this accelerated pace to the door of his private room. Before he could properly close it, his eyes sought his desk. He stood for a moment, then went upstairs, looked around the floor, sat in his chair, rang the bell and waited.

"Chief Detective Helms left already?"

"Yes sir. Left half an hour ago."

He nodded. "That's enough." And as he sat still, his hat pushed off his forehead, he thought it was just like Helms's confused impudence to silently carry away the only piece of physical evidence. But he thought that without animosity. Old and esteemed servants will take liberties. The piece of coat with the address sewn on was definitely not to be left behind. He shoved that expression of suspicion away from Chief Detective Helms and sent a letter to his wife urging her to apologize to Michaels' great lady, to whom they were engaged to dinner that night.

The cropped jacket and low, round hat he wore in a kind of curtained alcove containing a vanity, a row of wooden pegs, and a shelf showed off the length of his serious, brown face beautifully. Stepping back into the full light of the room, he looked like the vision of a cool, thoughtful Don Quixote, with the sunken eyes of a dark enthusiast and a very deliberate manner. Like an inconspicuous shadow, he quickly left the scene of his daily work. His descent onto the street was like descending into a slimy tank that had drained of water. A murky, somber dampness enveloped him.The walls of the houses were wet, the mud of the street gleamed with a phosphorescent effect, and as he stepped onto the beach from a narrow street next to Charing Cross station, he was assimilated by the genius of the place.

He stopped at the very edge of the sidewalk and waited. His practiced eyes had caught the creeping approach of a cart in the confused movement of lights and shadows that scrambled across the street. He made no sign; But as the low step that slid over the curb came to his feet, he deftly slipped in front of the large turning wheel and spoke through the small trapdoor almost before the man, looking ahead from his seat on the back, remarked that he had boarded a fare.

It wasn't a long drive. It ended with an abrupt signal, nothing special, between two lampposts in front of a large textile factory - a long line of shops already cloaked in sheets of corrugated iron for the night. When he paid a coin through the trapdoor, the fare slipped out, leaving the driver with an effect of eerie, eccentric cruelty. But the size of the coin was comfortable for him to touch, and since he had no literary training, he was not worried by the fear that it would soon turn into a dead leaf in his pocket. Because of his vocation, he rose above the world of passengers and viewed their actions with limited interest.His horse's sharp pull in the right circle expressed his philosophy.

Meanwhile, the deputy Detective was already giving his order to a waiter in a little Italian restaurant around the corner—one of those hungry traps, long and thin, baited with a perspective of mirrors and white diapers; devoid of air, but with an atmosphere all its own - an atmosphere of deceitful cooking that taunts a pathetic humanity in its direst miserable needs. In this immoral atmosphere, the deputy commissioner seemed to lose even more of his identity as he reflected on his venture. He had a feeling of loneliness, of evil freedom. It was pretty comfortable.As he got up after paying for his short meal and waited for his change, he saw himself in the pane of glass and was struck by his alien appearance. He looked at his own picture with a melancholy and curious look, Then, on a sudden impulse, he lifted the collar of his jacket. This arrangement seemed commendable to him, and he completed it by turning up the ends of his black mustache. He was content with the subtle change in his personal appearance caused by these small changes. "This will go very well," he thought. "I'm getting a little wet, a little spattered-"

He noticed the waiter at his side and a small stack of silver coins on the edge of the table in front of him. The waiter kept an eye on it while his other eye followed the long back of a tall, not very young girl, who was walking to a distant table, completely blind and completely unapproachable. She seemed to be a regular customer.

When the deputy commissioner left the house, he found that the frequent use of deceitful cooking skills had left the patrons of the premises with all their national and private characteristics lost. And that was odd as the Italian restaurant is such a quintessentially British institution. But these people were just as denationalized as the dishes that were served to them with every circumstance of unstamped seriousness. Nor was her personality shaped in any way, neither professionally nor socially nor racially. They seemed made for the Italian restaurant, except maybe the Italian restaurant was made for them.But this last hypothesis was unthinkable, since it could not be placed anywhere outside of these particular institutions. You never met these mysterious people anywhere else. It was impossible to get a precise idea of ??what jobs they did during the day and where they went to bed at night. And he himself had become unplaced. It would not have been possible for anyone to guess his profession. As for going to bed, he had his own doubts. Not in terms of his residence itself, but in terms of when he might return there.A pleasant sense of independence washed over him as he heard the glass doors swing open behind his back with a sort of imperfect, perplexed bang. He thrust forth at once into an immensity of greasy slime and damp plaster, riddled with lamps, and enveloped, oppressed, permeated, smothered and suffocated by the blackness of a wet London night composed of soot and drops of water. And he himself had become unplaced. It would not have been possible for anyone to guess his profession. As for going to bed, he had his own doubts. Not in terms of his residence itself, but in terms of when he might return there.A pleasant sense of independence washed over him as he heard the glass doors swing open behind his back with a sort of imperfect, perplexed bang. He thrust forth at once into an immensity of greasy slime and damp plaster, riddled with lamps, and enveloped, oppressed, permeated, smothered and suffocated by the blackness of a wet London night composed of soot and drops of water. And he himself had become unplaced. It would not have been possible for anyone to guess his profession. As for going to bed, he had his own doubts. Not in terms of his residence itself, but in terms of when he might return there.A pleasant sense of independence washed over him as he heard the glass doors swing open behind his back with a sort of imperfect, perplexed bang. He thrust forth at once into an immensity of greasy slime and damp plaster, riddled with lamps, and enveloped, oppressed, permeated, smothered and suffocated by the blackness of a wet London night composed of soot and drops of water. Not in terms of his residence itself, but in terms of when he might return there. A pleasant sense of independence washed over him as he heard the glass doors swing open behind his back with a sort of imperfect, perplexed bang.He thrust forth at once into an immensity of greasy slime and damp plaster, riddled with lamps, and enveloped, oppressed, permeated, smothered and suffocated by the blackness of a wet London night composed of soot and drops of water. Not in terms of his residence itself, but in terms of when he might return there. A pleasant sense of independence washed over him as he heard the glass doors swing open behind his back with a sort of imperfect, perplexed bang. He thrust forth at once into an immensity of greasy slime and damp plaster, riddled with lamps, and enveloped, oppressed, permeated, smothered and suffocated by the blackness of a wet London night composed of soot and drops of water.

Brett Street wasn't far away. It branched off narrowly from the side of an open triangular space surrounded by dark and mysterious houses, temples of petty trade where there were no traders for the night. Only the stand of a fruit seller on the corner created a tremendous fire of light and color. Everything was black beyond, and the few people who walked in that direction took a step behind the glowing heaps of oranges and lemons. No footsteps echoed. You would never hear from them again. The adventurous head of the Special Crimes Unit watched this disappearance from afar with interested eyes.He felt lighthearted, as if he had been ambushed by departmental desks and official inkwells, all alone in a jungle thousands of miles away. This joy and distraction before an important task seems to prove that our world is not such a serious business after all. Because the deputy commissioner was constitutionally not inclined to be frivolous.

The cop on the beat projected his somber and agitated form against the glowing glow of oranges and lemons and unhurriedly entered Brett Street. The deputy commissioner stayed out of sight, waiting for his return as if he were a member of the crime family. But this cop seemed lost to power forever. He never returned: he must have gone out across Brett Street.

The deputy Detective, coming to this conclusion, entered the street in his turn and found a large van parked in front of the dimly lit windows of a carter's restaurant. The man refreshed himself inside, and the horses fed steadily from their nose-bags, their big heads bowed to the ground. A little further, across the street, another suspicious speck of light emanated from Mr. Culver's shop front, which was lined with papers and vaguely stacked with cardboard boxes and book forms. The deputy commissioner stood and watched it across the street. There could be no error.Beside the front window, obscured by the shadows of nondescript things, the ajar door let a narrow, clear strip of gaslight onto the pavement.

Behind the deputy Detective, the van and horses, fused into one mass, seemed to be something alive—a black, square-backed monster blocking half the road, with sudden iron-shod stomps, violent clangs, and heavy, puffing sighs. Across Brett Street, across the broad street, glared the garishly festive, ominous glow of a large and prosperous inn. This barrier of blazing lights, opposing the shadows gathering around the humble abode of Mr. Culver's domestic bliss, seemed to draw the darkness of the street back upon itself, making it darker, brooding, and sinister.

CHAPTER VIII

After somewhat stoking the cool interest of several chartered innkeepers (the former acquaintances of her late, unfortunate husband) by persistent intrusiveness, Mrs Culver's mother had finally gained access to certain workhouses which a wealthy innkeeper had set up for her destitute widows of the trade.

To this end the old woman, with the keenness of her troubled heart, had pursued with stealth and determination. At the time, her daughter Gwen had to remark to Mr. Culver that "Mum spent half a kroner and five shillings on taxi fares almost every day last week." But the remark was not made reluctantly. Gwen respected her mother's infirmities. She was just a little surprised at this sudden urge to move. Mr. Culver, who was sufficiently splendid in his own way, had impatiently muttered the remark aside, as if disturbing his deliberations. These were frequent, profound, and long-lasting;They were dealing with a matter more important than five shillings. Significantly more important and incomparably more difficult to consider in all its aspects with philosophical composure.

The heroic old woman had achieved her aim in shrewd secrecy, and made a clear statement to Mrs Culver. Her soul triumphed and her heart trembled. She trembled inwardly, fearing and admiring the quiet, self-contained character of her daughter Gwen, whose displeasure was made even more evident by a multitude of awful silences. But she did not allow her inner fears to rob her of the benefit of the venerable composure that her outward appearance bestowed on her triple chin, the floating fullness of her old form, and the limp state of her legs.

The shock at the news was so unexpected that, contrary to her usual address, Ms Culver stopped the domestic occupation she was engaged in. It was dusting the furniture in the living room behind the store. She turned her head to her mother.

"Why did you want to do that?" she exclaimed in outraged astonishment.

The shock must have been so severe that she distanced herself from the detached and unyielding acceptance of facts that was her strength and protection in life.

"Didn't you make yourself comfortable enough here?"

She had engaged in this inquiry, but the next moment she maintained the consistency of her behavior by going back to dusting while the old woman sat frightened and silent under her dingy white cap and lackluster dark wig.

Gwen finished the chair and ran the duster over the mahogany at the back of the horsehair sofa, on which Mr. Culver liked to curl up in his hat and coat. She was engrossed in her work, but soon allowed herself one more question.

"How the hell did you do that, mother?"

Since that curiosity didn't touch the heart of things, which Mrs Culver always ignored, it was excusable. It was all about the methods. The old woman eagerly welcomed it as something to talk about with great sincerity.

She favored her daughter with a lengthy response, full of names and enriched with asides about the ravages of time, which manifested themselves in changes in human facial expressions. The names were mostly those of licensed food vendors - "Poor daddy's friends, my dear." She was given special credit for the kindness and condescension of a major brewer, a Honorable and an MP, the charity's chairman of governors. She spoke so cordially because she had been allowed to interview his private secretary by appointment - "a very polite gentleman, all in black, with a soft, sad voice, but so very, very thin and calm."He was like a shadow, my dear.``

Gwen prolonged her dusting duties until the story was finished and, in her usual manner and without the slightest comment, made her way from the living room to the kitchen (down two steps).

Mrs Culver's mother shed a few tears in token of her delight at her daughter's leniency in this dreadful affair, and exercised her wits on her furniture, for it was her own; and sometimes she wished it hadn't been. Heroism is all well and good, but there are circumstances where the disposal of a few tables and chairs, brass bedsteads, etc. can go a long way and have devastating consequences. She needed a few pieces herself, the endowment, which after much intrusiveness she had brought to her charitable breast, giving the objects of her care nothing but bare boards and cheaply papered bricks.The delicacy that guided their selection of the least valuable and most dilapidated items went unnoticed. because Gwen's philosophy was to ignore the inside of the facts; She assumed that the mother took what suited her best. As for Mr. Culver, his intense meditation, like a kind of Great Wall of China, completely isolated him from the phenomena of this world of futile efforts and illusory apparitions.

Having made her selection, disposing of the rest in a particular way became a perplexing question. She would leave it on Brett Street, of course. But she had two children. Gwen was cared for by her judicious association with this brilliant husband, Mr. Culver. Willie was penniless - and a little odd. His position had to be weighed against the claims of legal justice and even the motives of partisanship. Owning the furniture would in no way be a provision. He should have it - poor boy. But giving it to him would be an intrusion into his utter dependence.It was a kind of claim she feared weakening. Moreover, perhaps Mr. Culver's sensibilities would not brook being indebted to his brother-in-law for the chairs on which he sat. In a long experience of men's lodgers, Mrs Culver's mother had developed a somber but resigned notion of the fantastic side of human nature. What if Mr. Culver suddenly got the idea to tell Willie to take his blessed sticks somewhere? On the other hand, a separation, no matter how careful, might offend Gwen. No, Willie must remain destitute and dependent.And as she left Brett Street, she had said to her daughter, "There's no point in waiting until I'm dead, is there?" Anything I leave here is all yours now, my love." Willie must remain destitute and dependent. And as she left Brett Street, she had said to her daughter, "There's no point in waiting until I'm dead, is there?" Anything I leave here is all yours now, my love." Willie must remain destitute and dependent. And as she left Brett Street, she had said to her daughter, "There's no point in waiting until I'm dead, is there?" Everything I leave here is all yours now, my love."

Gwen, hat on her head, silently rearranged the collar of the old woman's cloak behind her mother's back. She fetched her purse, an umbrella, with an impassive face. It was time to spend the sum of threepence and sixpence on what would probably be the last taxi ride in Mrs Culver's mother's life. They went out the shop door.

The transmission awaiting her would have illustrated the adage that "truth can be crueler than caricature" if such an adage had existed. Behind a frail horse crept forward a metropolitan hired carriage on wobbly wheels and with a mutilated driver on the box. This last feature caused some embarrassment. When Mrs Culver's mother saw an iron hook sticking out of the man's left coat sleeve, she suddenly lost the heroism of the day. She really couldn't believe it. "What are you thinking, Gwen?" She held back. The big-faced taxi driver's impassioned utterances seemed to be squeezed out of a blocked throat.He leaned over from his box and whispered with mysterious indignation. What happened now? Could you treat a man like that? His huge, unwashed face glowed red on the muddy stretch of road. Was it likely they would have licensed him, he inquired desperately, if...

The local police officer reassured him with a friendly look; Then, without much consideration, he turned to the two women and said:

“He has been driving a taxi for twenty years. I never thought he would have had an accident.”

"Accident!" cried the driver in a contemptuous whisper.

The police officer's statement cleared things up. The modest group of seven, mostly minors, dispersed. Gwen followed her mother into the taxi. Willie climbed onto the box. His empty mouth and desperate eyes reflected his state of mind in view of the transactions taking place. In the narrow streets, the progress of the journey was felt by those present as the nearby fronts of houses sold by slowly and shakily, with a loud rattling and clinking of glass, as if about to collapse behind the taxi;and the frail horse, whose harness hung over his sharp backbone and flapped very loosely about his thighs, seemed to dance on tiptoe with infinite patience. Later, in the wider space of Whitehall, all visual signs of movement became indiscernible.

Finally Gwen remarked, "That's not a very good horse."

Her eyes shone motionless in the shadow of the cab in front of them. On the box, Willie first closed his empty mouth to urgently exclaim, "Don't do it."

The driver, holding up the reins looped around the hook, paid no attention. Maybe he hadn't heard. Willie's chest heaved.

"Don't flog."

The man slowly turned his bloated, soaked, multicolored face covered in white hair. His small red eyes glittered with moisture. His large lips were purple in hue. They stayed closed. With the dirty back of his whipping hand, he rubbed the stubble growing on his huge chin.

"You can't do that," Willie stammered violently. "It hurts."

"Must not whip," the other asked thoughtfully, whispering and immediately whipping. He did this not because his soul was cruel and his heart evil, but because he had to earn a living. And for a time the walls of St. Stephen, with their towers and battlements, watched, motionless and silent, a cab ringing. However, it also rolled. But there was excitement on the bridge. Willie suddenly descended from the box. Shouts rang out on the sidewalk, people ran forward, the driver stopped and whispered curses of indignation and astonishment. Gwen rolled down the window and stuck her head out, pale as a ghost.From the depths of the cab, her mother cried out in a pained voice, "Is that boy hurt? Is the boy hurt?”

Willie wasn't hurt, he hadn't even fallen, but the usual excitement had sapped his ability to speak coherently. All he could do was stammer at the window. "Too heavy. Too heavy." Gwen put her hand on his shoulder.

"Willie! Get straight onto the crate and don't try to get down.”

"NO. No. Walk. Have to walk."

When he tried to explain the nature of this necessity, he stammered incoherently. No physical impossibility got in the way of his mood. Willie could easily have kept up with the frail, prancing horse without getting out of breath. But his sister firmly refused her consent. "The idea! Who heard such a thing! Run after a cab!" Her mother, frightened and helpless in the depths of the mode of transport, begged her, "Oh, don't leave him, Gwen. He'll get lost. Don't leave him." "

"Certainly not. What next! Mr. Culver will be sorry to hear about this nonsense, Willie, I can tell you. He won't be happy at all."

The thought that Mr. Culver's grief and unhappiness were, as usual, working hard on Willie's basically docile mind gave up all resistance and climbed back onto the crate with a face of despair.

The coachman turned to face him reluctantly, his huge, inflamed face. "Don't try that silly game again, young fella."

Having thus uttered himself in a stern whisper, he drove on, strained almost to the point of extinction, brooding solemnly. In his opinion, the incident remained somewhat unclear. But his intellect lacked neither independence nor sanity, though it had lost its original vivacity in the numbing years of exposure to the weather. He seriously rejected the hypothesis that Willie was a drunk young fellow.

In the cab, the magic of stillness in which the two women had shoulder-to-shoulder with the jolting, clattering, and clinking of the ride had been broken by Willie's outburst. Gwen raised her voice.

"You did what you wanted, mother. If you're not happy afterwards, you have only yourself to thank. And I don't think you will be. I do not do that. Didn't you feel comfortable enough in the house? Whatever people will think of us, if you're doing this to a charity?"

'My dear,' cried the old woman gravely over the din, 'you were the best of daughters to me.' As for Mr. Culver - there -'

At a loss for words about Mr. Culver's Excellency, she turned her old, tearful eyes to the roof of the cab. Then she turned her head away and pretended to look out the window, as if assessing her progress. It was insignificant and ran close to the curb. The night, the early dirty night, the eerie, loud, hopeless and noisy night of South London had caught up with them on their last taxi ride. In the gaslight of the low-fronted shops, her large cheeks shone an orange hue under a black and purple hood.

Mrs Culver's mother's complexion had yellowed from the effects of age and from a natural disposition to bile, favored by the trials of a difficult and troubled existence, first as a wife, then as a widow. It was a complexion that took on an orange hue under the influence of blush. And this humble woman, hardened in the face of adversity, at an age when, by the way, one doesn't expect to blush, actually blushed in front of her daughter.In the privacy of a four-wheeler, en route to a charity cottage (one in a row) which, given its small size and ease of accommodation, could well have been conceived as a training ground for the charity Due to the grave's even more difficult circumstances, she was forced to to hide a blush of remorse and shame from her own child.

What will people think? She knew very well what they were thinking, the people Gwen had on her mind - her husband's old friends, as well as others whose interest she had sparked with such flattering success. She hadn't known before what a good beggar she could be. But she guessed very well what conclusions were drawn from her application. Because of this shrinking tenderness that accompanies aggressive brutality in male nature, the investigation into her circumstances had not progressed very far. She had controlled them with a visible tightening of her lips and an expression of emotion determined to maintain eloquent silence.And men would suddenly become uninterested, in the manner of their kind. She congratulated herself more than once on not having anything to do with women, who were naturally more callous and detail-oriented, would have been curious to know exactly which unkind one's behavior her daughter and son-in-law had driven her to this sad extremity. She burst into tears loud and clear only in front of the secretary of the major brewing company MP and chairman of the charity, who felt obliged on behalf of his client to diligently inquire about the true circumstances of the plaintiff. A cornered woman will cry.After looking at her with an air of "completely stunned," the thin and polite gentleman left his position under the guise of soothing remarks. She mustn't suffer. The charity's deed did not necessarily list "childless widows' '. In fact, that didn't disqualify her in any way. However, the discretion of the committee must be informed discretion.

The tears of that tall woman in a dark, dusty wig and an old silk dress adorned with dirty white cotton lace were the tears of real sorrow. She had cried because she was heroic and ruthless and full of love for her two children. Girls are often sacrificed for the welfare of boys. In this case, she sacrificed Gwen. By suppressing the truth, she slandered them. Of course, Gwen was independent and didn't need to care about the opinions of people she would never see and who would never see her; whereas poor Willie had nothing in the world to call his own save his mother's heroism and ruthlessness.

The first sense of security after Gwen's marriage faded with time (for nothing lasts), and Mrs Culver's mother, in the seclusion of the back bedroom, had recalled the lesson of that experience which the world imposes on a widowed woman. But she had remembered it without vain bitterness; her reserve of resignation almost bordered on dignity. She thought stoically that everything in this world decays and wears out; that the way of kindness should be made easy for the well-meaning; that their daughter, Gwen, was an extremely devoted sister and indeed a very confident wife. As for Gwen's sisterly devotion, her stoicism was fading.She exempted this feeling from the dominion of the decay that affected all things human and some divine. She couldn't help it; not doing so would have frightened her too much. But, reflecting on the circumstances of her daughter's marriage, she firmly rejected all flattering illusions. She took the cool and reasonable view that the less the strain, the longer the effect of Mr. Culver's kindness would last. This excellent man loved his wife, of course, but he would no doubt prefer to care for as little of her relations as was consistent with the fair display of that feeling.It would be better if all of his impact was focused on poor Willie. And the heroic old woman decided to part with her children out of devotion and deep politics. but he would no doubt prefer to keep as few of their relations as was consistent with the proper display of that feeling. It would be better if all of his impact was focused on poor Willie. And the heroic old woman decided to part with her children out of devotion and deep politics. but he would no doubt prefer to keep as few of their relations as was consistent with the proper display of that feeling.It would be better if all of his impact was focused on poor Willie. And the heroic old woman decided to part with her children out of devotion and deep politics.

The 'benefit' of this policy was (Mrs Culver's mother was subtle in her own way) that Willie's moral claim would be strengthened. The poor boy - a good, useful boy, if a little odd - didn't have a good enough reputation. It had been inherited with his mother in much the same way the furniture of Belgravian Mansion had been inherited, as if he were hers exclusively. What will happen, she wondered (for Mrs Culver's mother was somewhat imaginative) when I die? And when she asked herself that question, she was filled with fear. It was also horrible to think that she wouldn't then have the opportunity to find out what happened to the poor boy.But by turning him over to his sister, by walking away like that, she gave him the advantage of a direct dependent position. This was the more subtle sanction of Mrs Culver's mother's heroism and ruthlessness. Her act of abandonment was actually an agreement to permanently establish her son in life. Other people made material sacrifices for such an object, they did in this way. It was the only way. Also, she could see how it works. For better or for worse, she would avoid the dreadful uncertainty of her deathbed. But it was hard, hard, cruelly hard.

The taxi rattled, rang, shook; In fact, the last one was quite extraordinary. By its disproportionate power and size, it snuffed out any sense of forward motion; and the effect was like being shaken in a stationary device, like a medieval device for punishing crimes, or a very recent invention for curing a sluggish liver. It was extremely distressing; and Mrs Culver's mother's rising voice sounded like a cry of pain.

"I know, my love, you will visit me as often as you have time. Not true?"

"Of course," Gwen replied shortly, staring straight ahead.

And the cab pulled up in front of a steaming, greasy shop that was burning with gasoline and smelled of fried fish.

The old woman let out another scream.

"And, my dear, I have to see this poor boy every Sunday. He won't mind spending the day with his elderly mother..."

Gwen screamed undeterred:

"Ghost! I shouldn't be thinking. That poor boy is going to miss you with something cruel. I wish you'd thought about it a little, mother."

Don't think about it! The heroic woman swallowed a playful and uncomfortable object like a billiard ball that had tried to pop out of her throat. Gwen sat in silence for a while, sulking at the front of the cab, then broke out in what was an unusual tone of voice for her:

"I expect to get a job with him first, he'll be so restless -"

"Whatever you do, don't let it worry your husband, my love."

They discussed the scope of a new situation in the usual way. And the taxi shook. Ms Culver's mother raised some concerns. Could Willie be trusted to walk all the way on his own? Gwen claimed he was a lot less "absent-minded" now. On that they agreed. It couldn't be denied. Much less - hardly. They called out to each other comparatively happily in the jingle. But suddenly the maternal fear broke out again. There were two omnibuses and a short walk in between. It was too difficult! The old woman fell into grief and dismay.

Gwen stared ahead.

"Don't get so upset, mother. Of course you have to see him.”

"No honey. I'll try not to."

She wiped the tears from her eyes.

"But you can't pass up the time to come with him, and if he forgets himself and gets lost and someone speaks to him sharply, his name and address may fade from his memory and he may be lost for days -"

The idea of ??an infirmary for poor Willie - even if only during the investigation - made her heart ache. Because she was a proud woman. Gwen's gaze had become hard, alert, and imaginative.

"I can't bring him to you every week by myself," she cried. "But don't worry, mother. I'll make sure it doesn't get lost for long."

They felt a strange bump; a vision of brick pillars lingered outside the rattling windows of the cab; A sudden cessation of the terrible shaking and the noisy clanging left the two women dazed. What's happened? They sat motionless and frightened in the deep silence until the door opened and a hoarse, strained whisper was heard:

"Here you are!"

A row of small gabled houses, each with a faint yellow ground-floor window, surrounded the dark, open space of a lawned lot planted with shrubs and bordered on the patchwork of light and shadow on the broad street, which echoed the darkness and the rumble of traffic. The taxi had stopped in front of the door of one of those tiny houses - one without a light in the small window on the first floor. Mrs Culver's mother got out first, backwards, with a key in her hand. Gwen stopped on the paved walkway to pay the cab driver. After helping carry many small packages inside, Willie came out and stood under the light of a gas lamp belonging to the charity.The coachman looked at the pieces of silver, which seemed very small in his large, dirty palm and

He had been paid a decent wage - four shillings - and he regarded them in utter silence as if they had been the startling terms of some melancholic problem. Slowly transporting this treasure into an inside pocket required much laborious groping in the depths of the decayed clothing. His form was squat and without flexibility. Willie stood slim, shoulders slightly hunched and hands crammed into the side pockets of his warm coat, sulking at the side of the path.

The taxi driver, who paused in his deliberate movements, seemed to be gripped by a hazy memory.

"Oh! "Here you are, young fellow," he whispered. "You'll recognize him, won't you?"

Willie stared at the horse, whose hindquarters were stretched excessively from emaciation. The small stiff tail seemed attached for a heartless joke; and at the other end the thin, flat neck hung to the ground like a plank covered with old horsehide under the weight of a huge bony head. The ears hung carelessly at different angles; and the macabre form of this mute inhabitant of earth steamed straight from ribs and spine in the sultry stillness of the air.

The cab driver smacked Willie's chest lightly with the iron hook protruding from a ragged, greasy sleeve.

"Look here, young fellow. "How would you like to sit behind that Oss until two in the morning, P'raps?"

Willie looked absently into the wild little eyes with red-rimmed lids.

"He's not lame," the other continued, whispering energetically. "He doesn't have any sore spots on him. "Here he is. "How would you like-"

His tense, dead voice gave his statement the character of vehement secrecy. Willie's blank stare slowly turned to fear.

"You can take a good look! Until three and four in the morning. Cold and hungry. Looking for tariffs. drunks.”

His cheerful purple cheeks were streaked with white hairs; and like Virgil's Silenus, who, smearing his face with the juice of berries, told the innocent shepherds of Sicily of Olympian gods, he conversed with Willie on domestic affairs and the affairs of men whose sufferings are great and whose immortality is far from assured.

"I'm a night taxi, that's me," he whispered with a kind of boastful desperation. “I have to take out what they make me bloom well in the garden. I have my wife and four children with me.”

The enormity of this declaration of paternity seemed to leave the world speechless. There was silence, during which the flanks of the old horse, the steed of apocalyptic misery, smoked upwards in the light of the merciful gas lamp.

The cab driver grunted, then added in his mysterious whisper:

"It's not an easy world." Willie's face had been twitching for some time, and finally his emotions burst out in their usual succinct form.

"Bad! Bad!"

His gaze stayed on the horse's ribs, self-conscious and somber, as if afraid to look around at how bad the world is. And his slenderness, rosy lips, and pale, fair complexion gave him the look of a frail boy, despite the fluffy golden growth of hair on his cheeks. He pouted like a child, frightened. The small and large taxi driver looked at him with his wild little eyes, which seemed to burn in a clear, caustic liquid.

"Lovely on the bones, but damn it on poor guys like me," he gasped audibly.

"Poor! Poor!" Willie stammered, shoving his hands deeper in his pockets in convulsive sympathy. He couldn't say anything; for the tenderness of all pain and misery, the desire to make horse and driver happy, had reached the point of a bizarre longing to take her to bed. And that, as he knew, was impossible. Because Willie wasn't angry. It was a symbolic longing, so to speak; and at the same time it was very clear, for it sprang from experience, the mother of wisdom.As a child, when he crouched in a dark corner, scared, miserable, sore and miserable from the black misery of his soul, his sister Gwen used to come and take him to bed with her, as if to heaven of comforting peace. Although Willie tends to forget bare facts, such as his name and address, he had a faithful memory of sensations. Being placed in a bed of compassion was the best cure, with the only drawback being that it was difficult to apply on a large scale. And when Willie looked at the cab driver, he saw it clearly because he was sensible.

The cab driver leisurely continued his preparations as if Willie hadn't existed. He started to climb onto the bench but gave up at the last moment for some unknown reason, perhaps just disgust at the carriage exercise. Instead, he approached the motionless partner of his work, stooped to grasp the bridle, and raised the large, weary head to shoulder level with an effort of his right arm, like a feat of strength.

"Come on," he whispered secretly.

Limping, he led the cab away. There was an air of severity in this departure, the crumpled gravel of the driveway screaming beneath the slowly turning wheels, the horse's lean thighs moving with ascetic deliberation away from the light into the darkness of the open space dimly bounded by the peaked roofs became the dimly lit windows of the little workhouses. The rattle of gravel spread slowly down the driveway.Between the lamps of the Merciful Gate the slow train reappeared, lit for a moment, the short fat man hobbled busily, the horse's head raised in his fist, the lanky animal walked with stiff and forlorn dignity, the dark, low die Crate on wheels rolled awkwardly and waddled behind. They turned left. There was a pub across the street just fifty yards from the gate.

Willie was left alone by the charity's private lamppost, hands deep in his pockets, staring at it with an empty pout. His inept, weak hands were clenched in angry fists deep in his pockets. In the face of anything that directly or indirectly affected his morbid fear of pain, Willie eventually turned vicious. Magnanimous indignation made his frail chest swell to the point of bursting and made his open eyes squint. Willie was exceedingly smart because he was aware of his own impotence, but he wasn't smart enough to control his passions.The tenderness of his universal charity consisted of two phases, as inextricably linked and connected as the reverse and obverse of a medal. The agony of unbridled compassion was followed by the pain of an innocent but relentless anger. As these two conditions expressed outwardly by the same signs of futile physical excitement, his sister Gwen assuageF his excitement without ever fathoming their dual character. Mrs Culver wasted no part of her fleeting life in search of basic information. This is a type of economy that makes all appearances and has some of the perks of cleverness. Obviously, not knowing too much can be good.And such a view fits very well with constitutional inertia.

On the night that it can be said that Mrs Culver's mother, having separated from her children for good, also left this life, Gwen Culver was not researching her brother's psychology. The poor boy was naturally excited. After reassuring the old woman on the threshold that she would know how to guard against the danger of Willie losing himself for a very long time on his pilgrimages of filial piety, she took her brother's arm and went away. Willie didn't even mutter to himself, but because of that special sense of sisterly devotion she had developed in her earliest childhood, she sensed that the boy was indeed very excited.She held onto his arm tightly and seemed to be leaning on it as she thought of a few appropriate words for the occasion.

"Well, Willie, I need you to watch out for me at the intersections and get on the bus first like a good brother."

This appeal for male protection was met by Willie with his usual docility. It flattered him. He lifted his head and threw out his chest.

"Don't be nervous, Gwen. Don't be nervous! "Bus, all right," he replied in a harsh, slurred stutter that expressed a child's shyness and a man's determination. With the woman on his arm, he led the way fearlessly, but his bottom lip dropped. Yet on the pavement of the filthy and broad thoroughfare, whose poverty of life's comforts was foolishly exposed by an insane abundance of gas lanterns, their resemblance to one another was so plain as to catch the eye of casual passers-by.

Outside the doors of the corner tavern, where the abundance of gaslight reached the climax of true malice, a four-wheeled cab, parked at the curb with no one on the box, seemed thrown into the gutter of incurable decay. Mrs Culver recognized the means of transport. His appearance was so deeply deplorable, with such perfection of grotesque misery and the craziness of macabre detail, as if it were the taxi of death itself, that Mrs Culver, with a woman's ready compassion for a horse (when not seated) behind him), called vaguely:

"Poor animal!"

Suddenly, Willie leaned back and gave his sister a gripping tug.

"Poor! Poor!" he let out appreciatively. “The taxi driver is also poor. He told me himself.”

The contemplation of the frail and lonely steed overwhelmed him. Urged but adamant, he would remain there, trying to express the newly opened view of his compassion for human and equine misery in close association. But it was very difficult. "Poor animals, poor people!" was all he could repeat. It didn't seem energetic enough, and he stopped with an angry stutter, "Shame!" Willie wasn't a master of phrases, and perhaps that was precisely why his thoughts lacked clarity and precision. But he felt it with greater completeness and some depth.That little word contained all his feeling of indignation and horror at the one kind of misery that had to feed on the torment of the other - at the poor coachman beating the poor horse at home, so to speak, on behalf of his poor children. And Willie knew what it meant to be beaten. He knew from experience. It was a bad world. Bad! Bad!

Mrs Culver, his only sister, guardian and protector, could not pretend to have such insight. Besides, she hadn't experienced the magic of the taxi driver's eloquence. She was groping in the dark about the inwardness of the word "shame." And she said calmly:

"Come with me, Willie. You can't change that."

The docile Willie went along; but now he went on without pride, shuffling and murmuring half-words and even words that would have been whole if they hadn't been made up of halves that didn't belong together. It was as if he had tried to match every word he could remember with his feelings to get an idea. And indeed he finally got it. He stayed behind to say it straight away.

"Bad world for poor people."

As soon as he uttered this thought, he realized that he was already familiar with it in all its consequences. This circumstance strengthened his conviction immensely, but also increased his indignation. Someone, he said, should be punished for it - with great severity. Not being a skeptic but a moral being, he was in a way at the mercy of his righteous passions.

"Beastly!" he added succinctly.

It was clear to Mrs Culver that he was very excited.

"No one can change anything," she said. "Come with me. Do you care about me like that?”

Willie obediently increased his pace. He was proud to be a good brother. His morals, which were very comprehensive, demanded that of him. Nevertheless, the information from his sister Gwen, which was good, pained him. Nobody could help! He appeared somber, but soon his mood brightened. Like the rest of humanity, puzzled by the mystery of the universe, he had moments of comforting confidence in the organized powers of the earth.

"Police," he suggested confidently.

"That's not what the police are for," Mrs Culver remarked fleetingly, hurrying on.

Willie's face grew noticeably longer. He thought. The harder he thought, the more slack his lower jaw dropped.

And with a look of hopeless emptiness, he gave up his intellectual endeavor.

"Do not agree?" he murmured, resigned but surprised. "Do not agree?" He had envisioned the city police as some kind of benevolent institution for the suppression of evil. In particular, the notion of benevolence was closely linked to his sense of the power of the men in blue. He had loved all police officers tenderly and with innocent trustworthiness. And he was in pain. The suspicion of duplicity among the members of the troupe also annoyed him. Because Willie was open and as open as the day itself. What did they mean by pretending back then? Unlike his sister, who relied on face value, he wanted to get to the bottom of the matter.He continued his investigation with a furious challenge.

"Then what are they for, Winn? What are they for? Tell me."

Gwen didn't like controversy. However, fearing that Willie would initially miss his mother so much because he would have a bout of black depression, she didn't entirely dismiss the discussion. She answered without any trace of irony, but in a form that was perhaps not unnatural in the wife of Mr. Culver, delegate of the Central Red Committee, personal friend of certain anarchists and supporter of social revolution.

"Don't you know what the police are for, Willie? They are there so that those who have nothing take nothing away from those who have.”

She avoided using the verb "steal" because it always made her brother uncomfortable. Because Willie had a delicate honesty. Certain simple principles had been so fearfully inoculated into him (because of his "strangeness") that the mere names of certain transgressions filled him with dread. He had always been easily impressed by speeches. He was awed and frightened now, and his intelligence was very alert.

"What?" he asked, immediately concerned. "Not even if they were hungry? Don't they have to?"

The two had interrupted their walk.

'Not if that were ever the case,' said Mrs Culver with the composure of one unconcerned with the problem of wealth distribution, exploring the road's perspective for a bus of the right color. "Certainly not. But what's the point of talking about it? You're never hungry."

She glanced at the boy standing by her side like a young man. She found him lovable, attractive, loving and just a little, very little quirky. And she couldn't see him any other way, for he was connected to the salt of passion in her tacky life—the passion of outrage, courage, compassion, and even self-sacrifice. She didn't add, "And it's unlikely you ever will be as long as I live." But she certainly could have, having taken effective steps to that end. Mr. Culver was a very good husband. She had the honest impression that nobody could help but like the boy. She suddenly screamed:

"Quick, Willie. Stop the green bus.”

And Willie, trembling and important, with his sister Gwen on his arm, threw the other high over his head towards the approaching bus, with complete success.

An hour later Mr. Culver lifted his eyes from a newspaper he was reading behind the counter, or at least was looking at, and in the fading ringing of the doorbell he saw Gwen, his wife, enter the shop on her way and cross upstairs, followed by Willie , his brother-in-law. The sight of his wife was pleasant to Mr. Culver. It was his way. His brother-in-law's form remained imperceptible to him because of the sullen thoughtfulness that had lately settled like a veil between Mr. Culver and the phenomena of the sense world. He took care of his wife rigidly and wordlessly as if she had been a phantom. His voice for home use was hoarse and calm, but now it couldn't be heard at all.Nothing was heard of this at dinner, to which he was called "Rudolph " by his wife in the usual short manner. He sat down to consume it without conviction, wearing his hat pushed back on his head. It was not devotion to an outdoor life, but frequent visits to foreign cafés, that accounted for this habit, lending Mr. Culver's unwavering loyalty to his own fireplace a character of unceremonial transience. Twice he got up without a word when the bell rang, disappeared into the store and came back in silence. During these absences, when Mrs Culver distinctly sensed the vacant seat on her right, she missed her mother greatly, and stared at her rigidly;while Willie continued to shuffle his feet for the same reason, as if the floor beneath the table was uncomfortably hot. As Mr. Culver returned to his seat like the embodiment of silence, the character of Mrs Culver's gaze subtly changed and Willie stopped kicking his feet. because of his great and reverent regard for his sister's husband. He gave him a look of respectful sympathy. Mr. Culver was sorry. His sister Gwen had drummed it into him (on the omnibus) that Mr. Culver would be home in a state of mourning and not to worry.His father's anger, the irritability of gentlemen's lodgers, and Mr. Culver's tendency to excessive grief had been the main reasons for Willie's self-control. Of these feelings, all easy to provoke but not always easy to understand, the last had the greatest moral potency - because Mr. Culver was good. His mother and sister had established this ethical fact on an unshakable basis. They had erected, erected and consecrated it behind Mr. Culver's back, for reasons which had nothing to do with abstract morality. And Mr. Culver was not aware of it. It's entirely fair for him to say that he had no clue about appearing good to Willie.And yet it was so. In fact, as far as Willie knew, he was the only man so qualified, for the gentlemen who lived there had been too elusive and too isolated to recognize anything special about them other than perhaps their boots; and as for his father's disciplinary actions, his mother and sister were despondently reluctant to theorize the victim's kindness. It would have been too cruel. And it was even possible that Willie wouldn't have believed them. As far as Mr. Culver was concerned, nothing could stand in the way of Willie's faith. Mr. Culver was obviously yet mysteriously good. And the sorrow of a good man is sublime.In fact, as far as Willie knew, he was the only man so qualified, for the gentlemen who lived there had been too elusive and too isolated to recognize anything special about them other than perhaps their boots; and as for his father's disciplinary actions, his mother and sister were despondently reluctant to theorize the victim's kindness. It would have been too cruel. And it was even possible that Willie wouldn't have believed them. As far as Mr. Culver was concerned, nothing could stand in the way of Willie's faith. Mr. Culver was obviously yet mysteriously good. And the sorrow of a good man is sublime.In fact, as far as Willie knew, he was the only man so qualified, for the gentlemen who lived there had been too elusive and too isolated to recognize anything special about them other than perhaps their boots; and as for his father's disciplinary actions, his mother and sister were despondently reluctant to theorize the victim's kindness. It would have been too cruel. And it was even possible that Willie wouldn't have believed them. As far as Mr. Culver was concerned, nothing could stand in the way of Willie's faith. Mr. Culver was obviously yet mysteriously good. And the sorrow of a good man is sublime.The desolation of his mother and sister deterred them from theorizing kindness in front of the victim. It would have been too cruel. And it was even possible that Willie wouldn't have believed them. As far as Mr. Culver was concerned, nothing could stand in the way of Willie's faith. Mr. Culver was obviously yet mysteriously good. And the sorrow of a good man is sublime. The desolation of his mother and sister deterred them from theorizing kindness in front of the victim. It would have been too cruel. And it was even possible that Willie wouldn't have believed them. As far as Mr. Culver was concerned, nothing could stand in the way of Willie's faith.Mr. Culver was obviously yet mysteriously good. And the sorrow of a good man is sublime.

Willie gave his brother-in-law an awed, sympathetic look. Mr. Culver was sorry. Gwen's brother had never felt so connected to the secret of this man's goodness. It was understandable sadness. And Willie himself felt sorry. He was very sorry. The same kind of grief. And when Willie became aware of this uncomfortable condition, he shuffled his feet. His feelings usually expressed themselves in the movement of his limbs.

"Keep your feet still, my dear," said Mrs. Culver, with authority and tenderness; Then she turned to her husband in an indifferent voice, the feat of her instinctive tact: "Are you going out tonight?" She asked.

The mere suggestion seemed repugnant to Mr. Culver. He shook his head morosely and then sat for a full minute, eyes downcast, studying the piece of cheese on his plate. When that time had elapsed, he got up and walked out—amid the ringing of the shop doorbell. He acted so inconsistently, not out of a desire to make himself uncomfortable, but out of an insurmountable restlessness. It wasn't good going out. He couldn't find what he wanted anywhere in London. But he went out.He led a squad of somber thoughts through darkened streets, through lightened streets, in and out of two flash bars as if halfheartedly trying to make it a night, and finally back to his threatened home again, where he sat, lying exhausted they behind the counter and they crowded around him like a pack of hungry black dogs. After locking the house and turning off the gas, he took her upstairs—a dreadful companionship for a man going to bed.His wife had walked in front of him some time ago, and with her voluptuous figure vaguely outlined under the covers, her head on the pillow and one hand under her cheek, she presented to his distraction the sight of an early drowsiness beginning to dawn Possession of a balanced soul indicated. Her large eyes stared wide open, languid and dark against the snow-white linen. She didn't move. She had a balanced soul. She had a deep feeling that things didn't stand up to close inspection. From that instinct she made her strength and her wisdom. But Mr. Culver's reticence had weighed on her for many days. It actually affected her nerves. Lying and motionless, she said calmly:

"If you walk around in your socks like that, you'll catch a cold."

This speech, which reflected the woman's concern and the woman's wisdom, surprised Mr. Culver. He'd left his boots down, but he'd forgotten to put on his slippers, and he'd paced the bedroom like a caged bear on noiseless mats. Hearing his wife's voice he stopped and stared at her with sleepy, expressionless eyes for so long that Mrs Culver moved her limbs slightly under the covers. But she didn't move her black head sunk into the white pillow, one hand under her cheek and her big, dark, staring eyes.

She felt a pang of loneliness under her husband's blank gaze and at the memory of her mother's empty room across the hall. She had never been separated from her mother before. They had stood by each other. She felt like they had, and she told herself that Mother was gone now - gone forever. Mrs Culver was under no illusions. However, Willie stayed. And she said:

"Mother did what she wanted to do. I can't see any sense in it. I'm sure she didn't think you'd had enough of her. It's utterly evil to leave us like this.”

Mr. Culver was not a well-read man; His range of innuendos was limited, but there was a particular fit of circumstances that made him think of rats escaping a doomed ship. He almost said it. He had grown suspicious and bitter. Could it be that the old woman had such an excellent nose? But the unfoundedness of such a suspicion was evident, and Mr. Culver kept his mouth shut. However, not quite. He murmured heavily:

"Maybe it's a good thing."

He began to undress. Mrs Culver kept very still, very still, and her eyes were fixed in a dreamy, still gaze. And her heart seemed to stand still for a split second. She wasn't quite herself that night, as the saying goes, and she realized with some urgency that a single sentence can have several different meanings - mostly uncomfortable ones. How was it? And why? But she did not succumb to the inertia of fruitless speculation. Rather, she felt confirmed in her belief that things would not stand up to scrutiny.Practical and subtle in her own way, she brought Willie to the top in no time, for in her determination had the unerring nature and power of instinct.

"I certainly don't know what I'm going to do to cheer up this boy in the first few days. He will worry from morning to night before he adjusts to his mother's absence. And he's such a good boy. I couldn't do without him."

Mr. Culver continued to undress with the unnoticed inward concentration of a man undressing in the solitude of a vast and hopeless desert. For so inhospitable presented this fair earth, our common heritage, to Mr. Culver's spiritual vision. Everything was so quiet inside and out that the lonely ticking of the clock on the landing crept into the room as if to keep company.

Mr. Culver got into bed on his own side and lay silently behind Mrs Culver's back. His thick arms lay abandoned on the outside of the covers like fallen weapons, like discarded tools. At that moment he was only a hair's breadth from telling his wife about it. The moment seemed opportune. Out of the corner of his eye he saw her broad shoulders draped in white, the back of her head, her hair braided into three pigtails for the night, tied at the ends with black ribbons. And he refrained. Mr. Culver loved his wife as a woman ought to be loved - that is, in marriage, with the respect one has for one's most precious possession.That head prepared for the night, those broad shoulders, had something of familiar sanctity—the sanctity of domestic peace. She didn't move, solid and formless like a recumbent rough statue; He remembered her eyes wide open, staring into empty space. She was mysterious, with the enigma of living beings. The well-known secret agent [delta] of the late Honorable Scott-Weber's alarming dispatches was not the man to penetrate such mysteries. He was easily intimidated. And he was lazy too, with the laziness that is so often the secret of good nature. Out of love, timidity and indolence, he avoided touching this secret.There would always be enough time. For several minutes he endured his sufferings in silence in the sleepy stillness of the room. And then he interrupted it with a resolute statement. The well-known secret agent [delta] of the late Honorable Scott-Weber's alarming dispatches was not the man to penetrate such mysteries. He was easily intimidated. And he was lazy too, with the laziness that is so often the secret of good nature. Out of love, timidity and indolence, he avoided touching this secret. There would always be enough time. For several minutes he endured his sufferings in silence in the sleepy stillness of the room. And then he interrupted it with a resolute statement.The well-known secret agent [delta] of the late Honorable Scott-Weber's alarming dispatches was not the man to penetrate such mysteries. He was easily intimidated. And he was lazy too, with the laziness that is so often the secret of good nature. Out of love, timidity and indolence, he avoided touching this secret. There would always be enough time. For several minutes he endured his sufferings in silence in the sleepy stillness of the room. And then he interrupted it with a resolute statement. For several minutes he endured his sufferings in silence in the sleepy stillness of the room. And then he interrupted it with a resolute statement.For several minutes he endured his sufferings in silence in the sleepy stillness of the room. And then he interrupted it with a resolute statement.

"I'm going to the continent tomorrow."

His wife may already have fallen asleep. He couldn't say. In fact Mrs Culver had heard him. Her eyes stayed wide open and she lay very still, reinforcing her instinctive belief that things couldn't bear to be dwelled upon. And yet it was not unusual for Mr. Culver to undertake such a journey. He renewed his stock from Paris and Brussels. He often went by personally to do his shopping.A small select association of amateurs formed around the Brett Street shop, a secret association responsible for every business of Mr. Culver, who was destined by a mystical coincidence of temperament and necessity to act as secret agent all by himself , life was eminently suitable.

He waited a while and then added: "I'll be gone for a week or maybe two weeks. Ask Mrs. Lincoln to come for the day.”

Mrs. Lincoln was Brett Street's cleaning lady. A victim of her marriage to a dissolute carpenter, she was oppressed by the needs of many young children. With red arms and wrapped up to the armpits in coarse burlap, she exhaled the torment of the poor in a whiff of soapy water and rum, in the noise of scrubbing, in the clatter of tin buckets.

Mrs Culver spoke with deep determination, in a tone of the most superficial indifference.

“It is not necessary to have the woman here all day. I will get along very well with Willie.”

She let the lone clock on the landing count fifteen ticks into the abyss of eternity and asked:

"Shall I turn off the light?"

Mr. Culver snapped hoarsely at his wife.

"Let it out."

CHAPTER IX

When Mr. Culver returned from the continent after ten days, his mind was evidently not refreshed by the wonders of the voyage abroad, and his face was not lightened by the joys of homecoming. He entered to the ringing of the shop bell with an expression of somber and angry exhaustion. Bag in hand and head bowed, he walked straight behind the counter and collapsed into the chair as if he'd come all the way from Dover. It was early morning. Willie, who was dusting various items on display in the front windows, turned and stared at him in awe and awe.

"Here!" said Mr. Culver, giving the Gladstone bag a light kick on the floor; and Willie threw himself on it, seized it, and carried it off with triumphant abandon. He was so quick that Mr. Culver was clearly surprised.

As the shop bell rang, Mrs Lincoln, leading the sitting-room lattice in black, had looked through the door, got up from her knees, and, aproned and dirty from endless work, gone into the kitchen to say to Mrs Culver: ' There was Master, come back.”

Gwen got no further than the inner shop door.

"You're going to want some breakfast," she said from afar.

Mr. Culver moved his hands slightly, as if overwhelmed by an impossible proposition. But as soon as he was lured into the parlor, he did not refuse the food that was offered to him. He ate as if in a public place, his hat pushed off his forehead, the skirts of his heavy coat hanging in a triangle on either side of the chair. And down the length of the brown oilcloth-covered table, Gwen, his wife, spoke steadily to him, no doubt as artfully adapted to the circumstances of that return as Penelope's speech about the return of the wanderer Odysseus. However, Mrs Culver had not engaged in weaving during her husband's absence.But she had the entire upper floor cleaned thoroughly, sold some goods and saw Mr. Michaels several times. He had told her last time that he was moving away to live in a country cottage somewhere on London Street. Chatham and Dover Line. Kevin Yount also came once, led by his "wicked old housekeeper" under his arm. He was "a disgusting old man". She said nothing about Colleague Adjepong, whom she'd received crouched behind the counter, stony-faced and distant, and her mental reference to the sturdy anarchist was marked by a brief pause and a very faint blush.And when she called in her brother Willie as soon as she could be caught up in the flow of domestic events, she mentioned that the boy rode a moped a lot. Her mental reference to the sturdy anarchist was marked by a brief pause during which she blushed slightly. And when she called in her brother Willie as soon as she could be caught up in the flow of domestic events, she mentioned that the boy rode a moped a lot. Her mental reference to the sturdy anarchist was marked by a brief pause during which she blushed slightly. And when she called in her brother Willie as soon as she could be caught up in the flow of domestic events, she mentioned that the boy rode a moped a lot.

"It's like this all the time, mother leaves us like this."

Neither did Mr. Culver say 'Damn!' nor did he say 'Willie will be hanged!' And Mrs Culver, who was not State to the secret of his thoughts, did not see the generosity of that reticence.

"It's not that he's not working as well as he used to," she continued. "He's been very useful. You'd think he couldn't do enough for us.”

Mr. Culver cast a casual and sleepy glance at Willie, who was sitting to his right, delicate, pale-faced and rosy mouth vacant. It wasn't a critical look. It had no intention. And if Mr. Culver thought for a moment that his wife's brother looked unusually useless, it was only a tedious and fleeting thought, without the power and permanence which sometimes enables a thought to move the world. Mr. Culver sat back and bared his head. Before his outstretched arm could lay the hat down, Willie pounced on it and reverentially carried it into the kitchen. And again Mr. Culver was surprised.

'You could do anything with that boy, Rudolph ,' said Mrs Culver, with her best expression of unyielding calm. "He would walk through fire for you. He-"

She paused attentively and kept her ear on the kitchen door.

There Mrs. Lincoln was scrubbing the floor. She moaned miserably at Willie's appearance, having noticed that he was easily persuaded to give away the shillings his sister Gwen gave him from time to time for the benefit of their young children. On all fours among the puddles, wet and dirty, like some sort of amphibian and domestic animal that lives in ash bins and dirty water, she let out the usual exordium: "It's all very well for you, you have continued to do nothing like a." Gentleman.' And she followed with the perpetual lamentation of the poor, pathetically mendacious, miserably confirmed by the horrible whiff of cheap rum and soapsuds. She scrubbed vigorously, sniffed the whole time and talked meaningfully. And she was sincere.And on either side of her thin red nose her dull misty eyes were swimming with tears,

In the drawing room, Mrs Culver remarked knowingly:

"There's Mrs Lincoln again with her harrowing stories about her young children. They can't all be as small as she portrays them. Some of them must be big enough by now to try to do something for themselves. It just makes Willie angry.”

Those words were confirmed by a thump, like a fist pounding on the kitchen table. In the normal course of his sympathy, Willie had been furious to find out he didn't have a shilling in his pocket. Not being able to assuage Mrs. Lincoln's "little us" right away, he felt someone should suffer for it. Mrs Culver got up and went into the kitchen to "put an end to this nonsense". And she did it firmly but gently. She was aware that as soon as Mrs. Lincoln received her money, she would turn the corner to drink hot liquor at a seedy and musty tavern—the inevitable stop on the Via Dolorosa of her life.Ms Culver's comment on this practice had an unexpected depth, coming from someone who was not inclined to look beneath the surface of things. "Of course, what is she going to do to keep up? If I were like Ms. Lincoln, I probably wouldn't behave any differently."

In the afternoon of the same day, when Mr. Culver, waking from the last slumber of a long line before the parlor caught fire, was declaring his intention of going for a walk, Gwen said from the shop:

"I wish you would take this boy with you, Rudolph ."

For the third time that day, Mr. Culver was surprised. He stared stupidly at his wife. She continued her steady manner. The boy rode a moped around the house when he wasn't doing anything. It made her uneasy; It made her nervous, she admitted. And that sounded like an exaggeration to Gwen at rest. But the truth is, Willie moped in the conspicuous way of an unfortunate pet. He climbed the dark landing and sat on the floor at the foot of the tall clock, knees drawn up, head in hands. To see his pale face, with his large eyes shining in the twilight, was disconcerting; It was uncomfortable to think of him up there.

Mr. Culver grew accustomed to the startling novelty of the idea. He loved his wife as a man should: generously. But a grave objection struck him, and he formulated it.

"Maybe he'll lose sight of me and get lost in the street," he said.

Mrs Culver shook her head competently.

"He won't. you don't know him. This boy just adores you. But if you should miss him—”

Mrs Culver paused for a moment, but only for a moment.

"You just go ahead and get out. Do not worry. He will be fine. He will surely show up here soon."

That optimism brought Mr. Culver the fourth surprise of the day.

"Is he?" he grunted doubtfully. But maybe his brother-in-law wasn't such an idiot as he looked. His wife would know best. He averted his heavy eyes and said hoarsely, "Then let him come with you," and fell back into the clutches of Black Care, who may prefer to sit behind a rider, but also knows how to step close on his heels. who were not well enough to keep horses - such as Mr. Culver.

Gwen, standing at the shop door, did not see this deadly companion on Mr. Culver's walks. She watched the two figures on the dirt road, one tall and stocky, the other slender and short, with thin necks and pointed shoulders slightly hunched beneath large, semi-transparent ears. The fabric of their coats was the same, their hats were black and round. Inspired by the similarity in clothing, Mrs Culver let her imagination run wild.

"Maybe father and son," she said to herself. She also felt that Mr. Culver was the father poor Willie ever had in his life. She was also aware that it was her job. And with peaceful pride she congratulated herself on a certain resolution she had made a few years ago. It had cost her some effort and even a few tears.

She congratulated herself even more when, as the days went on, she noticed that Mr. Culver seemed to take kindly to Willie's company. Now, when Mr. Culver was ready to go for his walk, he called out loudly to the boy, no doubt in the mood in which a man invites the companionship of the house dog, though in a different way, of course. Inside the house, Mr. Culver could be seen staring curiously at Willie. His own demeanor had changed. He was still taciturn, but not so listless. Mrs Culver thought he was a bit nervous at times. It might have been seen as an improvement.And as for Willie, he was no longer muttering misery at the foot of the clock, but was muttering menacingly to himself in the corners. When asked, "What are you saying, Willie?" he merely opened his mouth and blinked at his sister. Sometimes he would clench his fists for no apparent reason, and when he was spotted in solitude he would scowl at the wall while the sheet of paper and pencil he had been given to draw circles lay empty and inactive on the kitchen table. It was a change, but not an improvement. Mrs Culver, dropping all these whims under the general definition of excitement, began to fear that Willie was hearing more of her husband's conversations with his friends than was good for him.Of course, during his 'walks', Mr. Culver met and conversed with various people. It could hardly be otherwise. His walks were an integral part of his outdoor pursuits, which his wife had never delved into. Mrs Culver thought the situation delicate, but she met it with the same impenetrable calm that impressed and even amazed the shop's customers and made the other visitors stand back, a little puzzled. NO! She feared there were things that weren't good for Willie, she told her husband. It only aroused the poor boy because there was nothing he could do about it. Nobody could.

It was in the store. Mr. Culver made no comment. He didn't reply, and yet the reply was obvious. But he refrained from pointing out to his wife that the idea of ??making Willie his companion on his walks was hers and no one else's. At that moment Mr. Culver would have seemed more than human in his magnanimity to an impartial observer. He took a small cardboard box from a shelf, looked inside to see if the contents were ok, and carefully placed it on the counter. It was only when this happened that he broke his silence, saying that Willie would most likely benefit greatly from being sent out of town for a while;only he suspected that his wife would not be able to do without him.

'Couldn't get on without him!' repeated Mrs Culver slowly. "I couldn't do without him if it was for his good! The idea! Of course I can manage without him. But he has nowhere to go.”

Mr. Culver produced brown paper and a piece of string; and meanwhile he murmured that Michaels lived in a little cottage in the country. Michaels wouldn't mind giving Willie a room to sleep in. There were no visitors and no conversation. Michaels wrote a book.

Mrs Culver declared her affection to Michaels; mentioned her dislike of Kevin Yount, the "bad old man"; and she said nothing of Adjepong. As for Willie, he could only be very pleased. Mr. Michaels was always so nice and friendly to him. He seemed to like the boy. Well the boy was a good boy.

"You seem to have grown very fond of him lately, too," she added after a pause, with her unyielding assurance.

Mr. Culver, who was tying the carton into a parcel for the post, snapped the string with an ill-considered jerk and mumbled several swear words confidentially to himself. Then he raised his voice to the usual hoarse murmur and announced his willingness to take Willie to the country himself and leave him safely with Michaels.

He carried out this plan the very next day. Willie didn't object. He seemed quite eager, in a confused sort of way. Periodically he cast his open gaze curiously on Mr. Culver's heavy face, especially when his sister was not looking at him. His expression was proud, concerned, and focused, like that of a young child being entrusted with a box of matches and permission to light a candle for the first time. But Mrs Culver, delighted at her brother's docility, advised him not to soil his clothes excessively in the country.As he did so, Willie shot his sister, guardian, and protector a look that, for the first time in his life, seemed to lack the quality of utter childlike trustworthiness. It was haughtily gloomy. Mrs Culver smiled.

"My goodness! You don't need to be offended. You know you get very messy when you get the chance, Willie."

Mr. Culver had already walked some way down the road.

Thus, owing to the heroic actions of her mother and the absence of her brother, Mrs Culver was more often than usual in that village alone, not only in the shop but also in the house. For Mr. Culver had to take his walks. She was alone longer than usual on the day of the attempted bombing in Greenwich Park because Mr. Culver left the house very early that morning and did not return until just before dark. She didn't mind being alone. She didn't feel like going out. The weather was too bad and the store was cozier than the streets. Sitting behind the counter sewing something, she didn't look from her work when Mr. Culver entered to the aggressive clatter of the bell.She had recognized his footsteps outside on the sidewalk.

She did not raise her eyes, but as Mr. Culver, silent and with his hat pulled down, walked straight to the drawing-room door, she said calmly:

"What a miserable day. You might have been to Willie's?"

"NO! I didn't," said Mr. Culver quietly, slamming the glass saloon door behind him with unexpected energy.

Mrs Culver was silent for a while, her work on her lap, before putting it under the counter and getting up to light the gas. When that was done, she went into the living room on her way to the kitchen. Mr. Culver would want his tea at once. Trusting in the power of her charms, Gwen expected no solemn grace of address and no courtesy from her husband in the daily dealings of their married life; Vain and antiquated forms at best, probably never strictly adhered to, now abandoned even in the highest spheres, and always foreign to the standards of their class. She expected no courtesy from him. But he was a good husband, and she had a faithful respect for his rights.

Mrs Culver would have walked through the living room and then to her domestic duties in the kitchen with the perfect composure of a woman sure of the power of her charms. But there was a faint, very faint and rapid rattle as she heard. Bizarre and incomprehensible, it caught Mrs Culver's attention. Then, as the character became clear to her, she paused in astonishment and concern. She lit a match on the box she was holding, switched it on and lit one of the two gas burners above the living room table, which, since it was broken, whistled at first in surprise and then purred pleasantly like a … cat.

Mr. Culver, contrary to his usual custom, had thrown off his coat. It was on the sofa. His hat, which he had evidently also thrown off, lay tipped over under the edge of the sofa. He had dragged a chair in front of the fireplace and was hanging low over the glowing hearth, feet tucked into the mantelpiece, head between his hands. His teeth chattered with unbridled ferocity, making his entire huge back tremble at the same rate. Mrs Culver was startled.

"You got wet," she said.

'Not very much,' ground Mr. Culver through a deep shudder. With a great effort he kept his teeth from chattering.

"I'll put you on my hands," she said with genuine discomfort.

'I don't think so,' remarked Mr. Culver, sniffing hoarsely.

He must have somehow managed to catch a terrible cold between seven in the morning and five in the afternoon. Mrs Culver looked down at his arched back.

"Where have you been today?" She asked.

'Nowhere,' answered Mr. Culver in a low, choked, nasal voice. His demeanor suggested an offended pout or a severe headache. The inadequacy and insincerity of his response was painfully evident in the dead silence of the room. He sniffled apologetically, adding, "I was at the bank."

Mrs Culver took notice.

"You have!" she said dispassionately. "For what reason?"

Mr. Culver mumbled, nose over the bars and clearly indignant.

"Withdraw the money!"

"What do you mean? All of it?"

"Yes. All of it."

Mrs Culver carefully spread out the scanty tablecloth, took two knives and two forks from the table drawer, and suddenly stopped her methodical approach.

"Why did you do that?"

'Perhaps I would like to soon,' sniffed Mr. Culver vaguely, having reached the end of his calculated indiscretions.

"I don't know what you mean," his wife remarked in a completely casual tone, but stood motionless between the table and the cupboard.

"You know you can trust me," Mr. Culver remarked hoarsely to the grille.

Mrs Culver slowly turned to the cupboard and said carefully:

"Oh yes. I can trust you."

And she continued with her methodical approach. She put two plates down, got the bread and butter, and quietly walked back and forth between the table and the cupboard in the stillness and stillness of her home. As she was about to take out the jam, she practically figured, "He'll be hungry because he's been gone all day," and went back to the cupboard one more time to get the cold beef. She placed it under the whirring jet of gas, and with a glimpse of her motionless husband embracing the fire, she went (down two steps) into the kitchen. Only when she came back, carving knife and fork in hand, did she speak again.

"If I hadn't trusted you, I wouldn't have married you."

Bent over the mantelpiece, Mr. Culver seemed to have fallen asleep, his head in his hands. Gwen made the tea and called softly:

"Rudolph ."

Mr. Culver got up at once and staggered a little before sitting down at the table. His wife examined the sharp edge of the carving knife, placed it on the bowl, and pointed out the cold beef. He remained impervious to the suggestion, chin on chest.

'You should nurse your cold,' said Mrs Culver dogmatically.

He looked up and shook his head. His eyes were bloodshot and his face red. His fingers had tousled his hair into a fleeting mess. Overall, he had a disreputable appearance that bespoke the uneasiness, irritation, and gloom after violent debauchery. But Mr. Culver was not a dissolute man. In his demeanor he was respectable. His appearance may have been the result of a feverish cold. He drank three cups of tea but refrained from eating altogether. He recoiled from it with sombre dislike when Mrs Culver urged him, finally saying:

"Aren't your feet wet? You'd better put your slippers on. You're not going out tonight."

Mr. Culver indicated by sullen grunts and gestures that his feet weren't wet and that he didn't care anyway. The suggestion regarding the slippers was ignored as being under his consideration. But the question of going out in the evening received an unexpected development. Mr. Culver had no intention of going out at night. His thoughts encompassed a larger plan. It was clear from murky and incomplete wording that Mr. Culver had considered the advisability of emigrating. It wasn't entirely clear whether he had France or California in mind.

The utter unexpectedness, improbability and unimaginability of such an event robbed this vague statement of any effect. Mrs Culver said calmly, as if her husband had threatened her with the end of the world:

"The idea!"

Mr. Culver declared that he had had enough of everything, and besides - she cut him off.

"You have a bad cold."

Indeed, it was evident that Mr. Culver was not in his usual state, physically and even mentally. A gloomy indecision kept him silent for a while. Then he muttered some ominous generalities about necessity.

"Must be," Gwen repeated, sitting quietly across from her husband with her arms crossed. “I would like to know who should make you. You are not a slave. No one needs to be a slave in this country – and don't make yourself one.” She paused, and with an invincible and steady openness. "Business isn't that bad," she continued. "You have a comfortable home."

She looked around the living room, from the corner cupboard to the good fire in the fireplace. Cozily tucked away behind the shop of dubious goods, with the mysteriously cloudy window and suspiciously ajar door in the dark and narrow street, it was a respectable home in all essential aspects of domestic decorum and comfort. Her devoted affection missed her brother Willie, who now settled in the back streets of Kent in a dank village under the care of Mr. Michaels. She missed him terribly, with all the strength of her protective passion. This was the boy's home too - the roof, the closet, the Helmsed fireplace.At that thought Mrs Culver rose, walked to the other end of the table and said wholeheartedly:

"And you're not tired of me."

Mr. Culver made no sound. Gwen leaned against his shoulder from behind and pressed her lips to his forehead. That's how she stayed. No whisper reached her from the outside world.

The sound of footsteps on the sidewalk was silenced in the discrete darkness of the store. Only the jet of gas above the table purred evenly in the brooding stillness of the living room.

During the contact of that unexpected and prolonged kiss, Mr. Culver, who was gripping the edges of his chair with both hands, maintained a hieratic immobility. When the pressure eased, he let go of the chair and stood up to stand in front of the fireplace. He no longer turned his back on the room. With swollen features and the impression of being drugged, he followed his wife's movements with his eyes.

Mrs Culver walked about quietly, clearing the table. Her calm voice commented on the discarded idea in a reasonable and domestic tone. It would not stand up to scrutiny. She condemned it in every way. But her only real concern was for Willie's welfare. In this context, he seemed to her to be sufficiently “peculiar” not to be hastily taken abroad. And that's all. But when she spoke on this crucial point, she aimed for absolute vehemence in her presentation. Meanwhile, she pulled on an apron with brusque movements to wash the cups.And as if delighted by the sound of her unchallenged voice, she even went so far as to say in an almost sour tone:

"If you go abroad, you'll have to do without me."

'You know I wouldn't do that,' said Mr. Culver hoarsely, the echoing voice of his private life shaking with enigmatic emotion.

Mrs Culver was already regretting her words. They had sounded less friendly than she intended. They also had ignorance of unnecessary things. In fact, she hadn't meant them at all. It was a type of expression suggested by the demon of perverse inspiration. But she knew a way to make it look like it hadn't happened.

She turned her head over her shoulder and cast a half mischievous, half cruel look out of her wide eyes at the man who was lumbering by the fireplace—a look the Gwen of the Belgravia mansion days was not in the mood for would have been able to because of their seriousness and their ignorance. But the man was her husband now, and she was no longer ignorant. She kept her eye on him for a full second, her serious face moving like a mask as she said playfully,

"You couldn't. You would miss me too much.”

Mr. Culver set out.

"Exactly," he said louder, stretched out his arms and took a step towards her. Something fierce and doubtful in his expression made it seem uncertain whether he intended to strangle or hug his wife. But Ms Culver's attention was diverted from the rally by the ringing of the shop bell.

"Invite, Rudolph . You go."

He stopped, his arms slowly lowered.

'Go,' repeated Mrs Culver. "I have my apron on."

Mr. Culver obeyed woodenly, stone-eyed and like an automaton whose face was painted red. And this resemblance to a mechanical figure went so far that he gave off the absurd aura of an automaton, as if he were aware of the machinery inside him.

He closed the living-room door and Mrs Culver hurriedly carried the tray into the kitchen. She washed the cups and a few other things before stopping to listen. Not a sound reached her. The customer was in the store for a long time. It was a customer, for if it hadn't been, Mr. Culver would have brought him in. With a jerk she undid the laces of her apron, threw it on a chair and walked slowly back into the drawing room.

Just then, Mr. Culver came out of the shop.

He had blushed. It came out an odd, papery white. His face had lost its stunned, feverish rigidity and in that short time assumed a confused and haunted expression. He went straight to the sofa and looked at his coat lying there as if afraid to touch it.

"What's up?" asked Mrs Culver in a low voice. Through the open door she could see that the customer hadn't left yet.

'I have to go out tonight,' said Mr. Culver. He didn't try to pick up his robe.

Without a word, Gwen made his way to the store, closed the door behind her, and went behind the counter. She didn't look at the customer until she was comfortably seated in the chair. But by now she had noticed that he was tall, thin, and wore his mustache pinned up. In fact, he just turned over the sharp points. His long, bony face protruded from a turned-up collar. He was a little spattered, a little wet. A dark man, the cheekbones well defined below the slightly hollow temple. A total stranger. Not a customer either.

Mrs Culver looked at him calmly.

"You came over from the continent?" she said after a while.

The tall, thin stranger only answered with a faint and quirky smile, without looking closely at Mrs Culver.

Mrs Culver's calm, indifferent gaze rested on him.

"You understand English, don't you?"

"Oh yes. I understand English."

There was nothing alien about his accent, except that he seemed to be struggling with his slow pronunciation. And Ms Culver, based on her varied experiences, had concluded that some foreigners could speak English better than the locals. She said, staring at the parlor door:

"Perhaps you are not thinking of staying in England forever?"

The stranger smiled at her again, silently. He had a kind mouth and inquiring eyes. And he apparently shook his head a little sadly.

"My husband will get through to you. In the meantime you can't do anything better than stay at Mr. Giugliani's place for a few days. It's called Continental Hotel. Private. It is quiet. My husband will take you there.”

"A good idea," said the thin, dark man, whose eyes had suddenly hardened.

'You knew Mr. Culver before - didn't you? Maybe in France?”

"I've heard of him," the visitor admitted in his slow, careful tone that nonetheless had a certain terse intent.

There was a pause. Then he spoke again, in a far less elaborate manner.

"Your husband didn't happen to go out into the street to wait for me?"

"In the street!" repeated Mrs Culver, surprised. "He couldn't. There is no other door to the house.”

She sat impassively for a moment, then left her seat to peer through the glass door. Suddenly she opened it and disappeared into the living room.

Mr. Culver had only put on his coat. But why he should remain bent over the table on both arms afterwards, as if he were dizzy or sick, she couldn't understand. "Rudolph ," she called under her breath; and when he got up:

"Do you know this man?" she asked quickly.

'I've heard of him,' whispered Mr. Culver uneasily, glancing wildly at the door.

A touch of disgust shone in Mrs Culver's beautiful, indifferent eyes.

"One of Kevin Yount's friends - a hideous old man."

"NO! NO!" protested Mr. Culver, who was busy fishing for his hat. But when he pulled it out from under the sofa, he held it as if he didn't know how to use a hat.

'Well - he's waiting for you,' said Mrs Culver at last. "I'm saying, Rudolph , he's not one of those embassy people you've been struggling with lately?"

'I'm concerned with the embassy people,' repeated Mr. Culver, with a touch of surprise and fear. "Who told you about the embassy people?"

"You yourself."

"I! I! I spoke to you from the embassy!"

Mr. Culver seemed frightened and confused beyond measure. His wife explained:

"You've been talking a little in your sleep lately, Rudolph ."

"What - what did I say? What do you know?"

"Not much. It seemed mostly nonsense. Enough to make me think something was troubling you."

Mr. Culver banged his hat on his head. A crimson wave of anger ran down his face.

"Nonsense - what? The embassy people! I would cut out their hearts one by one. But let her be careful. I have a tongue in my head.”

He was seething, pacing between the table and the sofa, his open coat catching on the corners. The red tide of anger subsided, leaving his face white and nostrils trembling. For practical reasons, Mrs Culver considered these apparitions cold.

"Well," she said, "get rid of the man, whoever he is, as soon as you can and come to my house. One would like to take care of him for a day or two."

Mr. Culver calmed down and, with determination on his pale face, had already opened the door when his wife called him back in a whisper:

"Rudolph ! Rudolph !” He came back, startled. "What about the money you took out?" she asked. "You have it in your pocket? Wouldn't it have been better..."

Mr. Culver stared stupidly at his wife's outstretched hand for some time before slapping his forehead.

"Money! Yes! Yes! I didn't know what you meant."

He pulled a new pigskin satchel from his breast pocket. Mrs Culver took it without another word, and stood until the bell rang after Mr. Culver and Mr. Culver's visitor had fallen silent. Only then did she take a look at the amount and pulled out the bills for this purpose. After this visit, she looked around thoughtfully and with a touch of distrust in the silence and solitude of the house. This abode of their married life struck her as lonely and unsafe as if it were in the middle of the forest. No container she could think of among the massive, heavy furniture struck her as anything but flimsy and particularly tempting to her idea of ??a burglar.It was an ideal conception endowed with sublime abilities and wondrous insight. The cash register was out of the question. It was the first place a thief went. Mrs Culver hastily undid a few hooks and slipped the handbag under the bodice of her dress. Having thus disposed of her husband's capital, she was quite glad to hear the doorbell ringing announcing her arrival. She adopted the fixed, unabashed gaze and stony expression reserved for the casual customer and walked behind the counter.

A man standing in the center of the store inspected it with a quick, cool, all-round look. His gaze wandered over the walls, took in the ceiling, took in the floor - all in a moment. The tips of a long, light-colored mustache reached below the jawline. He smiled the smile of an old, if distant, acquaintance, and Mrs Culver remembered seeing him before. No customer. She softened her "customer gaze" to mere indifference and looked at him across the counter.

For his part, he approached confidentially, but not too clearly.

'Husband at home, Mrs Culver?' he asked in a simple, full voice.

"NO. He went out."

"I'm sorry. I called to get some private information from him."

That was exactly the truth. Chief Detective Helms had been all the way home and had even considered putting on his slippers since, he said to himself, he'd practically been thrown off the case. He indulged in some contemptuous thoughts and some angry thoughts, and found the occupation so unsatisfactory that he decided to seek relief in the open. Nothing prevented him from phoning Mr. Culver, as it were casually, in a friendly manner. It was in the character of a private man that when he went out privately he would use his usual means of transport. Their general direction was towards Mr. Culver's house.So consistent was Chief Detective Helms's respect for his private character that he took extra pains to avoid any police officers on duty in the Brett Street area. This precaution was far more necessary for a man of his station than for an obscure deputy commissioner. Private Citizen Helms entered the streets and maneuvered in a manner that would have been stigmatized as sneaking in a member of the criminal class. The piece of cloth picked up at Greenwich was in his pocket. Not that he had the slightest intention of producing it privately. On the contrary, he wanted to know what Mr. Culver would say voluntarily.He hoped that Mr. Culver's speech would be likely to incriminate Michaels. It was essentially a conscientious, professional hope, but not without moral value. Because Chief Detective Helms was a servant of justice. When he found Mr. Culver at home he was disappointed. Maneuvers in a manner that would have been stigmatized as treacherous in a member of the criminal class. The piece of cloth picked up at Greenwich was in his pocket. Not that he had the slightest intention of producing it privately. On the contrary, he wanted to know what Mr. Culver would say voluntarily. He hoped that Mr. Culver's speech would be likely to incriminate Michaels.It was essentially a conscientious, professional hope, but not without moral value. Because Chief Detective Helms was a servant of justice. When he found Mr. Culver at home he was disappointed. Maneuvers in a manner that would have been stigmatized as treacherous in a member of the criminal class. The piece of cloth picked up at Greenwich was in his pocket. Not that he had the slightest intention of producing it privately. On the contrary, he wanted to know what Mr. Culver would say voluntarily. He hoped that Mr. Culver's speech would be likely to incriminate Michaels.It was essentially a conscientious, professional hope, but not without moral value. Because Chief Detective Helms was a servant of justice. When he found Mr. Culver at home he was disappointed. He wanted to know what Mr. Culver would volunteer to say. He hoped that Mr. Culver's speech would be likely to incriminate Michaels. It was essentially a conscientious, professional hope, but not without moral value. Because Chief Detective Helms was a servant of justice. When he found Mr. Culver at home he was disappointed. He wanted to know what Mr. Culver would volunteer to say.He hoped that Mr. Culver's speech would be likely to incriminate Michaels. It was essentially a conscientious, professional hope, but not without moral value. Because Chief Detective Helms was a servant of justice. When he found Mr. Culver at home he was disappointed.

"I'd wait a little longer for him if I was sure he wouldn't be long in coming," he said.

Mrs Culver made no representations whatsoever.

"The information I need is fairly confidential," he repeated. "You know what I mean? I was wondering if you could give me some idea of ??where he went?"

Mrs Culver shook her head.

"I can not say that."

She turned away to put some boxes on the shelves behind the counter. Chief Detective Helms looked at her thoughtfully for a while.

"I take it, you know who I am?" he said.

Mrs Culver glanced over her shoulder. Chief Detective Helms was amazed at her coolness.

"Come on! "You know I'm with the police," he said sharply.

'I don't worry too much about it," remarked Mrs Culver, going back to sorting her crates.

"My name is Helms. Chief Detective Helms, Special Crimes Unit.”

Mrs Culver deftly put a small cardboard box in its place, turned and faced him again, with heavy eyes and hanging idle hands. There was silence for a while.

"So your husband went out fifteen minutes ago! And he didn't say when he would be back?"

"He didn't go out alone," Mrs Culver dropped carelessly.

"A friend?"

Mrs Culver touched her hair. It was in perfect order.

"A stranger called."

"I see. What kind of man was this stranger? Would you mind telling me?"

Mrs Culver didn't mind. And when Chief Detective Helms heard of a dark, thin man with a long face and a raised mustache, he made alarmed signs and cried:

"Damn if I didn't think that! He wasted no time.”

He was deeply outraged in the secret of his heart by the unofficial behavior of his immediate boss. But he was not an unworldly person. He lost all desire to wait for Mr. Culver to return. He didn't know why they had moved out, but he thought it was possible that they would return together. The case isn't being properly prosecuted, it's being rigged, he thought bitterly.

"I'm afraid I don't have time to wait for your husband," he said.

Mrs Culver took this statement impassively. Her detachment had always impressed Chief Detective Helms. It was at that moment that his curiosity was piqued. Chief Detective Helms hung in the wind, drifting with his passions like the most reticent citizen.

"I think," he said, looking at her steadily, "if you'd like, you could give me a pretty good idea of ??what's going on."

Mrs Culver forced her beautiful lazy eyes to meet his, and murmured:

"Go on! What's up?"

"Well, the affair I wanted to talk to your husband about briefly."

That day Mrs Culver had, as usual, glanced at the morning paper. But she hadn't exercised outdoors. The paperboys never entered Brett Street. It wasn't a road for their business. And the echoes of their screams, echoing through the busy main streets, rang out between the dirty brick walls, not even reaching the store's threshold. Her husband hadn't brought an evening paper home with him. At least she hadn't seen it. Mrs Culver knew nothing at all of any affair. And she said it with a real touch of wonder in her calm voice.

Chief Detective Helms didn't believe for a moment that much ignorance. Briefly and without friendliness, he stated the bare fact.

Mrs Culver looked away.

"I call it silly," she said slowly. She paused. "We are not oppressed slaves here."

The chief Detective waited watchfully. Nothing more came.

"And your husband didn't mention anything to you when he got home?"

Mrs Culver simply turned her face from right to left in negative. There was a sluggish, confusing silence in the store. Chief Detective Helms felt unbearably provoked.

"There was one other little thing," he began in a distant tone, "that I wanted to talk to your husband about. Then a – a – in our opinion – stolen coat came into our hands.”

Mrs Culver, who was particularly wary of thieves that evening, lightly touched the bosom of her dress.

"We haven't lost a coat," she said quietly.

"That's funny," continued Private Citizen Helms. "I see you have a lot of marker ink here..."

He picked up a small bottle and studied it against the jet of gas in the center of the shop.

"Purple - isn't it?" he remarked, putting it down again. "Like I said, it's weird. Because there is a label sewn on the inside of the coat with your address written on it in marker ink.”

Mrs Culver leaned over the counter with a low exclamation.

"So this belongs to my brother."

"Where's your brother? Can I see him?" asked the chief Detective energetically. Mrs Culver leaned a little further over the counter.

"NO. He's not here. I wrote that label myself."

"Where is your brother now?"

"He lived with - a friend in the country."

“The coat comes from the country. And what's the friend's name?"

"Michaels," Mrs Culver admitted in a reverent whisper.

The Chief Detective whistled. His eyes snapped.

"Just like that. Capital. And your brother, what's he like? A stocky, dark guy, huh?"

"Oh no," cried Mrs Culver fervently."It must be the thief. Willie is slim and fair.”

"Good," said the chief Detective in an appreciative tone. And as Mrs Culver stared at him, vacillating between dismay and amazement, he searched for information. Why is the address sewn into the coat like this?And he heard that the mutilated remains, which he had examined with utter disgust that morning, were that of a young man, nervous, absent-minded, queer, and that the woman who spoke to him had had that boy's care since he one year old was baby.

"Easily excitable?" he suggested.

"Oh yes. He is. But how did he come to lose his coat-"

Chief Detective Helms suddenly pulled out a pink newspaper he had bought less than half an hour ago. He was interested in horses. Forced by his vocation to adopt an attitude of doubt and distrust towards his fellow citizens, Chief Detective Helms assuaged the instinct of credulity ingrained in the human breast by placing unbounded trust in the sports prophets of this particular evening publication. Dropping the extra on the counter, he put his hand in his pocket again and pulled out the piece of cloth that fate had bestowed on him from a pile of things apparently gleaned from rubble and rag shops, he offered and handed over it to Mrs Culver for inspection.

"I take it you recognize that?"

She took it mechanically in both hands.Her eyes seemed to widen as she looked.

"Yes," she whispered, then lifted her head and staggered back a little.

"Why is it ripped out like that?"

The chief Detective snatched the towel out of her hands over the counter and she sat down heavily on the chair. He thought: The identification is perfect. And in that moment he had a glimpse of the whole amazing truth. Culver was the "other man".

'Mrs Culver,' he said, 'it seems to me that you know more about this bomb affair than you realize yourself.'

Mrs Culver sat still and amazed, lost in boundless amazement. What was the connection? And she got so stiff all over that when the bell rang she couldn't turn her head, which sent Private Investigator Helms spinning on his heel.Mr. Culver had closed the door and the two men looked at each other for a moment.

Mr. Culver, without looking at his wife, walked up to the chief Detective, who was relieved to see him returning alone.

"You are here!" murmured Mr. Culver heavily. "Who are you looking for?"

"Nobody," Chief Detective Helms said in a low voice. "Look, I'd like a word or two with you."

Mr. Culver, still pale, had brought a determined expression with him. He still didn't look at his wife.He said:

"Then come in here." And he led the way into the living room.

As soon as the door was closed Mrs Culver jumped up from her chair and ran towards it as if to push it open, but instead fell on her knees and put her ear to the keyhole.The two men must have stopped as soon as they passed because she heard the chief Detective's voice clearly, although she could not see him pressing his finger firmly on her husband's chest.

'You're the other man, Culver.Two men were seen entering the park.”

And Mr. Culver's voice said:

"Well, take me now. What's to stop you?You have the right."

"Oh no! I know too well who you've betrayed yourself to. He'll have to handle this little matter all by himself. But make no mistake, it's me who found you out."

Then all she heard was mumbling. Detective Helms must have shown Mr. Culver the piece of Willie's coat because Willie's sister, guardian and protector heard her husband a little louder.

"I never noticed that she managed that evasive maneuver."

Again, for a time, Mrs Culver heard nothing but murmurs, the secret of which was less nightmarish to her brain than the dreadful hints of formed words.Then, on the other side of the door, Chief Detective Helms spoke up.

"You must have been crazy."

And Mr. Culver's voice answered, with a sort of somber fury:

"I've been mad for a month or more, but now I'm not angry. Everything is over. It will all come out of my head and there will be consequences.”

There was silence, and then Private Citizen Helms murmured:

"What's coming out?"

'Everything,' called Mr. Culver's voice, and then dropped very low.

After a while it rose again.

“You have known me for several years now and have also found me useful. You know I was a straight man.Yes, directly.”

This appeal to an old acquaintance must have been extremely uncomfortable for the chief Detective.

His voice was warning.

"Don't trust what you've been promised so much. If I were you I would disappear. I don't think we'll run after you."

Mr. Culver was heard laughing a little.

"Oh yes; you're hoping that the others will get rid of me for you — aren't you? No, no; you're not going to shake me off now. To these people, I've been a straight man for too long, and now it all needs to come out."

"Then let it come out," agreed Chief Detective Helms's indifferent voice."But tell me now, how did you escape?"

"I was walking down Chesterfield Walk," Mrs Culver heard her husband's voice, "when I heard the bang. That's when I started running. Fog. I didn't see anyone until I was past the end of George Street. I don't think I've met anyone until then."

"It's that simple!" marveled at Chief Detective Helms's voice. "The bang scared you, didn't it?"

"Yes; it was too soon," confessed Mr. Culver's dark, hoarse voice.

Mrs Culver pressed her ear to the keyhole;Her lips were blue, her hands cold as ice, and her pale face, in which the two eyes looked like two black holes, felt as if it were engulfed in flames.

On the other side of the door, the voices grew very quiet. Now and then she caught words, sometimes in her husband's voice, sometimes in the Chief Detective's soft tones. She heard this last sentence:

"We think he tripped on the root of a tree?"

There was a hoarse, talkative murmur that lasted for some time, and then the Chief Detective spoke with emphasis, as if answering a question.

"Of course. Blasted into small pieces: limbs, gravel, clothing, bones, splinters - all mixed up. I'm telling you, they had to get a shovel to collect it."

Mrs Culver suddenly jumped up from her crouched position, dropped her ears and staggered back and forth between the counter and the wall shelves, toward the chair. Her mad eyes noticed the sporty leaf the chief Detective had left behind and as she threw herself against the counter, she grabbed it and fell onto the chair, yanking the upbeat, rosy leaf across in an attempt to open it and tossing it then on the table floor. On the other side of the door, Chief Detective Helms said to Mr. Culver, the secret agent:

"So your defense will be effectively a full confession?"

"It will. I'll tell the whole story."

"You're not believed as much as you think you are."

And the chief Detective remained thoughtful. The turn this affair took meant the disclosure of many things - the squandering of fields of knowledge which, cultivated by an able man, had a distinct value to the individual and to society. I was sorry, sorry for interfering. It would leave Michaels unharmed; it would bring to light the professor's home industry; He mentally agreed with the words that Mr. Culver finally threw out in response to his last remark.disorganized the entire supervisory system; Don't put an end to the row in the papers, which from this point of view, by a sudden revelation, seemed to him to be invariably written by fools for morons to read.

"Maybe not. But it's going to mess up a lot of things. I was a straight man and I'm going to be honest about this as well..."

"If they let you," said the Chief Detective cynically. "You will no doubt be instructed before you are put in the dock. And at the end it may be that you will be let in on a sentence that will surprise you. I wouldn't put too much trust in the gentleman who spoke to you.”

Mr. Culver listened with a frown.

"My advice to you is to get out while you still can. I have no instructions. "There are some of them," Chief Detective Helms continued, putting special emphasis on the word "they," "who think you're already dead."

"As a matter of fact!" Mr. Culver was moved to say so. Although he had spent most of his time in the common room of an obscure little inn since his return from Greenwich, he could hardly hope for such good news.

"That's your impression." The Chief Detective nodded to him. "Get out. Out with it."

"To where?" growled Mr. Culver. Raising his head, he looked at the closed living room door and murmured soulfully, "I just wish you'd take me with you tonight." I'd feel free to go."

"I think so," the chief Detective agreed sardonically, following his gaze.

Mr. Culver's forehead was slightly damp. He confidentially lowered his hoarse voice to the unmoved Chief Detective.

“The boy was stupid and irresponsible. Every court would have seen that immediately. Only suitable for the institution. And that was the worst thing that could have happened to him if..."

The chief Detective, his hand on the doorknob, whispered in Mr. Culver's face.

"He might have been a moron, but you must have been crazy. What got you so blown away?”

Mr. Culver, thinking of Mr. William, did not hesitate in his choice of words.

"A Hyperborean pig," he hissed energetically. "A, what you might call it, a - a gentleman."

The chief Detective gave a short, understanding nod with a steady gaze and opened the door. Mrs Culver, who was behind the counter, might have heard his departure but not seen it, followed by the aggressive ringing of the bell. She was at her post behind the counter. She sat stiffly upright in the chair and had two dirty pink slips of paper spread out at her feet. Her palms were pressed convulsively to her face, fingertips pressed against her forehead as if the skin had been a mask she was ready to tear off violently.The utter immobility of her pose expressed the excitement of rage and despair, all the potential violence of tragic passions, better than any superficial display of screams and the banging of a distracted head against the walls could have done. Chief Detective Helms,He walked through the store at his busy, swinging pace, giving her only a cursory glance. And when the cracked bell stopped trembling on its curved steel band, nothing stirred near Mrs Culver, as if her stance had the holding power of a spell. Even the butterfly-shaped gas flames attached to the ends of the suspended T-brackets burned without a quiver.In this shop of seedy goods, lined with matt brown-painted shelves that seemed to devour the brilliance of the light, the gold circlet of the wedding ring on Mrs Culver's left hand shone exceedingly with the immaculate luster of one piece from a magnificent treasure trove of jewels set in a trash cans were thrown. as if her stance had the locking power of a spell. Even the butterfly-shaped gas flames attached to the ends of the suspended T-brackets burned without a quiver.In this shop of seedy goods, lined with matt brown-painted shelves that seemed to devour the brilliance of the light, the gold circlet of the wedding ring on Mrs Culver's left hand shone exceedingly with the immaculate luster of one piece from a magnificent treasure trove of jewels set in a trash cans were thrown. as if her stance had the locking power of a spell. Even the butterfly-shaped gas flames attached to the ends of the suspended T-brackets burned without a quiver.In this shop of seedy goods, lined with matt brown-painted shelves that seemed to devour the brilliance of the light, the gold circlet of the wedding ring on Mrs Culver's left hand shone exceedingly with the immaculate brilliance of one piece from a sumptuous hoard of jewels set in a trash cans were thrown.

CHAPTER X

The Deputy Commissioner, driven quickly in a hansom from the Soho neighborhood towards Westminster, disembarked at the center of the Empire, where the sun never sets. A few staunch policemen, who seemed unimpressed by the duty of guarding the lofty place, saluted him. As he entered the areas of the house, which in the minds of many millions is the house par excellence, through a portal that was not very high, he finally met the fugitive and revolutionary Teddy.

This kind and nice young man hid his surprise at the early arrival of the deputy commissioner, whom he was supposed to look after for a while at midnight. For him, showing up so early was a sign that things, whatever they were, had gone wrong. With an exceedingly ready sympathy that often goes hand in hand with a cheerful temper in nice youngsters, he felt sorry for the tall presence he dubbed “The Boss” and also for the deputy Detective, whose face seemed more menacingly wooden than ever. and wonderfully long. "What a strange, alien-looking fellow he is," he thought, smiling distantly with kindly mirth.And when they got together, he began to talk, kindly intending to bury the embarrassment of failure under a heap of words. It looked like the big attack that was looming that night would fizzle out. An inferior henchman of "that brute cheeseman" was about to mercilessly bore a very thin house with some shamelessly contrived statistics. He, Teddy, hoped he would bore her into counting every minute. But then it might just be taking the time to let the guzzling Cheeseman dine in peace. In any case, the boss could not be persuaded to go home.

"He'll see you right away, I think. He's sitting all alone in his room thinking about all the fish in the sea,” Teddy concluded lightly. "Come along."

Notwithstanding his kind nature, the young private secretary (unpaid) was amenable to the common foibles of humanity. He didn't want to hurt the feelings of the deputy commissioner, who, to him, looked unusually like a man who'd ruined his job. But his curiosity was too great to be contained by mere compassion. As they walked on, he couldn't help but toss lightly over his shoulder:

"And your spirit?"

"Caught," the Deputy Commissioner replied with a succinctness that was by no means meant to be off-putting.

"Good. You have no idea how much these big men hate being let down by small things."

After this profound observation, the seasoned Teddy seemed to think. Anyway, he didn't say anything for two seconds. Then:

"I'm glad. But - I say - is it really such a small thing as you imagine?"

"Do you know what you can do with a sprat?" asked the deputy commissioner in turn.

"He gets put in a sardine box sometimes," chuckled Teddy, whose scholarship on the subject of the fishing industry was fresh and vast compared to his ignorance of all other industrial matters. "On the Spanish coast there are sardine canning factories that..."

The deputy commissioner interrupted the statesman's apprentice.

"Yes. Yes. But sometimes a sprat is thrown away to catch a whale."

"A whale. Phew!" exclaimed Teddy, holding his breath. "So you're after a whale?"

"Not exactly. What I'm looking for looks more like a dogfish. You might not know what a dogfish is like."

"Yes; I do. We're up to our necks in special books - shelves full of them - with plates . . .

"Exactly as described," praised the deputy commissioner. “Only mine is completely clean-shaven. you saw him. It's a funny fish.”

"I saw him!" Teddy said in disbelief. "I can't imagine where I could have seen him."

"With the Explorers, I'd say," the deputy commissioner dropped calmly. At the name of this extremely exclusive club, Teddy looked scared and stopped.

"Nonsense," he protested, but in a reverent tone. "What do you mean? A member?"

"Volunteering," the deputy commissioner murmured through his teeth.

"Heaven!"

Teddy looked so surprised that the deputy commissioner smiled slightly.

"It's strictly between us," he said.

"That's the most disgusting thing I've ever heard in my life," Teddy said weakly, as if his astonishment had drained his life force in a second.

The deputy commissioner gave him a serious look. Until they got to the door of the big man's room, Teddy maintained an indignant and solemn silence, as if resentful of the Deputy Commissioner for revealing such an unsavory and disturbing fact. It revolutionized his conception of the Explorers' Club's extreme selection and social purity. Teddy was only revolutionary in politics; He wanted to keep his social beliefs and personal feelings unchanged throughout the years allotted to him on this earth, believing that overall it was a beautiful place to live.

He stepped aside.

"Go in without knocking," he said.

Shades of green silk hung low over all the lights gave the room something of the deep gloom of a forest. The haughty eyes were the great man's physical weakness. This point was kept secret. Whenever the opportunity arose, he conscientiously gave them rest.

The entering deputy Detective saw at first only a large, pale hand supporting a large head and hiding the upper part of a large, pale face. There was an open shipping box on the desk, along with a couple of long sheets of paper and a handful of quills. On the large, flat surface was absolutely nothing but a small bronze statuette, draped in a toga, mysteriously alert in its shadowy immobility. The Deputy Commissioner, who was asked to chair, took his seat. In the dim light, the salient features of his personality—long face, black hair, and lanky build—made him seem more of a stranger than ever.

The big man showed no surprise, no eagerness, no emotion. The pose in which he rested his menacing eyes was deeply meditative. He hasn't changed it in the slightest. But his tone was not dreamy.

"So! What have you found out already? On the first step, you encountered something unexpected."

"Not exactly unexpected, Sir Redethel. What I encountered first and foremost was a mental state.”

The Great Presence made a slight movement. "You must be clear, please."

"Yes, Sir Redethel. You no doubt know that most criminals will at some point feel an overwhelming need to confess something—to be honest with someone. And they often do it with the police. In this lock that Helms was dying to investigate, I found a man in this particular mental state. The man figuratively threw himself on my chest. It was enough for me to whisper who I was and add, "I know you're behind this." It must have seemed a miracle to him that we already knew, but he took it all in stride. That it was so wonderful didn't stop him for a moment.It only remained for me to ask him two questions: Who instigated you to do this? and who was the man who did it? He answered the first question with remarkable emphatic force. As for the second question, I'm assuming the guy with the bomb was his brother-in-law - quite a boy - a moron. . . . It's quite an odd thing – perhaps too long to fully explain now.”

"What did you learn then?" asked the tall man.

“Firstly, I have learned that ex-convict Michaels had nothing to do with it, although in fact the boy had been living with him in the country at times up until 8am this morning. It's more than likely Michaels didn't know about it until now.”

"Are you sure of that?" asked the tall man.

"Certainly, Sir Redethel. This Culverer went there this morning and took the boy with him on the pretext that he was walking in the streets. Since it wasn't the first time he had done this, Michaels couldn't harbor the slightest suspicion of anything unusual. Besides, Sir Redethel, this man's indignation had left Culver in no doubt—nothing at all. An extraordinary achievement, which you or I would hardly take seriously, but which obviously made a great impression on him, almost drove him insane.”

The deputy commissioner then briefly conveyed to the tall man, who sat quietly with his eyes resting under the visor of his hand, how much Mr. Culver appreciated Mr. Wladimir's approach and character. The deputy commissioner didn't seem to deny him a certain level of competence. But the great personality remarked:

"It all seems very fantastic."

"Not true? You'd think it was a cruel joke. But our man obviously took it seriously. He felt threatened. You know, he was in direct contact with the old Scott-Weber himself at the time and considered his services indispensable. It was a most rude awakening. I imagine he's lost his head. He got angry and scared. In my opinion, I get the impression that he thought these embassy people were quite capable not only of throwing him out, but of giving him away one way or another..."

"How long were you with him?" the presence behind his large hand interrupted him.

"About forty minutes, Sir Redethel, in a house of ill repute called the Continental Hotel, locked in a room which, incidentally, I used for the night. I found him under the influence of that reaction which follows the effort of a crime. The man cannot be called a hardened criminal. It is obvious that he did not plan the death of this miserable boy - his brother-in-law. That was a shock to him - I could see that. Maybe he's a man with strong sensibilities. Maybe he even liked the boy - who knows? He could have hoped the guy would get away;In that case, getting this thing to anyone's home would have been almost impossible. In any case, he consciously risked nothing more than his arrest.”

The Deputy Commissioner paused in his speculation to think for a moment.

"Although in this last instance he could hope for his own share of the business to be kept secret, I cannot imagine," he went on, in his ignorance of poor Willie's devotion to Mr. Culver (who was good) and above that his really peculiar stupidity, which in the old affair with the firecrackers on the stairs had for many years defied the entreaties, persuasion, anger and other inquiries of his beloved sister. Because Willie was loyal. . . . "No, I can't imagine that. It's possible he never thought of it at all.It sounds like an extravagant way of putting it, Sir Redethel, but his state of dismay reminded me of an impulsive man who, having committed suicide thinking it would end all his problems, found out that he was nothing caused such things.”

The deputy commissioner gave this definition with an apologetic voice. But in truth there is a kind of clarity inherent in flamboyant language, and the great man was not offended. A slight jerking movement of the large half of the body lost in the gloom of the green silk screens, the large head leaning on the large hand, accompanied a temporarily suppressed but powerful sound. The big man had laughed.

"What did you do to him?"

The deputy commissioner answered very readily:

"As he seemed anxious to get back to his wife in the shop, I let him go, Sir Redethel."

"You did? But the guy will disappear."

"Sorry. I don't think so. Where could he go? Furthermore, you must consider that he must also think of the danger posed by his Colleagues. He is at his post. How could he explain that he had left it " But even if there were no obstacles to his freedom of action, he would not do anything. He currently lacks the moral energy to make any decision. Allow me also to point out that if I had arrested him, we would have had a course of action and would have been obliged, to which I first wanted to know your exact intentions."

The great personality rose heavily, an imposing shadowy figure in the greenish gloom of the room.

"I'll see the Attorney General tonight and send it to you in the morning. Is there anything else you would like to tell me now?”

The deputy commissioner was also on his feet, slim and flexible.

"I don't think so, Sir Redethel, unless I go into details that—"

"NO. No details please."

The tall, shadowy figure seemed to flinch, as if physically afraid of detail; then he stepped forward, expansive, huge and heavy, and extended a large hand to him. "And you say that this man has a wife?"

"Yes, Sir Redethel," said the Deputy Commissioner, respectfully squeezing the outstretched hand. “A real wife and a real, respectable marital relationship. He told me that after his interview at the embassy he gave up everything, tried to sell his business and left the country, only he was sure that his wife would not even hear about going abroad. "Nothing could be more representative of the respectable bond than that," continued the deputy commissioner, with a touch of grimness, whose own wife had also refused to hear of a trip abroad. "Yes, a real wife. And the victim was a real brother-in-law.In a way, we are dealing with a domestic drama here.”

The deputy commissioner laughed a little; But the great man's thoughts seemed far away, perhaps on matters of his country's domestic affairs, the battlefield of his crusade against the Paynim Cheeseman. The deputy commissioner withdrew quietly and unnoticed, as if already forgotten.

He had his own crusade instincts. This affair, which Chief Detective Helms loathed in one way or another, seemed to him a providential starting point for a crusade. It was very important to him to start. He walked slowly home, pondering this venture on the way and reflecting on Mr. Culver's psychology in a mixed mood of disgust and satisfaction. He went all the way home. Finding the living room dark, he went upstairs and spent some time between the bedroom and the dressing room, changing his clothes and pacing with the air of a thoughtful sleepwalker.But he shook it off before heading back out to join his wife at the home of Michaelmas' great patroness.

He knew he would be welcome there. As he entered the smaller of the two salons, he saw his wife in a small group at the piano. A young composer who was about to become famous was talking from a music stool to two fat men whose backs looked old and three slim women whose backs looked young. Behind the screen, the tall lady had only two people with her: a man and a woman, seated side by side in armchairs at the foot of their sofa. She shook hands with the deputy commissioner.

"I never hoped to see you here tonight. Annie told me-"

"Yes. I had no idea that my work would be over so soon."

The deputy commissioner added quietly, "I am pleased to report that Michaels is fully aware -"

The ex-prisoner's patroness was outraged by this assurance.

"Why? Were your people stupid enough to associate him with...?"

"Not stupid," interrupted the deputy commissioner and respectfully disagreed. "Smart enough - pretty smart enough for that."

There was silence. The man at the foot of the couch had stopped speaking to the lady and was watching with a faint smile.

"I don't know if you've met before," said the tall lady.

Mr. William and the Deputy Commissioner acknowledged each other with punctual and reserved courtesy.

"He scared me," suddenly explained the lady sitting next to Mr. William, bowing her head to this gentleman. The deputy commissioner knew the lady.

"You don't look frightened," he announced after giving her a conscientious look with his tired and even gaze. He was now thinking to himself that sooner or later you meet everyone in this house. Mr. William's rosy face was covered with a smile because he was witty, but his eyes remained serious, like the eyes of a confident man.

"Well, at least he tried," the lady added.

"Perhaps out of habit," said the deputy commissioner, moved by an irresistible inspiration.

"He threatened society with all sorts of horrors," the lady continued, speaking softly and slowly, "on the occasion of that explosion in Greenwich Park." It seems we must all tremble with fear at what is to come if these people are not oppressed all over the world. I had no idea this was such a serious matter.”

Mr. William pretended not to be listening, leaned towards the sofa and spoke in a friendly and hushed voice, but he heard the deputy commissioner say:

"I have no doubt that Mr. William has a very clear idea of ??the true meaning of this matter."

Mr. William wondered what this confused and obtrusive policeman was getting at. Descended from generations who fell victim to the instruments of arbitrary power, he had racial, national, and individual fears of the police. It was an innate weakness, totally independent of his judgment, his reason, his experience. He was born for it. But this feeling, which resembled the irrational horror of some people for cats, did not stand in the way of his immense contempt for the English police. He finished the sentence addressed to the tall lady and swiveled slightly in his chair.

“They say we have a great experience with these people. Yes; In fact, we suffer greatly from their activity, while you” – Mr. William hesitated a moment, smiling and confused – “while you gladly endure their presence in your midst,” he concluded, showing a dimple on each clean-shaven cheek. He then added more seriously, "I might even say — because you do."

When Mr. William finished speaking, the deputy commissioner looked down and the conversation ended. Almost immediately after that, Mr. William said goodbye.

No sooner had he turned his back on the couch than the deputy Detective rose.

"I thought you'd stay and bring Annie home," Michaels' patron said.

"I think I still have a bit of work to do tonight."

"In connection-?"

"Well, in a way."

"Tell me, what is it really - this horror?"

"It's hard to say what it is, but it could still be a celebre," said the deputy commissioner.

He hurriedly left the salon and found Mr. William still in the hall, carefully wrapping a large silk handkerchief around his neck. Behind him a servant was waiting with his cloak. Another stood ready to open the door. The deputy commissioner was duly helped into his coat and let out immediately. After descending the front steps, he paused as if trying to decide which way to go. Seeing this through the open door, Mr. William stopped in the hallway, took out a cigar and asked for a light. It was furnished for him by an elderly man in livery with an air of calm solicitude. But the match went out;Then the servant closed the door, and Mr. William calmly lit his large Havana.

When he finally left the house, he was disgusted to see the "confused policeman" still standing on the sidewalk.

“Can he wait for me?” Mr. William thought, looking up and down for signs of a hansom. He didn't see any. A few carriages waited at the curb, their lamps burning steadily, the horses standing perfectly still as if carved in stone, the carriage drivers sat motionless under their great fur cloaks, not a quiver moving the white straps of their great whips. Mr. William walked on and the "damn cop" joined him. He did not say anything. At the end of the fourth step, Mr. William felt angry and restless. This couldn't last.

"Bad weather," he growled angrily.

"Mild," said the deputy commissioner without passion. He was silent for a while. "We caught a man named Culver," he announced casually.

Mr. William didn't stumble, didn't stagger back, didn't change his stride. But he couldn't help but exclaim, "What?" The Deputy Commissioner didn't repeat his statement. "You know him," he continued in the same tone.

Mr. William stopped and got throaty. "What makes you say that?"

"I don't. That's what Culver says."

"A kind of lying dog," said Mr. Wladimir in a somewhat oriental manner of speaking. But in his heart he was almost struck by the wondrous cleverness of the English police. The change in his mind on the subject was so violent that he felt slightly nauseous for a moment. He threw away his cigar and walked on.

"What has pleased me most about this affair," the assistant continued slowly, "is that it is an excellent starting point for a job that I feel needs to be taken on—namely, the clearing out of this one." Country with all the foreign political spies, the police and dogs like that. In my opinion they are a terrible nuisance; also an element of danger. But we can't track them down individually. The only way is to make their employers uncomfortable with their employment. Things are getting naughty. And also dangerous for us here.”

Mr. William paused again for a moment.

"What do you think?"

"The prosecution of this Culver will demonstrate both the danger and the indecency to the public."

"Nobody will believe what such a man says," said Mr. William contemptuously.

"The richness and precision of detail will win over the general public," said the deputy commissioner gently.

"So that's seriously what you want to do."

“We have the man; We have no choice."

"You will only fuel the lying spirit of these revolutionary scoundrels," protested Mr. William. "What do you want to make a scandal for? – Out of morale – or what?”

Mr. William's concern was obvious. Having thus ascertained that there must be some truth in Mr. Culver's summary statements, the Deputy Commissioner said indifferently:

“There is also a practical side. We really have enough to do to take care of the original. It cannot be said that we are not effective. But we do not intend to be bothered by deception on any pretext whatsoever.”

Mr. William's tone became haughty.

“For my part, I cannot share your view. It's selfish. There is no doubt about my feelings for my own country; But I always felt that we should also be good Europeans – I mean governments and men.”

"Yes," said the deputy commissioner simply. “You just look at Europe from its other side. But,” he continued in a good-natured tone, “foreign governments cannot complain about the inefficiency of our police force.” Look at this outrage; A case that is particularly difficult to prosecute because of the fraud involved. In less than 12 hours, we've uncovered the identity of a man literally torn to pieces, found the organizer of the assassination, and got a glimpse of the instigator behind him. And we could have gone further; only we stopped at the borders of our territory.”

"So this revealing crime was planned abroad," Mr. William said quickly. "Do you admit that it was planned abroad?"

"Theoretically. Only theoretically, on foreign territory; 'Abroad only through a fiction,' said the deputy commissioner, alluding to the nature of embassies that are supposed to be an integral part of the country to which they belong. 'But that is a detail. I spoke to you about this matter because it is your government that complains the most about our police force. You can see that we are not so bad. I wanted to tell you in particular about our success."

"I must be very grateful," Mr. William murmured through his teeth.

"We can identify every anarchist here," the Deputy Commissioner continued, as if quoting Chief Detective Helms. "Now it's just a matter of getting rid of the Agent Provocateur to make everything safe."

Mr. William held out his hand to a passing carter.

"You don't go in here," remarked the deputy commissioner, gazing at a building of noble proportions and hospitable appearance, with the light of a great hall falling through its glass doors onto a wide staircase.

But Mr. William, who was sitting in the car with a stony expression, drove away without a word.

The deputy commissioner himself did not enter the noble building. It was the Explorers' Club. The thought went through his mind that in the future you would not see Mr. William, honorary member, there so often. He looked at his watch. It was only half past nine. He had had a very full evening.

CHAPTER XI

After Chief Detective Helms left him, Mr. Culver walked about the sitting room.

From time to time he eyed his wife through the open door. 'She knows all about it now,' he thought, with regret at her grief and a certain satisfaction in himself. Mr. Culver's soul, though perhaps not large enough, was capable of tender feelings. The idea of ??breaking the news to her had sent him into a fever. Chief Detective Helms had relieved him of that duty. That was good so far. Now it was left to him to confront her grief.

Mr. Culver never imagined he would have to deal with death, the catastrophic nature of which neither cunning reasoning nor convincing eloquence can dispel. Mr. Culver never intended Willie to perish by such sudden violence. He didn't want him to perish at all. Dead Willie was a far greater nuisance than he had ever been when he was alive. Mr. Culver had promised a favorable outcome to his enterprise, relying not on Willie's intelligence, which sometimes plays strange tricks on a man, but on the boy's blind docility and blind devotion. Though not a great psychologist, Mr. Culver had recognized the depth of Willie's fanaticism.He dared to entertain the hope that Willie would leave the walls of the observatory as he had been instructed, taking the path he had been shown several times before and returning to his brother-in-law. the wise and good Mr. Culver, outside the park grounds. Fifteen minutes should have been enough for the biggest idiot to turn off the engine and walk away. And the professor had guaranteed more than fifteen minutes. But Willie had stumbled within five minutes of being left to his own devices. And Mr. Culver was morally shaken. He had foreseen anything but that.He had foreseen that Willie would be distracted and lost - wanted - and eventually found in a police station or backcountry workhouse. He had expected Willie to be arrested and was not afraid, for Mr. Culver had a high opinion of Willie's loyalty, which on many walks had been carefully drummed into him with the need for silence. Strolling the streets of London like a wandering philosopher, Mr. Culver had changed Willie's view of the police through conversations full of subtle arguments. Never has a sage had a more attentive and admiring disciple.The submission and adoration were so evident that Mr. Culver felt something akin to affection for the boy. In any case, he hadn't expected his connection to be expressed quickly. His wife sewing the boy's address into his coat as a precaution was the last thing on Mr. Culver's mind. You can't think of everything. That's what she meant when she said he didn't have to worry if he lost Willie during their walks. She had assured him that the boy would turn up well. Well, he had shown up with a vengeance! The submission and adoration were so evident that Mr. Culver felt something akin to affection for the boy.In any case, he hadn't expected his connection to be expressed quickly. His wife sewing the boy's address into his coat as a precaution was the last thing on Mr. Culver's mind. You can't think of everything. That's what she meant when she said he didn't have to worry if he lost Willie during their walks. She had assured him that the boy would turn up fine. Well, he had shown up with a vengeance! The submission and adoration were so evident that Mr. Culver felt something akin to affection for the boy. In any case, he hadn't expected his connection to be expressed quickly.His wife sewing the boy's address into his coat as a precaution was the last thing on Mr. Culver's mind. You can't think of everything. That's what she meant when she said he didn't have to worry if he lost Willie during their walks. She had assured him that the boy would turn up fine. Well, he had shown up with a vengeance! That's what she meant when she said he didn't have to worry if he lost Willie during their walks. She had assured him that the boy would turn up fine. Well, he had shown up with a vengeance! That's what she meant when she said he didn't have to worry if he lost Willie during their walks.She had assured him that the boy would turn up fine. Well, he had shown up with a vengeance!

'Well,' murmured Mr. Culver, puzzled. What did she mean by that? Save him the trouble of keeping an eye on Willie? Most likely she had meant well. Only she should have told him about the precaution she had taken.

Mr. Culver went behind the counter. It was not his intention to heap bitter reproaches on his wife. Mr. Culver felt no bitterness. The unexpected turn of events had converted him to the doctrine of fatalism. Now nothing more could be helped. He said:

"I didn't mean to harm the boy."

Mrs Culver shuddered at the sound of her husband's voice. She didn't reveal her face. The late Honorable Scott-Weber's trusted secret agent looked at her for a while with a heavy, insistent, and uncomprehending gaze. The torn evening paper lay at her feet. It couldn't have said much to her. Mr. Culver felt the need to speak to his wife.

"It's this damn Helms – what?" he said. "He upset you. He's a brute who blurts it out to a woman. I got sick thinking about how to teach you. I sat in Cheshire Cheese's little parlor for hours thinking about how best to do it. You understand that I have never done anything bad to that boy.”

Mr. Culver, the secret agent, was telling the truth. It was his marital affection that suffered the greatest shock from the premature outburst. He added:

"I wasn't feeling particularly happy sitting there thinking about you."

He noticed another slight shudder from his wife, affecting his sensitivity. When she insisted on hiding her face in her hands, he figured he'd better leave her alone for a while. At that gentle impulse, Mr. Culver withdrew again into the drawing-room, where the jet of gas purred like a contented cat. Mrs Culver's marital foresight had meant that Mr. Culver's supper was cold beef with a carving knife and fork and half a loaf of bread. He noticed all this for the first time, cut off a piece of bread and meat and began to eat.

His appetite was not based on numbness. Mr. Culver had not eaten breakfast that day. He had left home fasting. Not being a vigorous man, he found his resolve in the nervous excitement that seemed to be gripping him mostly by the neck. He couldn't have swallowed anything solid. Michaels' hut was as meager in provisions as a prisoner's cell. The holiday apostle lived on a little milk and stale crusts of bread. Besides, after his modest meal, Mr. Culver had already gone upstairs when he arrived. He was absorbed in the toil and pleasure of literary composition, and had not even answered Mr. Culver's call up the short flight of stairs.

"I'm taking this young guy home for a day or two."

And sure enough, Mr. Culver did not wait for an answer, but marched out of the cottage at once, followed by the obedient Willie.

Now that it was all over, and his fate slipped out of his hands with unexpected swiftness, Mr. Culver felt terribly physically empty. He cut the meat, cut the bread, and devoured his supper while standing at the table, glancing now and then at his wife. Her continued immobility disturbed the comfort of his thinking. He went back into the store and got very close to her. This veiled-faced sorrow made Mr. Culver uneasy. He expected his wife to be very upset, of course, but he wanted her to pull herself together. He needed all of her help and all of her loyalty in these new situations that his fatalism had already accepted.

"There's nothing to be done," he said in a tone of somber concern. "Come on, Gwen, we have to think about tomorrow. You'll want to have all your wits on you after I'm taken away."

He stopped. Mrs Culver's chest heaved convulsively. This was not reassuring to Mr. Culver, who felt that the newly created situation required calm, determination and other qualities from the two most affected that were incompatible with the mental disorder of passionate grief. Mr. Culver was a human man; He had come home and was ready to give free rein to his wife's affection for her brother.

Only he understood neither the nature nor the full extent of this feeling. And in that he was forgivable, for it was impossible for him to understand without ceasing to be himself. He was shocked and disappointed, and his speech expressed this with a certain harsh tone.

"You could be looking at a guy," he remarked after waiting a while.

As if by the hands covering Mrs Culver's face, the reply came deadened, almost pathetic.

"As long as I live, I don't want to look at you."

"Ah? What!' Mr. Culver was merely astonished at the superficial and literal meaning of this statement. It was evidently unreasonable, the mere cry of exaggerated sorrow. He threw over it the cloak of his marital satisfaction. Mr. Culver's mind lacked profound Impression that the worth of an individual is what he is in himself, he could not possibly comprehend the worth of Willie in the eyes of Mrs. Culver. She took it damn hard, he thought to himself. It was all the fault of that damn Helms. What did he want to upset the woman for ?But for her own good, she must not be allowed to go on like this until she is beside herself.

"Look here! 'You can't sit in the shop like that,' he said with an affected sternness that contained a certain annoyance; for pressing practical matters have to be discussed when they have to stay up all night. 'Someone might come in at any moment ' he added, and waited again. There was no effect, and during the pause the thought of the finality of death struck Mr. Culver. He changed his tone. 'Come. "It won't bring him back," he said softly, feeling ready to take her in his arms and hold her to his chest where impatience and compassion lived side by side.But, save for a brief shudder, Mrs Culver seemed unaffected by the force of that dreadful truism. It was Mr. Culver himself who was touched. In his simplicity he urged moderation by asserting the claims of his own personality.

"Be sensible, Gwen. What would it have been like if you had lost me!”

He had vaguely expected to hear her scream. But she didn't move. She leaned back a little and fell silent in a completely unreadable silence. Mr. Culver's heart began to beat faster with desperation and something that resembled apprehension. He put his hand on her shoulder and said:

"Don't be a fool, Gwen."

She gave no sign. It was impossible to have a meaningful conversation with a woman whose face you couldn't see. Mr. Culver grabbed his wife's wrists. But her hands seemed glued. She staggered forward under his pull and almost fell off her chair. Startled to feel her limp so helplessly, he was trying to put her back in the chair when she suddenly went very stiff, jerked her hands free and ran out of the shop, across the drawing room and into the kitchen. That was very fast. He'd only caught a glimpse of her face and enough of her eyes to know she wasn't looking at him.

It all seemed like a battle for possession of a chair, for Mr. Culver immediately took his wife's place. Mr. Culver did not cover his face with his hands, but a somber thoughtfulness veiled his features. A prison sentence could not be avoided. He didn't want to avoid it now. A prison was a place as safe from certain acts of unlawful revenge as the grave, with the advantage that there was room for hope in a prison. What he had in mind was prison, parole, and then a life somewhere abroad like he had already considered in case of failure.Well, it was a failure, if not exactly the kind of failure he feared. It had been such a close success that he could have startled Mr. William out of his wild mockery with this proof of occult effectiveness. At least that's how it seemed to Mr. Culver now. His standing at the embassy would have been enormous if his wife hadn't had the unfortunate idea of ??sewing the address into Willie's coat. Mr. Culver, being no fool, had soon recognized the extraordinary character of his influence on Willie, though he did not quite understand its origin - the lesson of his supreme wisdom and goodness instilled in him by two concerned women.In whatever eventuality he had foreseen, Mr. Culver had reckoned with the right insight into Willie's instinctive loyalty and blind discretion. The eventuality he had not foreseen had terrified him as a humane man and a loving husband. From all other points of view it was rather advantageous. Nothing can match the eternal agency of death. Mr. Culver, sitting perplexed and frightened in the small drawing room of the Cheshire Cheese, He could not help but admit it to himself, for his sensitivity did not interfere with his judgment. Willie's violent disintegration, disturbing as it is, only ensured success;Because, of course, the aim of Mr. William's threats was not to tear down a wall, but to achieve a moral effect. It could be said that the effect was achieved with great effort and distress on the part of Mr. Culver. However, when quite unexpectedly billeted in Brett Street, Mr. Culver, who had fought like a man in a nightmare to retain his position, took the blow in the spirit of a staunch fatalist.The position actually came about through no one's fault. A small, tiny fact had caused it. It was like slipping on a piece of orange peel in the dark and breaking your leg. because his sensitivity did not get in the way of his judgement.Willie's violent disintegration, disturbing as it is, only ensured success; Because, of course, the aim of Mr. William's threats was not to tear down a wall, but to achieve a moral effect. It could be said that the effect was achieved with great effort and distress on the part of Mr. Culver. However, when quite unexpectedly billeted in Brett Street, Mr. Culver, who had fought like a man in a nightmare to retain his position, took the blow in the spirit of a staunch fatalist. The position actually came about through no one's fault. A small, tiny fact had caused it. It was like slipping on a piece of orange peel in the dark and breaking your leg.because his sensitivity did not get in the way of his judgment. Willie's violent disintegration, disturbing as it is, only ensured success; Because, of course, the aim of Mr. William's threats was not to tear down a wall, but to achieve a moral effect. It could be said that the effect was achieved with great effort and distress on the part of Mr. Culver.However, when quite unexpectedly billeted in Brett Street, Mr. Culver, who had fought like a man in a nightmare to retain his position, took the blow in the spirit of a staunch fatalist. The position actually came about through no one's fault. A small, tiny fact had caused it.It was like slipping on a piece of orange peel in the dark and breaking your leg. As troubling as it may be, it only ensured success; Because, of course, the aim of Mr. William's threats was not to tear down a wall, but to achieve a moral effect. It could be said that the effect was achieved with great effort and distress on the part of Mr. Culver. However, when quite unexpectedly billeted in Brett Street, Mr. Culver, who had fought like a man in a nightmare to retain his position, took the blow in the spirit of a staunch fatalist. The position actually came about through no one's fault. A small, tiny fact had caused it.It was like slipping on a piece of orange peel in the dark and breaking your leg. As troubling as it may be, it only ensured success; Because, of course, the aim of Mr. William's threats was not to tear down a wall, but to achieve a moral effect. It could be said that the effect was achieved with great effort and distress on the part of Mr. Culver. However, when quite unexpectedly billeted in Brett Street, Mr. Culver, who had fought like a man in a nightmare to retain his position, took the blow in the spirit of a staunch fatalist. The position actually came about through no one's fault. A small, tiny fact had caused it.It was like slipping on a piece of orange peel in the dark and breaking your leg. It could be said that the effect was achieved with great effort and distress on the part of Mr. Culver. However, when quite unexpectedly billeted in Brett Street, Mr. Culver, who had fought like a man in a nightmare to retain his position, took the blow in the spirit of a staunch fatalist. The position actually came about through no one's fault. A small, tiny fact had caused it.It was like slipping on a piece of orange peel in the dark and breaking your leg. It could be said that the effect was achieved with great effort and distress on the part of Mr. Culver.However, when quite unexpectedly billeted in Brett Street, Mr. Culver, who had fought like a man in a nightmare to retain his position, took the blow in the spirit of a staunch fatalist. The position actually came about through no one's fault. A small, tiny fact had caused it. It was like slipping on a piece of orange peel in the dark and breaking your leg. The position actually came about through no one's fault. A small, tiny fact had caused it. It was like slipping on a piece of orange peel in the dark and breaking your leg. The position actually came about through no one's fault.A small, tiny fact had caused it. It was like slipping on a piece of orange peel in the dark and breaking your leg.

Mr. Culver took a weary breath. He held no grudge against his wife. He thought: She has to run the shop while they lock me up. And when he also thought about how terribly she would miss Willie at first, he worried a lot about her health and her spirit. How would she bear her loneliness - all alone in this house? Wouldn't it be enough for her to collapse while he's locked up? What would become of the store then? The store was an asset. Although Mr. Culver's fatalism accepted his downfall as a secret agent, he had no desire to be completely ruined, mostly, it must be admitted, out of consideration for his wife.

Silent and out of sight in the kitchen, she frightened him. If only she had had her mother with her. But that silly old woman - Mr. Culver was seized with angry dismay. He needs to talk to his wife. He could certainly tell her that under certain circumstances a man is indeed desperate. But he didn't hesitate to share this information with her. At first it was clear to him that this evening was no time for business. He got up to close the street door and dump the gas in the store.

Having thus secured solitude around his hearth, Mr. Culver entered the sitting room and glanced into the kitchen. Mrs Culver sat in the place where poor Willie would normally settle in the evenings, with paper and pencil to draw those strings of lights made up of myriad circles that suggested chaos and eternity. Her arms were crossed on the table and her head rested on her arms. Mr. Culver studied her back and the arrangement of her hair for a while and then walked away from the kitchen door.Mrs Culver's philosophical, almost contemptuous, disinterestedness, which formed the basis of their understanding of domestic life, made her extremely difficult to get in touch with, now that tragic necessity had arisen. Mr. Culver clearly sensed this difficulty.

Since curiosity is a form of self-disclosure, a systematically uninterested person always remains partly mysterious. Every time he passed the door, Mr. Culver would cast an uneasy look at his wife. It wasn't that he was afraid of her. Mr. Culver imagined being loved by this woman. But she hadn't trained him to utter confidence. And the trust he needed to build was deeply psychological. How, despite his lack of practice, could he tell her even vaguely what he felt himself: that there are conspiracies with deadly fates, that an idea sometimes grows in a mind until it has an external existence, a power in its own right and even a… suggestive voice ?He couldn't tell her that a man could be haunted by a fat, witty, clean-shaven face until the wildest way of getting rid of it, a child of wisdom, seemed to him.

At this mental allusion to a first secretary of a great embassy, ??Mr. Culver paused in the doorway, glared at the kitchen, fists clenched, and turned to his wife.

"You don't know what kind of monster I was dealing with."

He started to stroll across the table again; When he got back to the door, he stopped and stared at the door from two steps up.

"A silly, mocking, dangerous brute who has no more sense than- After all these years!" A man like me! And I played my head on this game. you didn't know Also absolutely correct. What was the point of telling you that in the seven years we've been married I'd be in danger of getting a knife in me at any time? I'm not the type to worry about a woman who likes me. You had nothing to know.' Mr. Culver turned angrily around the sitting room again.

"A poisonous beast," he began again from the door. "Drive me into a ditch to starve for a joke. I could tell he thought it was a damn good joke. A man like me! Look here! Some of the highest peaks in the world still have me to thank for walking on their two feet. That's the man you married, my girl!"

He noticed that his wife had sat up. Mrs Culver's arms remained outstretched on the table. Mr. Culver looked after her as if he could see the effect of his words there.

“In the last eleven years there has not been an assassination attempt in which I have not risked my life. There are dozens of these revolutionaries I sent with their bombs in the pockets of the guilty to be caught at the border. The old Honorable knew what I was worth to his country. And then suddenly there comes a pig – an ignorant, presumptuous pig.”

Mr. Culver slowly descended two steps, entered the kitchen, took a glass from the dresser and, without looking at his wife, went to the sink with it. "It wasn't the old Honorable who committed the wicked folly of getting me to see him at eleven in the morning. There are two or three in this town who, if they had seen me, would sooner or later have dared to hit me on the head. It was a stupid, murderous ploy to expose a man - like me - for nothing."

Mr. Culver turned on the tap over the sink and downed three glasses of water one after the other to douse the flames of his indignation. Mr. William's behavior was like an incendiary stick, which upset his internal economy. He could not overcome disloyalty. This man, unwilling to labor at the usual arduous tasks that society imposes on its humbler members, had exercised his secret industry with tireless devotion. There was a treasure of loyalty in Mr. Culver. He had been loyal to his employers, to the cause of social stability, and also to his affections, as was evident when, having put the glass in the sink, he turned and said:

"If I hadn't thought of you, I would have grabbed the tyrant by the throat and rammed his head into the chimney. I could have been more than a match for that pink-faced, clean-shaven man..."

Mr. Culver failed to finish the sentence as if there was no doubt about the last word. For the first time in his life he confided in this indifferent woman. The uniqueness of the event, the power and importance of the personal feelings aroused in the course of this confession, drove Mr. Culver's thoughts of Willie's fate from his mind. The boy's stuttering existence of fear and indignation, and the violence of his end, had vanished from Mr. Culver's mind for a time. For this reason, when he looked up, he was startled at his wife's inappropriate look.It wasn't a wild look and he wasn't distracted, but his attention was peculiar and unsatisfactory in that it seemed to be focused on a point beyond Mr. Culver's person. The impression was so strong that Mr. Culver looked over his shoulder. There was nothing behind him, just the whitewashed wall. Gwen Culver's excellent husband saw no signs on the wall. He turned to his wife again and repeated with some emphasis:

"I would have grabbed his throat. As surely as I'm standing here, if I hadn't thought of you, I would have nearly choked the brute's life before I let him get up. And don't you think he would have called the police too? He wouldn't have dared. You understand why - don't you?"

He blinked knowingly at his wife.

'No,' said Mrs Culver flatly and without even looking at him. "What are you talking about?"

A great discouragement, the result of weariness, came upon Mr. Culver. He had had a very tiring day and his nerves had been stretched to the limit. After a month of mad sorrow that ended in an unexpected catastrophe, Mr. Culver's storm-tossed spirit longed for rest. His career as a secret agent had come to an end that no one could have foreseen; Only now maybe he could finally manage to get a night's sleep. But when he looked at his wife, he doubted it. She took it very hard - not at all like herself, he thought. He tried to speak.

"You need to pull yourself together, my girl," he said sympathetically. "What has been done cannot be undone."

Mrs Culver flinched slightly, although not a muscle moved on her white face. Mr. Culver, not looking at her, went on thoughtfully.

"You're going to bed now. What you want is a good scream.”

This opinion had nothing to commend except the general assent of mankind. It is well known that every feeling a woman has is bound to end in a shiver, as if it were nothing more substantial than vapor floating in the sky. And it is very likely that if Willie had died in his bed under her desperate gaze and in her protective arms, Mrs Culver's grief would have found relief in a flood of bitter and pure tears. Mrs Culver, like other people, had a sufficient store of unconscious resignation to deal with the normal manifestation of human destiny. Without "breaking her head over it," she knew she "couldn't bear to dwell on it too much."But the deplorable circumstances of Willie's death, which Mr. Culver believed were episodic and part of a larger catastrophe, dried her tears at the source. It was the effect of a white-hot iron drawn across her eyes; At the same time, her heart, hardened and frozen to a lump of ice, held her body in an inner shudder, set her features in a frozen, contemplative stillness, turned to a whitewashed wall with no writing on it. The exigencies of Mrs Culver's temperament, which if stripped of its philosophical reserve was maternal and violent, compelled her to turn a series of thoughts in her still head.These thoughts were more imagined than expressed. Mrs Culver was a woman who spoke exceedingly few words, either for public or private use. With the anger and dismay of a betrayed woman, she reviewed the course of her life in visions that focused on Willie's difficult existence from his earliest days. It was a life with a single purpose and a noble unity of inspiration, like those rare lives that have left their mark on the thoughts and feelings of mankind. But Mrs. Culver's visions lacked refinement and grandeur.She imagined putting the boy to bed by the light of a single candle on the deserted top floor of a "commercial building," dark under the roof and exceedingly sparkling with lights and cut glass at street level like a fairytale palace. This malevolent splendor was the only one to be found in Mrs. Culver's visions. She remembered brushing the boy's hair and tying his apron—she still wore an apron herself; the comfort given by another creature almost as small but not quite so frightened to a small and badly frightened creature; she had the vision that the blows were intercepted (often with her own head),a door desperately kept shut against a man's anger (not for very long); a poker thrown once (not very far) that sunk that particular storm into the mute and dreadful stillness that followed a clap of thunder. And all these scenes of violence came and went, accompanied by the uncultured din of deep screams from a man whose fatherly pride was hurt and who declared that he was obviously cursed because one of his children was a "drooling Idjut and the other a wicked she-devil." ” That was said of her many years ago.And all these scenes of violence came and went, accompanied by the uncultured din of deep screams from a man whose fatherly pride was hurt and who declared that he was obviously cursed because one of his children was a "drooling Idjut and the other a wicked she-devil." ” That was said of her many years ago. And all these scenes of violence came and went, accompanied by the uncultured din of deep screams from a man whose fatherly pride was hurt and who declared that he was obviously cursed because one of his children was a "drooling Idjut and the other a wicked she-devil." ” That was said of her many years ago.

Mrs Culver heard the words again, eerily, and then the desolate shadow of Belgravian mansion fell on her shoulders. It was a crushing memory, an exhausting vision of countless breakfast trays carried up and down countless flights of stairs, of endless haggling for Penny, of the endless drudgery of sweeping, dusting, and cleaning from basement to attic; while the unconscious mother, reeling on swollen legs, cooked in a filthy kitchen, and poor Willie, the unconscious chief genius of all her toils, blackened the gentlemen's boots in the scullery.But this vision had an air of a hot London summer in it, and the central figure was a young man in Sunday clothes, with a straw hat on his dark head and a wooden pipe in his mouth. Affectionate and cheerful, he was a fascinating companion on a journey through life's glittering stream; only his boat was very small. There was room for a partner at the helm, but no room for passengers. He was allowed to step away from the threshold of the Belgravian mansion while Gwen averted her tearful eyes. He wasn't a lodger.The tenant was Mr. Culver, lazy and working late, sleepy under his covers and jokingly looking over a morning, but with a glimmer of infatuation in his heavy lids and always with some money in his pockets. There were no sparks on the sluggish stream of his life. It flowed through secret places. But his barque appeared to be a roomy craft, and his taciturn magnanimity took the presence of passengers as a matter of course. but no accommodation for passengers. He was allowed to step away from the threshold of the Belgravian mansion while Gwen averted her tearful eyes. He wasn't a lodger.The tenant was Mr. Culver, lazy and working late, sleepy under his covers and jokingly looking over a morning, but with a glimmer of infatuation in his heavy lids and always with some money in his pockets. There were no sparks on the sluggish stream of his life. It flowed through secret places. But his barque appeared to be a roomy craft, and his taciturn magnanimity took the presence of passengers as a matter of course. but no accommodation for passengers. He was allowed to step away from the threshold of the Belgravian mansion while Gwen averted her tearful eyes. He wasn't a lodger.The tenant was Mr. Culver, lazy and working late, sleepy under his covers and jokingly looking over a morning, but with a glimmer of infatuation in his heavy lids and always with some money in his pockets. There were no sparks on the sluggish stream of his life. It flowed through secret places. But his barque appeared to be a roomy craft, and his taciturn magnanimity took the presence of passengers as a matter of course. sleepy, joking mornings under his covers, but with gleams of infatuation on his heavy lids and always some money in his pockets. There were no sparks on the sluggish stream of his life. It flowed through secret places.But his barque appeared to be a roomy craft, and his taciturn magnanimity took the presence of passengers as a matter of course. sleepy, joking mornings under his covers, but with gleams of infatuation on his heavy lids and always some money in his pockets. There were no sparks on the sluggish stream of his life. It flowed through secret places. But his barque appeared to be a roomy craft, and his taciturn magnanimity took the presence of passengers as a matter of course.

Mrs Culver envisioned a seven-year security for Willie, for which she loyally paid; of security growing into confidence, into a homely feeling, stagnant and deep like a calm pond, whose guarded surface scarcely trembled at the occasional passing of Colleague Adjepong, the sturdy anarchist with shamelessly inviting eyes, whose gaze had a corrupt clarity that sufficed , to enlighten every woman not completely stupid.

It was only a few seconds since the last word was said aloud in the kitchen and Mrs Culver was already staring at the vision of an episode no more than a fortnight old. With eyes that were extremely dilated, she stared at the vision of her husband and poor Willie walking side by side down Brett Street from the store. It was the last scene of an existence created by Mrs Culver's genius; an existence alien to all grace and charm, bereft of beauty and almost decency, but admirable in continuity of feeling and tenacity of intention.And this last vision had such plastic relief, such nearness of form, such fidelity of suggestive detail, that it elicited from Mrs Culver an anxious and feeble murmur, reproducing the supreme illusion of her life, a horrified murmur that turned pale dead lips.

"Could have been father and son."

Mr. Culver stopped and lifted a worried face. "Ah? What did you say?" he asked. Receiving no answer, he continued his dark footsteps. Then, with a menacing movement of his thick, fleshy fist, he broke out:

"Yes. The embassy people. Quite a lot, isn't it? Before a week is out I'm going to make some of them wish 20 feet underground. Uh? What?"

He looked sideways, head bowed. Mrs Culver looked at the whitewashed wall. An empty wall - completely empty. A void to run into and bang your head on. Mrs Culver sat motionless. She remained still, as the populace of half the earth would remain still in amazement and despair if, by the perfidy of a familiar providence, the sun suddenly vanished from the summer sky.

'The message,' Mr. Culver began again, after initially grimacing and baring his teeth wolfishly. "I wish I could get away with a stick in there for half an hour. I pounded until there wasn't a single intact bone left. But anyway, I'm still going to teach them what it means to throw a man like me out to rot in the streets. I have a tongue in my head. The whole world will know what I have done for them. I'm not afraid. I do not care. Everything will come out. Any damn thing. let them be careful!”

With these words Mr. Culver expressed his desire for revenge. It was a very appropriate revenge. It corresponded to the intuitions of Mr. Culver's genius. It also had the advantage of being within the bounds of its power and could easily adapt to the practice of its life, which had precisely been betraying the secret and unlawful actions of those around it. Anarchists or diplomats were all one for him. Mr. Culver, by nature, had no respect for people. His contempt extended evenly over the entire field of his operations. But as a member of a revolutionary proletariat - which he undoubtedly was - he was rather hostile to social distinctions.

"Nothing on earth can stop me now," he added, pausing while staring at his wife, who was staring at a blank wall.

The silence in the kitchen continued and Mr. Culver was disappointed. He had expected his wife to say something. But Mrs Culver's lips, held in their usual form, retained a statuesque immobility, like the rest of her face. And Mr. Culver was disappointed. But the occasion, he realized, required no speech from her. She was a woman of very few words. For reasons that were fundamental to his psychology, Mr. Culver was inclined to trust any woman who had given herself to him. That's why he trusted his wife. Their match was perfect but not precise.It was a tacit understanding that suited Mrs Culver's curiosity and Mr. Culver's indolent and secretive habits of mind. They refrained from getting to the bottom of the facts and motives.

This reticence, which in a way reflected their deep trust in each other, also introduced a certain element of vagueness into their intimacy. No system of marital relationships is perfect. Mr. Culver assumed his wife understood him, but he would have liked to hear what she was thinking. It would have been a consolation.

There were several reasons why he was denied that comfort. There was a physical obstacle: Mrs Culver did not have a good command of her voice. She saw no alternative between screaming and silence and instinctively choose silence. Gwen Culver was a taciturn temperament. And there was the paralyzing cruelty of the thought that occupied her. Her cheeks were pale, her lips ashen, her immobility amazing. And she thought, without looking at Mr. Culver: 'This man took the boy to murder him.' He kidnapped the boy from his house to murder him. He took the boy away from me to kill him!”

Mrs Culver's whole being was shaken by this inconclusive and insane thought. It was in her veins, in her bones, in the roots of her hair. In spirit she adopted the biblical attitude of mourning—the covered face, the torn robes; The sound of wails and wails filled her head. But her teeth were fiercely clenched and her tearless eyes were hot with rage because she was not a submissive being. The protection she offered her brother originated in a fierce and indignant expression on her face. She had to love him with a fighting love. She had fought for him - even against herself.His loss had the bitterness of defeat combined with the agony of a confused passion. It wasn't an ordinary stroke. Besides, it wasn't death that took Willie from her. It was Mr. Culver who took him away. She had seen him. She had watched him take the boy away without raising a hand. And she had let him go like - like an idiot - a blind idiot. Then, after murdering the boy, he came to her house. He just came home like any other man would come home to his wife. . . .

Through clenched teeth, Mrs Culver murmured to the wall:

"And I thought he had caught a cold."

Mr. Culver heard these words and made them his own.

"It was nothing," he said moodily. "I was angry. I was annoyed with your account."

Mrs Culver slowly turned her head and shifted her gaze from the wall to her husband's person. Mr. Culver looked at the floor with his fingertips between his lips.

"It can't be helped," he murmured, dropping his hand. "You have to pull yourself together. You will need all your wits. It's you who brought the police to our ears. Anyway, I'm not going to say anything more,' Mr. Culver continued magnanimously. "You could not know that."

'I couldn't,' breathed Mrs Culver. It was as if a corpse had spoken. Mr. Culver resumed the thread of his speech.

"I do not blame you. I'll make her sit up. Once it's under lock and key, it's safe enough for me to talk - you understand? You must reckon I'm two years away from you," he continued in a tone of genuine concern. "It will be easier for you than for me. You're going to have something to do while I - Look, Gwen, what you have to do is keep this business going for two years. You know enough for that. you have a good head I'll let you know when it's time to start selling. You must be extra careful. The Colleagues will keep an eye on you all the time.You must be as skilled as you can and as close as the grave. Nobody can know what you're going to do. I don't mind getting hit in the head or stabbed in the back once I'm let out."

So spoke Mr. Culver, turning his mind with ingenuity and foresight to the problems of the future. His voice was somber because he had correctly assessed the situation. Anything he didn't want to happen had happened. The future had become precarious. Perhaps his judgment had been momentarily clouded by his fear of Mr. William's recalcitrant folly. A man a little over forty can be excusably thrown into considerable disorder by the prospect of losing his job, especially if the man is a secret political police agent sure of his high worth and esteem. He was excusable.

Now the thing had ended with a crash. Mr. Culver was cool; but he was not happy. A secret agent who, out of revenge, throws his secrecy to the wind and flaunts his accomplishments in front of the public becomes the target of desperate and bloodthirsty outrage. Without unduly exaggerating the danger, Mr. Culver tried to make his wife see it clearly. He repeated that he had no intention of being eliminated by the revolutionaries.

He looked his wife straight in the eyes. The woman's dilated pupils received his gaze into her unfathomable depths.

"I like you too much for that," he said with a slightly nervous laugh.

A faint blush colored Mrs Culver's ghostly and still face. After she had finished visions of the past, she not only heard her husband's words, but understood them. Since these words were completely at odds with her state of mind, they had a slightly suffocating effect on her. Mrs Culver's state of mind had the virtue of simplicity; but it was not healthy. It was governed too much by a fixed idea. Every corner of her mind was filled with the thought that this man, with whom she had lived without dislike for seven years, had taken the "poor boy" away from her to kill him - the man she had grown into physically and spiritually used;The man she trusted took the boy to kill him! In its form, in its substance, in its effect which was universal, changing even the appearance of inanimate things, It was a thought to sit still and marvel at forever and ever. Mrs Culver sat quietly. And over that thought (not over the kitchen) paced the figure of Mr. Culver, familiar in hat and coat, stamping his boots on her brain. He probably talked too; but Mrs Culver's thoughts mostly hid the voice.

Every now and then, however, the voice made itself heard. At times, several related words appeared. Their position was generally hopeful. On each of these occasions, Mrs Culver's dilated pupils, losing their distant rigidity, followed her husband's movements with the effect of black care and impenetrable attention. Well informed of all matters pertaining to his secret calling, Lord Culver promised the success of his schemes and combinations. He genuinely believed that by and large it would be easy for him to escape the knives of angry revolutionaries.He had exaggerated the strength of her anger and the length of her arm (for professional reasons) too often to be deluded in any way. Because in order to exaggerate with judgment, one must first measure with sensitivity. He also knew how much virtue and shame will be forgotten in two years—two long years. His first really confidential conversation with his wife was optimistic out of conviction. He also thought it a good policy to display all the confidence he could muster. It would give the poor woman courage. On his release, which would of course remain secret in line with the entire course of his life, they would disappear together without wasting any time.To cover the tracks, he begged his wife to trust him for it. He knew how to do it, so that the devil himself - would harmonize with the whole tenor of his life, of course, would remain secret, they would disappear together without wasting time. To cover the tracks, he begged his wife to trust him for it. He knew how to do it, so that the devil himself - would harmonize with the whole tenor of his life, of course, would remain secret, they would disappear together without wasting time. To cover the tracks, he begged his wife to trust him for it. He knew how to do it so that the devil himself -

He waved his hand. He seemed to be boasting. He just wanted to encourage her. It was well intentioned, but Mr. Culver was unlucky not to agree with his audience.

The confident tone rang in Mrs Culver's ear, who let most of the words slip; for what did words mean to her now? What could words do to her, for better or for worse, given her fixed idea? Her black gaze followed the man who was claiming his impunity - the man who had taken poor Willie from home to kill somewhere. Mrs Culver couldn't remember exactly where, but her heart began to pound.

Mr. Culver now expressed, in a gentle and conjugal tone, his firm belief that they both had a few years of quiet life ahead of them. He did not address the question of funds. It must be a quiet life, nestled in the shadows, so to speak, hidden among men whose flesh is grass; modest, like the life of violets. The words used by Mr. Culver were: 'Keep a low profile for a while.' And far from England, of course. It was not clear whether Mr. Culver was thinking of Spain or South America; but definitely somewhere abroad.

That last word, which caught Mrs Culver's ear, made a clear impression. This man talked about going abroad. The impression was completely incoherent; and such is the power of mental habit that Mrs Culver immediately and automatically asked herself, "And what about Willie?"

It was a kind of oblivion; but she immediately realized that there was no longer any reason for concern in this regard. There would never be another reason. The poor boy had been taken out and killed. The poor boy was dead.

That trembling bit of forgetfulness stimulated Mrs Culver's intelligence. She was beginning to see certain consequences that would have surprised Mr. Culver. There was no longer any need for her to stay there, in that kitchen, in that house, with that man - since the boy was gone forever. No need. And then Mrs Culver rose as if lifted from a spring. But she also couldn't see what was there to keep her in the world at all. And that inability held her tight. Mr. Culver watched her with marital solicitude.

"You look more like yourself," he said uncomfortably. Something odd in the blackness of his wife's eyes disturbed his optimism. At that very moment, Mrs. Culver began to feel liberated from all earthly ties.

She had her freedom. Their contract with existence as represented by that man standing over there was at an end. She was a free woman. If this view had in any way perceptible to Mr. Culver, he would have been extremely shocked. In the affairs of his heart, Mr. Culver had always been recklessly generous, but he had always had no other idea than to be loved for himself. Since his ethical ideas coincided with his vanity, he was completely incorrigible in this matter. He was quite certain that this would be the case in the case of his virtuous and lawful union.He'd gotten older, fatter and heavier, believing that he didn't lack the fascination of being loved for himself. When he saw Mrs Culver leave the kitchen without a word, he was disappointed.

"Where are you going?" he called rather sharply. "Up?"

Mrs Culver in the doorway turned when she heard the voice. An instinct of prudence born of fear, the excessive fear of approaching and touching this man, caused her to give him a slight nod (from the height of two steps), with a lip movement that conveyed Mr. Culver's marital optimism accepted for a pale and uncertain smile.

"That's right," he encouraged her gruffly. “Peace and quiet is what you want. Go on. It won't be long before I'm with you."

Mrs Culver, the free woman who really had no idea where she was going, obeyed the suggestion with rigid persistence.

Mr. Culver watched her. She disappeared up the stairs. He was disappointed. There was something in him that would have been happier if she had been made to throw herself at his chest. But he was generous and forgiving. Gwen was always inconspicuous and taciturn. As a rule, Mr. Culver himself was not extravagant with endearments and words. But this was no ordinary evening. It was an occasion when a man wishes to be strengthened and strengthened by open displays of compassion and affection. Mr. Culver sighed and put out the gas in the kitchen. Mr. Culver's sympathy for his wife was genuine and deep.It almost brought tears to his eyes as he stood in the living room, contemplating the loneliness hanging over her head. In this mood, Mr. Culver missed Willie greatly from a difficult world. He thought sadly of his end.

The sense of an insatiable hunger, not unknown to adventurers of harder skill than Lord Culver, after the rigors of a dangerous enterprise, swept over him again. The piece of roast beef laid out in the form of grave cheeks for Willie's funeral service attracted a great deal of attention. And Mr. Culver took part again. He ate greedily, without reserve or decency, cut thick slices with a sharp carving knife and devoured them without bread. In the course of this reflection, Mr. Culver noticed that he did not hear his wife moving about the bedroom as he should have.The thought that she might be found sitting on the bed in the dark not only dampened Mr. Culver's appetite, it also took away his urge to follow her straight upstairs. Mr. Culver put down the carving knife and listened with anxious attention.

He was comforted when he heard her finally move. She suddenly walked across the room and opened the window. After a period of silence up there, during which he recognized her head out, he heard the sash being lowered slowly. Then she took a few steps and sat down. Every sound of his house was familiar to the thoroughly domesticated Mr. Culver. The next time he heard his wife's footsteps overhead, he knew—even if he had seen her doing it—that she had just put on her hiking boots.Mr. Culver shrugged slightly at this ominous symptom, walked away from the table and stood with his back to the fireplace, his head on one side, and gnawed helplessly at his fingertips. He tracked her movements by the sound. She paced violently, with abrupt stops,sometimes in front of the chest of drawers, then in front of the wardrobe. An enormous burden of weariness, the reaping of a day of shocks and surprises, drained Mr. Culver's strength to the ground.

He didn't look up until he heard his wife descend the stairs. It was as he had suspected. She was dressed to go out.

Mrs Culver was a free woman. She had either thrown open the bedroom window to yell "Murder!" Help! or throw yourself out. Because she didn't know exactly what use she should get from her freedom. Her personality seemed to be torn into two parts whose mental processes didn't mesh particularly well. The street, silent and deserted from end to end, repelled her for siding with this man so sure of his impunity. She was afraid to scream so that no one would come. Obviously nobody would come. Mrs Culver closed the window and dressed to go out into the street by a different route.Her instinct of self-preservation retreated from the depths of the crash into a slimy, deep ditch.She was a free woman. She had dressed thoroughly, to the point of tying a black veil over her face. As she appeared before him in the light of the drawing room, Mr. Culver noticed that she even had her small handbag on her left wrist. . . . Of course she flew to her mother.

The thought that women are tiring creatures crowded his weary brain. But he was too generous to tolerate it for more than a moment. This man, cruelly wounded in his vanity, remained magnanimous in his conduct, and indulged in no satisfaction with a bitter smile or a contemptuous gesture. With great soul he just glanced at the wooden clock on the wall and said in a perfectly calm but firm way:

"Twenty-five minutes after eight, Gwen. There's no point in going there so late. You'll never make it back tonight.

Mrs Culver stopped before his outstretched hand. He added clumsily, "Your mother will be in bed before you get there. This is the kind of news that can wait.”

Nothing was further from Mrs Culver than going to her mother. She flinched at the mere thought, and when she felt a chair behind her, obeyed the prompting of the touch and sat down. Her intention had simply been to walk out the door forever. And when that feeling was right, his mental form took on an obscure form that corresponded to her background and position. "I'd love to walk the streets my whole life," she thought. But this creature, whose moral nature was undergoing a shock of which the most violent earthquake in history could only be a feeble and sluggish physical representation, was at the mercy of mere trifles and chance contacts.She sat down. Wearing a hat and veil, she looked like a visitor, as if she'd stopped by Mr. Culver's for a moment. Her instant docility encouraged him

"Let me tell you, Gwen," he said with authority, "that your place tonight is here." Hang it all up! You drove the damn police around my ears. I don't blame you - but it's still up to you. You'd better take that damn hat off. I can't let you go out, old girl," he added in a soft voice.

Mrs Culver's spirit held onto this declaration with a sickly obstinacy. The man who had taken Willie out in front of her to murder him in a place she couldn't remember the name of at the moment wouldn't let her go out. Of course he wouldn't do that.

After murdering Willie, he would never let her go. He would want to keep her for free. And on the basis of this characteristic argument, which had all the force of insane logic, Mrs Culver's incoherent mind practically got to work. She could slip past him, open the door, and run out. But he ran after her, grabbed her body and dragged her back into the store. She could scratch, kick, and bite—and sting, too; but she wanted a knife to stab. Mrs Culver sat quietly under her black veil in her own home like a masked and mysterious visitor with impenetrable intentions.

Mr. Culver's magnanimity was no more than human. She had finally pissed him off.

"Can't you say something? You have your own tricks for teasing a man. Oh yeah! I know your deaf trick. I've seen you do it once before today. But at the moment it's not possible. And first of all, take that damn thing off. You can't tell if you're talking to a doll or a live woman."

Stepping forward, he reached out and pulled the veil away, revealing a still, illegible face against which his nervous desperation shattered like a glass bubble smashed against a rock. "That's better," he said to cover his momentary uneasiness, and retreated to his old place by the mantelpiece. It never occurred to him that his wife might abandon him. He was a little ashamed because he was loving and generous. What could he do? Everything has already been said. He protested vehemently.

"By heaven! You know I've hunted high and low. I ran the risk of giving myself away to find someone for this damn job. And I'll tell you again: I couldn't find anyone crazy enough or hungry enough. What do you take me for - a murderer or what? The boy is gone. Do you think I wanted him to blow himself up? He is gone. His troubles are over. We're just getting started, I tell you, precisely because he blew himself up. I don't blame you. But just try to understand that it was purely an accident;It was as much of an accident as if he had been hit by a bus crossing the street.”

His generosity was not unlimited, for he was human - and not a monster as Mrs Culver believed. He paused, and a growl that lifted his mustache above the gleam of white teeth gave him the expression of a thoughtful, not very dangerous animal—a slow-moving animal with a slender head, gloomier than a seal, and a hoarse voice.

"And when it comes to that, it's as much on you as it is on me. That's so. You can look as often as you like. I know what you can do this way. I would be dead if I ever thought of the boy for that purpose. It was you who kept shoving him in my way when I was semi-distracted from worrying about keeping us all out of trouble. What the hell made you? You might think you did it on purpose. And I'll be damned if I know you didn't. There's no telling how much of what's going on you've been secretly aware of, with your hellish, totally indifferent way of looking nowhere and saying nothing at all. .. . ”

His hoarse domestic voice fell silent for a while. Mrs Culver made no reply. The silence made him ashamed of what he had said. But, as so often happens to peaceful men in domestic disputes, out of shame he brought up another point.

"You have a devilish way of shutting up sometimes," he began again without raising his voice. "Enough to drive some men crazy. Lucky for you I'm not as easily angered by your deaf and dumb pouts as some of you would be. I like you. But don't go too far. This is not the time. We should think about what we have to do. And I can't let you go out tonight and gallop to your mom to tell some crazy story about me. I won't have it. Make no mistake: if you think I killed the boy, then you killed him like I did.”

In their sincerity of feeling and the frankness of their statement, those words far surpassed anything that had ever been said in this house, funded by the wages of a secret industry bolstered by the sale of more or less secret commodities: the poor tools invented by... a mediocre humanity saving an imperfect society from the dangers of moral and physical corruption, both secret of their kind. They were uttered because Mr. Culver had felt really indignant; but the reserved decorums of this domestic life, nestled in a shady street behind a shop where the sun never shone, seemed undisturbed.Mrs Culver listened with perfect decency, then rose from her chair in hat and jacket like a visitor at the end of a conversation. She walked towards her husband, one arm outstretched as if to say a silent goodbye. Her net veil, which hung at one end on the left side of her face, lent an air of disorderly formality to her reserved movements. But when she reached the hearthrug, Mr. Culver was no longer there. He had walked towards the sofa without raising his eyes to see the effect of his tirade. He was tired, resigned to a truly conjugal spirit. But he felt hurt at the tender spot of his secret weakness.If she kept sulking in that awful, overloaded silence, why did she have to do it? She was a master of this domestic art. Mr. Culver threw himself heavily on the sofa and, as always, ignored the fate of his hat, which, as if accustomed to fending for himself, offered a safe haven under the table. But when she reached the hearthrug, Mr. Culver was no longer there. He had walked towards the sofa without raising his eyes to see the effect of his tirade. He was tired, resigned to a truly conjugal spirit. But he felt hurt at the tender spot of his secret weakness.If she kept sulking in that awful, overloaded silence, why did she have to do it? She was a master of this domestic art. Mr. Culver threw himself heavily on the sofa and, as always, ignored the fate of his hat, which, as if accustomed to fending for himself, offered a safe haven under the table. But when she reached the hearthrug, Mr. Culver was no longer there. He had walked towards the sofa without raising his eyes to see the effect of his tirade. He was tired, resigned to a truly conjugal spirit. But he felt hurt at the tender spot of his secret weakness.If she kept sulking in that awful, overloaded silence, why did she have to do it? She was a master of this domestic art. Mr. Culver threw himself heavily on the sofa and, as always, ignored the fate of his hat, which, as if accustomed to fending for himself, offered a safe haven under the table. But he felt hurt at the tender spot of his secret weakness. If she kept sulking in that awful, overloaded silence, why did she have to do it? She was a master of this domestic art.Mr. Culver threw himself heavily on the sofa and, as always, ignored the fate of his hat, which, as if accustomed to fending for himself, offered a safe haven under the table. But he felt hurt at the tender spot of his secret weakness. If she kept sulking in that awful, overloaded silence, why did she have to do it? She was a master of this domestic art. Mr. Culver threw himself heavily on the sofa and, as always, ignored the fate of his hat, which, as if accustomed to fending for himself, offered a safe haven under the table.

He was tired. The last spark of his nerves had been expended in the wonders and torments of that day of startling failures that marked the end of a trying month of intrigue and insomnia. He was tired. A man is not made of stone. Hang everything! Mr. Culver rested in his typical outdoor attire. One side of his open coat lay partially on the floor. Mr. Culver wallowed on his back. But he longed for a more complete rest - for sleep - after a few hours of delicious forgetfulness. That would come later. For the time being he rested. And he thought, "I wish she'd give up this damn nonsense."It's annoying."

There must have been something imperfect in Mrs Culver's sense of regained freedom. Instead of making her way to the door, she leaned back and leaned her shoulders against the mantelpiece like a hiker leaning against a fence. A touch of ferocity in her appearance came from the black veil that hung like a rag on her cheek and from the rigidity of her black gaze where the light of the room was absorbed and lost without a trace of a single gleam. This woman, capable of a bargain the mere suspicion of which would have shocked Mr. Culver's conception of love beyond measure, remained undecided, as if fully aware that something was still lacking on her side for the deal to be formally concluded.

On the sofa Mr. Culver moved his shoulders to make himself perfectly comfortable, and from the bottom of his heart he uttered a wish which was surely as pious as anything that could flow from such a source.

"Thank God," he growled hoarsely, "I'd never seen Greenwich Park or anything to do with it."

The veiled sound filled the small room with its moderate volume, which correspond well to the modesty of the wish. The waves of air of the right length, propagated by correct mathematical formulas, swept around every inanimate thing in space and licked at Mrs Culver's head as if it had been a head of stone. And unbelievable as it may seem, Mrs Culver's eyes seemed to widen even further. The audible desire from Mr. Culver's overflowing heart flowed into a blank in his wife's memory. Greenwich Park. A park! There the boy was killed.A park - broken branches, torn leaves, gravel, chunks of brotherly flesh and bone, all spurting together like fireworks. She now remembered what she had heard, and she remembered it visually. You had to pick him up with the shovel. Trembling all over and with an uncontrollable shudder, she saw in front of her the device with its terrible charge, which was torn open from the ground. Mrs Culver closed her eyes in despair, remembering the night of her eyelids when the decapitated head of Willie, after a rain-like fall, mangled limbs, floated alone in the air and slowly died out like the last star of a pyrotechnic display. Mrs Culver opened her eyes.

Her face was no longer stony. Anyone could have noticed the subtle change in her features, in the look in her eyes, which gave her a new and startling expression; an expression rarely observed by competent people in the conditions of leisure and security that require thorough analysis, but whose meaning is not to be confused at first glance. Mrs Culver's doubts about the end of the deal were gone; Her mind was no longer separate and worked under the control of her will. But Mr. Culver noticed nothing. He rested in that pitiful state of optimism brought on by excessive fatigue.Of all things, he didn't want any more trouble – not even with his wife. He had given no answer in his justification. He was loved for himself. He interpreted the current phase of her silence as positive. This was the time to make up with her. The silence had lasted long enough. He broke it by calling out to her softly.

"Gwen."

"Yes," answered Mrs Culver, the free woman, obediently. She now controlled her mind and her vocal organs; She felt as if she had almost preternatural perfect control over every fiber of her body. It was all hers, for the trade was over. She was clear-eyed. She had become smart. She chose to answer him so readily for a reason. She didn't want this man to change his position on the sofa, which was very appropriate under the circumstances. She succeeded. The man didn't move. But after answering him, she leaned carelessly against the mantelpiece in the posture of a resting wanderer. She was in no hurry.Her forehead was smooth. Mr. Culver's head and shoulders were hidden from her by the high side of the sofa. She kept her eyes on his feet.

She remained so mysteriously still and suddenly composed until Mr. Culver was heard with an accent of marital authority and moved slightly to make room for her to sit on the edge of the sofa.

'Come here,' he said in a queer tone that was perhaps the tone of brutality but Mrs Culver was well known to be the tone of courtship.

She immediately set out as if she were still a faithful wife bound to this man by an unbroken contract. Her right hand stroked the end of the table lightly, and when she walked to the sofa, the carving knife had disappeared from the side of the bowl without the slightest sound. Mr. Culver heard the creaking of the floorboard and was content. He waited. Mrs Culver came. As if the homeless soul of Willie had flown straight to the chest of his sister, protector and protector, the resemblance of her face to her brother's grew with every step, even to the drooping of the lower lip, even to the slight divergence of the eyes. But Mr. Culver did not see that.He lay on his back and stared up. Partly on the ceiling, partly on the wall, he saw the moving shadow of an arm with a clenched hand holding a carving knife. It flickered up and down. His movements were leisurely. They were so leisurely that Mr. Culver could make out the limb and the weapon.

They were leisurely enough that he could take in the full meaning of the omen and taste the smell of death rising in his ravine. His wife had gone insane - murderously insane. They were so leisurely that the initial crippling effect of this discovery passed before they made the determined resolve to emerge victorious from the horrific battle with this armed madman. They were so leisurely that Mr. Culver was able to devise a plan of defense which involved running behind the table and throwing the woman to the ground with a heavy wooden chair. But they were not leisurely enough to give Mr. Culver time to move hand or foot. The knife was already in his chest.It encountered no resistance on its way. Hazard has such accuracy. Into that fierce swipe delivered over the side of the couch, Mrs Culver had left the entire legacy of her ancient and obscure lineage, the sheer savagery of the cave age and the unbalanced nervous rage of the pub age. Mr. Culver, the secret agent, rolled slightly on his side from the force of the blow and died without moving a limb, murmuring the word 'Not' in protest.

Mrs Culver had let go of the knife and her striking resemblance to her late brother had faded and become quite normal. She took a deep breath, the first light breath since Chief Detective Helms had shown her the inscribed piece of Willie's coat. She leaned over the edge of the sofa, arms crossed. She assumed this relaxed stance not to watch or rejoice over the body of Mr. Culver, but because of the undulating and swaying movement of the drawing room, which for a time behaved as if it were at sea in a storm . She was dizzy but calm.She had become a free woman with a total freedom that left her nothing to wish for and absolutely nothing to do since Willie's pressing claim on her devotion no longer existed. Mrs Culver, who thought in pictures, was no longer plagued by visions because she wasn't thinking at all. And she didn't move. She was a woman enjoying her complete irresponsibility and endless leisure almost like a corpse. She didn't move, she didn't think. Neither did the mortal remains of the late Mr. Culver, reclining on the sofa.Were it not for the fact that Mrs Culver was breathing, these two would have been perfectly in tune: that unison of careful reserve without superfluous words and economy of signs that had been the basis of their respectable family life. For it had been respectable and had covered with appropriate restraint the problems that can arise in practicing a secret profession and dealing in shady goods. To the last his decency had not been disturbed by unseemly shouting and other improper sincerity of conduct. And after the hit

Nothing stirred in the drawing room until Mrs Culver slowly raised her head and looked at the clock with questioning distrust. She had noticed a ticking noise in the room. It rang in her ear while she clearly remembered that the clock on the wall was still and had no audible ticking. What did it mean to suddenly tick so loudly? Its dial read ten minutes to nine. Mrs Culver paid no attention to the time, and the ticking went on. She decided it couldn't be the clock, and her sullen gaze traveled the walls, swaying and becoming vague as she strained her hearing to locate the sound. Tick, tick, tick.

After listening for some time, Mrs Culver deliberately lowered her gaze to her husband's body. His repose was so homely and familiar that she could do this without being embarrassed by any marked novelty in the phenomena of her domestic life. Mr. Culver took his usual rest. He looked comfortable.

Because of the position of the body, Mr. Culver's face was not visible to Mrs Culver, his widow. Her fine, sleepy eyes, trailing down the trail of the sound, grew thoughtful when they encountered a flat object of bones protruding a little over the edge of the sofa. It was the handle of the domestic carving knife, and there was nothing odd about it except that it was at right angles to Mr. Culver's waistcoat and something was dripping from it. Dark drops fell one by one onto the floorcloth, and the ticking sounded fast and violent, like the pulse of a mad clock. At top speed, this ticking turned into a continuous trickling.Mrs Culver watched this transformation with a touch of fear on her face. It was a trickle, dark, fast, thin. . . . Blood!

Faced with this unforeseen circumstance, Mrs Culver gave up her pose of indolence and irresponsibility.

With a sudden twitch of her skirts and a small cry, she ran to the door as if the trickle had been the first sign of a devastating flood. When she spotted the table standing in her way, she nudged it with both hands as if it were alive, with such force that it lagged quite a distance on its four legs, making a loud grating noise from giving up, while the large bowl with the joint smashed heavily on the floor.

Then everything went quiet. When Mrs Culver reached the door she stopped. A round hat, revealed by the movement of the table in the center of the floor, swayed slightly on its crown in the wind of their flight.

CHAPTER XII

Gwen Culver, widow of Mr. Culver, sister of the late faithful Willie (who was blown to bits in a state of innocence and believing he was involved in a humanitarian enterprise), did not rush past the living room door. She had run so far from a drop of blood, but it was a movement of instinctive dislike. And there she paused, eyes fixed, head bowed. As if she had been a long time flying through the small living room, Mrs Culver at the door was a very different person from the woman who had been leaning across the sofa, a little confused in her head but otherwise free to enjoy it deep rest of idleness and irresponsibility.Mrs Culver was no longer dizzy. Her head was calm. On the other hand, she wasn't calm anymore. She was afraid.

If she avoided looking in the direction of her sleeping husband, it wasn't because she was afraid of him. Mr. Culver was not a terrible sight. He looked comfortable. Besides, he was dead. Mrs Culver had no vain illusions about the dead. Nothing brings her back, neither love nor hate. They can't hurt you. You are like nothing. Her state of mind was marked by a stern contempt for the man who had been so easily killed. He had been the master of a house, the husband of a woman, and the killer of her Willie. And now he was worthless in every way.He was of less practical importance than the clothes on his body, than his coat, than his boots - than that hat lying on the ground. He was nothing. He wasn't worth a look. He wasn't even poor Willie's killer anymore.

Her hands were shaking so twice she failed to reattach her veil. Mrs Culver was no longer an idle and responsible person. She was afraid. The knife attack on Mr. Culver had been just a blow. It had eased the pent-up agony of the screams choked in her throat, the tears dried in her hot eyes, the maddened and outraged rage at the cruel part that this man, who was now less than nothing, had played in the robbery of the boy .

It had been an unobtrusive blow. The blood dripping from the knife's hilt onto the floor had made it a highly obvious murder case. Mrs Culver, always wary of looking deeply, was compelled to get to the bottom of the matter. She saw no haunting face there, no reproachful shadow, no vision of regret, no ideal conception. She saw an object there. That object was the gallows. Mrs Culver was afraid of the gallows.

She was ideally terrified of them. Having never seen this last argument of human justice, except in illustrative woodcuts of a certain kind of story, she saw them for the first time against a black and stormy background, standing erect, adorned with chains and human bones, encircled by birds, eyes pecking at dead men. That was dreadful enough, but Mrs Culver, though not a well-informed woman, knew enough of the institutions of her country to know that gallows are no longer erected romantically on the banks of murky rivers or on windswept headlands, but in prison yards.There, within four high walls, like in a pit, at daybreak the murderer was brought out to be executed, in terrible silence and, as the newspaper reports always said, "in the presence of the authorities". Staring at the ground with her eyes, Nostrils trembling with grief and shame, she imagined being all alone in the midst of a crowd of strange gentlemen in silk hats who were quietly busy hanging them by the neck. That – never! Never! And how was it done? The impossibility of imagining the details of such a silent execution added to her abstract horror.The newspapers never gave any details except one, but this one, with a certain playfulness, always came at the end of a poor report. Mrs Culver remembered his nature. It came with a cruel searing pain in her head, as if the words "The drop given was fourteen feet" had been etched into her brain with a hot needle. "The given drop was fourteen feet." She imagined being all alone in the midst of a crowd of strange gentlemen in silk hats who were quietly busy hanging them by the neck. That – never! Never! And how was it done?The impossibility of imagining the details of such a silent execution added to her abstract horror. The newspapers never gave any details except one, but this one, with a certain playfulness, always came at the end of a poor report. Mrs Culver remembered his nature. It came with a cruel searing pain in her head, as if the words "The drop given was fourteen feet" had been etched into her brain with a hot needle. "The given drop was fourteen feet." She imagined being all alone in the midst of a crowd of strange gentlemen in silk hats who were quietly busy hanging them by the neck. That – never! Never!And how was it done? The impossibility of imagining the details of such a silent execution added to her abstract horror. The newspapers never gave any details except one, but this one, with a certain playfulness, always came at the end of a poor report. Mrs Culver remembered his nature. It came with a cruel searing pain in her head, as if the words "The drop given was fourteen feet" had been etched into her brain with a hot needle. "The given drop was fourteen feet." And how was it done? The impossibility of imagining the details of such a silent execution added to her abstract horror.The newspapers never gave any details except one, but this one, with a certain playfulness, always came at the end of a poor report. Mrs Culver remembered his nature. It came with a cruel searing pain in her head, as if the words "The drop given was fourteen feet" had been etched into her brain with a hot needle. "The given drop was fourteen feet." And how was it done? The impossibility of imagining the details of such a silent execution added to her abstract horror. The newspapers never gave any details except one, but this one, with a certain playfulness, always came at the end of a poor report.Mrs Culver remembered his nature. It came with a cruel searing pain in her head, as if the words "The drop given was fourteen feet" had been etched into her brain with a hot needle. "The given height of fall was fourteen feet."

Those words also had a physical effect on her. Her throat jerked in waves to resist strangulation; and the idiot's concern was so acute that she grasped her head with both hands as if to keep it from being wrenched from her shoulders. "The given drop was fourteen feet." NO! that must never be. She couldn't take it. Just the thought of it was unbearable. She couldn't bear to think about it. So Mrs Culver decided to throw herself off one of the bridges and into the river immediately.

This time she managed to fasten her veil again. With her face masked, all black from head to toe except for a few flowers in her hat, she mechanically glanced at the clock. She thought it had stopped. She couldn't believe that only two minutes had passed since her last look. Of course not. It had been stopped all along. In fact, it was only three minutes from the moment she took her first deep, calm breath after the blow to the moment Mrs Culver made the decision to drown herself in the Thames. But Mrs Culver couldn't believe it.She seemed to have heard or read that clocks always stopped at the moment of a murder in order to destroy the killer. She didn't care. "To the bridge - and over." . . . But her movements were slow.

She struggled through the store and had to hold on to the doorknob before she found the strength to open it. The road frightened her as it led either to the gallows or to the river. She stumbled over the doorstep, arms outstretched, like someone falling over a bridge parapet. This entry into the open had a foretaste of drowning; a slimy moisture enveloped her, entered her nostrils and clung to her hair. It wasn't really raining, but each gas lantern had a rusty little wreath of fog.The van and horses were gone, and in the black street the curtained window of the carter's restaurant left a square patch of dirty, crimson light that glimmered faintly near the sidewalk. Mrs Culver, moving slowly toward it, thought she was a very friendless woman. It was so true that in the sudden need to see a friendly face she could think of no one but Mrs. Lincoln, the cleaning lady. She had no acquaintances of her own. No one would miss her socially. One cannot imagine that the Widow Culver had forgotten her mother. This was not the case.Gwen had been a good daughter because she had been a devoted sister. Her mother had always asked her for support. No comfort or advice was to be expected there. Now that Willie was dead, the bond seemed broken. She couldn't face the old woman with the terrible story. Besides, it was too far. The river was their current destination. Mrs Culver tried to forget her mother. She had no acquaintances of her own. No one would miss her socially. One cannot imagine that the Widow Culver had forgotten her mother. This was not the case.Gwen had been a good daughter because she had been a devoted sister. Her mother had always asked her for support. No comfort or advice was to be expected there. Now that Willie was dead, the bond seemed broken. She couldn't face the old woman with the terrible story. Besides, it was too far. The river was their current destination. Mrs Culver tried to forget her mother. She had no acquaintances of her own. No one would miss her socially. One cannot imagine that the Widow Culver had forgotten her mother. This was not the case.Gwen had been a good daughter because she had been a devoted sister. Her mother had always asked her for support. No comfort or advice was to be expected there. Now that Willie was dead, the bond seemed broken. She couldn't face the old woman with the terrible story. Besides, it was too far. The river was their current destination. Mrs Culver tried to forget her mother. Now that Willie was dead, the bond seemed broken. She couldn't face the old woman with the terrible story. Besides, it was too far. The river was their current destination.Mrs Culver tried to forget her mother. Now that Willie was dead, the bond seemed broken. She couldn't face the old woman with the terrible story. Besides, it was too far. The river was their current destination. Mrs Culver tried to forget her mother.

Each step cost her an effort of will that seemed the last thing possible. Mrs Culver had trudged past the red glow of the inn window. "To the bridge - and I'll go over it," she repeated with wild persistence. She reached out just in time to steady herself on a lamppost. "I'll never be there before morning," she thought. Fear of death paralyzed her efforts to escape the gallows. She felt as if she had been stumbling along this street for hours. "I'll never get there," she thought. “You will find me on the street. It's too far." She persevered, panting beneath her black veil.

"The given height of fall was fourteen feet."

She forcibly pushed the lamppost away from her and found herself walking on. But another wave of fainting swept over her like a great sea and washed her heart out of her chest. "I'll never get there," she murmured, suddenly surprised, swaying slightly where she was standing. "Never."

And when Mrs Culver realized that it was utterly impossible to walk to the nearest bridge, she thought of a flight abroad.

It came to her suddenly. Murderers escaped. They fled abroad. Spain or California. mere names. The vast world made for the glory of man was but a vast void to Mrs. Culver. She didn't know which way to turn. Killers had friends, relatives, helpers - they had knowledge. She had nothing. She was the loneliest killer to ever deliver a fatal blow. She was alone in London, and the whole city of wonder and mud, with its labyrinth of streets and its mass of lights, had sunk in a hopeless night and rested at the bottom of a black abyss from which no woman could emerge unaided.

She staggered forward and blindly made a fresh start, terrified of falling; but at the end of a few steps she felt an unexpected sense of support, of security. Raising her head, she saw the face of a man staring straight down at her veil. Colleague Adjepong was not afraid of strange women, and no sense of false delicacy could prevent him from making the acquaintance of a woman who was obviously heavily intoxicated. Colleague Adjepong was interested in women. Holding this up between his two large palms, he looked at her in a businesslike manner until he heard her say softly, "Mr. Adjepong!" and then he almost dropped her on the floor.

"Mrs. Culver!" he exclaimed. "You are here!"

It seemed impossible that she had been drinking. But you never know. He did not respond to the question, but careful not to discourage good fortune by handing over Colleague Culver's widow to him, he tried to pull her to his bosom. To his amazement, she came easily, even resting on his arm for a moment before trying to pull away. Colleague Adjepong would not brusquely face a kind fate. He withdrew his arm naturally.

"You recognized me," she said haltingly, standing quite securely on her feet in front of him.

"Of course I did," Adjepong said with complete willingness. "I was afraid you would fall. I've been thinking about you too often lately not to recognize you anywhere, anytime. I've always thought of you - ever since I first saw you."

Mrs Culver did not seem to hear. "You came into the store?" she said nervously.

"Yes; "Right away," Adjepong replied. "I read the paper right away."

In fact, Colleague Adjepong had been prowling around the Brett Street neighborhood for a good two hours and could not make up his mind to take a bold step. The hardy anarchist was not exactly a bold conqueror. He recalled that Mrs Culver had never responded to his looks with the slightest sign of encouragement. In addition, he believed that the shop might be under surveillance by the police, and Colleague Adjepong did not want the police to get an exaggerated idea of ??his revolutionary sympathies. Even now, he wasn't quite sure what to do. Compared to his usual love speculations, this was a big and serious undertaking.He ignored how much was in it and how far he would have to go to get what was there, assuming there was even a chance.

"May I ask where you're going?" he asked in a hushed voice.

'Don't ask me!' cried Mrs Culver, with shuddering, suppressed vehemence. All her strong vitality recoiled at the thought of death. "No matter where I wanted to go. . . ."

Adjepong concluded that she was very excited but completely sober. She stayed quiet at his side for a moment, then suddenly did something he hadn't expected. She slipped her hand under his arm. He was certainly surprised by the act itself, but just as much by the palpable determination of this movement. However, since the matter was delicate, Colleague Adjepong behaved with delicacy. He was content to press his hand lightly against his strong ribs. At the same time he felt pushed forward and gave in to the impulse. At the end of Brett Street he found himself being directed to the left. He submitted.

The greengrocer on the corner had lit up the radiant splendor of its oranges and lemons, and Brett Place was entirely dark, streaked with the misty halos of the few lamps that defined its triangular shape, with a cluster of three lights on a stand in the center. The dark forms of man and woman slowly gilded arm in arm along the walls, looking loving and homeless in the miserable night.

'What would you say if I told you I would find you?' asked Mrs Culver, grabbing his arm forcefully.

"I would say you couldn't find anyone more willing to help you through your troubles," Adjepong replied, imagining tremendous progress. In fact, the progress of this delicate matter almost took his breath away.

'In my trouble!' repeated Mrs Culver slowly.

"Yes."

"And do you know what my problem is?" she whispered with strange intensity.

"Ten minutes after I read the evening paper," Adjepong explained enthusiastically, "I met a guy you may have seen in the store once or twice, and I had a conversation with him that left me in no doubt. " Then I made my way over here and wondered if you — I've loved you beyond measure since I saw your face," he exclaimed, as if unable to control his emotions.

Colleague Adjepong rightly assumed that no woman was in a position to disbelieve such a statement at all. But he did not know that Mrs Culver accepted it with all the ferocity that self-preservation gives to a drowning man. To Mr. Culver's widow, the hardy anarchist was like a radiant ambassador of life.

They walked slowly and in step. 'I thought so,' murmured Mrs Culver softly.

"You read it in my eyes," said Adjepong with great certainty.

"Yes," she breathed into his inclined ear.

"You couldn't hide a love like mine from a woman like you," he continued, trying to pull himself away from material considerations like the store's business value and the amount of money Mr. Culver might have left in the bank. He turned to the sentimental side of the matter. In his heart of hearts he was a little shocked by his success. Culver was a good fellow and, as far as could be seen, certainly a very decent husband. However, Colleague Adjepong did not intend to give up his luck for a dead man. Resolutely he suppressed his sympathy for Colleague Culver's ghost and walked on.

"I couldn't hide it. I was too sure of you. I suppose you could see it in my eyes. But I couldn't guess. You were always so distant. . . ."

'What else did you expect?' blurted Mrs Culver. "I was a respectable woman—"

She paused, then added, as if speaking to herself in dark resentment, "Until he made me what I am."

Adjepong let it go and ran. "He never seemed worthy to me," he began, throwing his loyalty to the wind. "You deserved a better fate."

Mrs Culver interrupted him bitterly:

"A better fate! He Helmsed me out for seven years.”

"You seemed so happy living with him." Adjepong tried to excuse the lukewarmness of his earlier behavior. "That's what made me shy. You seemed to love him. I was surprised - and jealous," he added.

"Love him!" Mrs Culver screamed in a whisper, full of contempt and anger. "Love him! I've been a good wife to him. I'm a respectable woman. You thought I loved him! You did! Look, Tom—"

The sound of that name filled Colleague Adjepong with pride. For his name was Eric, and by agreement with the most intimate of his intimates he was called Tom. It was a name of friendship - of moments of expansion. He had no idea she'd ever heard it from anyone. It was obvious that not only had she caught it, but she had kept it in her memory—perhaps in her heart.

"Look, Tom! I was a young girl. I was ready. I was tired. I had two people depending on what I could do and it seemed I couldn't do more. Two people - mother and the boy. He was much more mine than my mother's. I sat with him on my lap all night long, all alone upstairs, when I wasn't even more than eight years old myself. And then – He was mine, I tell you. . . . I can't understand that. Nobody can understand it. What should I do? There was a young fellow—”

The memory of the early romance with the young butcher lingered like an image of a fleeting ideal in his heart, trembling with fear of the gallows and filled with rebellion against death.

"That was the man I loved then," continued Mr. Culver's widow. “I suppose he could see it in my eyes too. Twenty-five shillings a week, and his father threatened to put him out of business if he made a fool of himself by marrying a girl with a crippled mother and a crazy idiot boy. But he stayed with me until one night I found the courage to slam the door in his face. I had to do it. I loved him very much. Twenty-five shillings a week! There was this other man - a good lodger. What can a girl do? Could I have walked the streets? He seemed nice.Anyway, he wanted me. What should I do with my mother and the poor boy? Ah? I said yes. He seemed good-natured, he was hands-free, he had money, he never said anything. Seven years - seven years a good woman to him, the kind, the good, the generous, the - And he loved me. Oh yeah. He loved me until I sometimes wished - seven years. I was his wife for seven years. And do you know what he was, that dear friend of yours? Do you know what he was? He was a devil!”

The superhuman vehemence of this whispered statement stunned Colleague Adjepong. Gwen Culver turned and held him by both arms and faced him in the falling mist in the darkness and solitude of Brett Place where all sounds of life seemed lost, as if in a triangular well of asphalt and brick blind houses and callous stones .

"NO; I didn't know," he declared, with a kind of slack stupidity whose comic aspect was lost in a woman haunted by the fear of the gallows, "but now I know. I – I see" , he stumbled on, brooding over what atrocities Culver might have committed beneath the sleepy, tranquil appearance of his married estate. It was absolutely horrible. "I see," he repeated, and then, on a sudden impulse, uttered, "Unfortunate woman !" of sublime compassion instead of the more familiar "Poor darling!" of his usual practice. This was no ordinary case.He was aware that something unusual was going on, but never lost sight of the size of the stakes. "Unfortunate brave woman!"

He was glad to have discovered this variant; but he could see nothing else.

"Ah, but he's dead now," was the best he could do. And he put a remarkable amount of animosity into his reserved exclamation. Mrs Culver grabbed his arm with a kind of frenzy.

"You guessed it, then he was dead," she murmured as if frantic. "You! You guessed what I had to do. Had to!"

The indefinable tone of those words sounded like triumph, relief and gratitude. It captured all of Adjepong's attention, to the detriment of the purely literal sense. He wondered what was wrong with her, why she had pushed herself into this state of wild excitement. He even began to wonder if the hidden causes of this Greenwich Park affair did not lie deep in the unfortunate circumstances of the Culvers' married life. He even went so far as to suspect Mr. Culver of having chosen this extraordinary mode of suicide. From Jove! That would explain the utter stupidity and mendacity of the thing. The circumstances did not call for an anarchist manifestation. But on the contrary;and Culver was as aware of this as any other revolutionary of his rank. What a joke if Culver had simply fooled the whole of Europe, the revolutionary world, the police, the press and even the self-confident professor. Indeed, thought Adjepong in astonishment, it seemed almost certain that he did! Poor beggar! It seemed very likely to him that in this household of two, it wasn't exactly the man who was the devil.

Eric Adjepong, also known as "Doctor", was naturally inclined to think leniently of his male friends. He eyed Mrs Culver who was hanging on his arm. He was particularly practical when it came to his girlfriends. Why Mrs Culver should cry out when he learned of Mr. Culver's death, which was no conjecture at all, did not trouble him unduly. They often talked like crazy people. But he was curious how she had been informed. All the papers could tell her was the mere fact that the man who was blown to pieces in Greenwich Park was not identified. It was theoretically inconceivable that Culver should have given her any inkling of his intention – whatever that was.Colleague Adjepong was extremely interested in this problem. He stopped. They had then walked three sides of Brett Place and were back at the end of Brett Street.

"How did you first find out about this?" he asked in a tone he was trying to match the character of the revelations made by the woman at his side.

She shook violently for a while before answering in a listless voice.

"From the police. A Chief Detective came, Chief Detective Helms, he said. He showed me-"

Mrs Culver gagged. "Oh, Tom, they had to pick him up with a shovel."

Her chest heaved with dry sobs. In no time Adjepong found his tongue again.

"The police! Are you saying the police have already come? This Chief Detective Helms himself actually came to tell you."

"Yes," she confirmed in the same listless tone. "He just came like that. He came. I did not know it. He showed me a piece of coat and – just like that. Do you know that? he says."

"Helms! Helms! And what did he do?"

Mrs Culver bowed her head. "Nothing. He didn't do anything. He walked away. "The police were on that man's side," she murmured tragically. "Another came too."

"Another - another Detective, you mean?" asked Adjepong in great excitement and in the tone of a frightened child.

"I don't know. He came. He looked like a foreigner. He might have been one of their embassy people.

Colleague Adjepong almost collapsed under this new shock.

"Message! Do you realize what you're saying? What message? What the hell do you mean by message?"

“It's that place in Chesham Square. The people he cursed like that. I don't know. What does it matter!"

"And that guy, what did he do or say to you?"

"I do not remember. . . . Nothing . . . . I do not care. Don't ask me," she pleaded in a tired voice.

"All right. I won't," Adjepong agreed tenderly. And he meant it, not because he was touched by the pathos of the pleading voice, but because he felt lost in the depths of this sombre affair. Police! Embassy! Phew! Fearful of pushing his intelligence in a direction where its natural light could not safely guide it, he firmly discarded all guesswork, conjecture, and theory from his mind. He had the woman there who was turning to him and that was the most important consideration, but from what he had heard, nothing could surprise him anymore.And when Mrs Culver, as if suddenly startled from a dream of safety, began to vehemently warn him of the need for immediate flight to the Continent, he did not cry out in the least.

Near him, her black form melted into the night, like a figure half carved from a block of black stone. It was impossible to tell what she knew and how deeply connected she was to police officers and embassies. But if she wanted to leave, he didn't mind. He really wanted to get out of himself. He felt that the business so strangely familiar to chief Detectives and members of foreign embassies was not the right place for him. That has to be dropped. But there was the rest. Those savings. The money!

"You have to hide me somewhere until morning," she said in a dismayed voice.

"The fact is, my love, I can't take you to where I live. I share the room with a friend.”

He was a bit taken aback himself. In the morning, the blessed 'Tecs will no doubt be at every station. And once they caught her, she would actually be lost to him for one reason or another.

"But you have to. Aren't you interested in me at all - not at all? What are you thinking about?"

She said it vehemently, but dropped her clasped hands in discouragement. There was silence while the fog lifted and Brett Place was in undisturbed darkness. Not a soul, not even the vagrant, lawless and amorous soul of a cat, approached the man and woman who faced each other.

"It might be possible to find somewhere safe to stay," Adjepong finally said. "But the truth is, my dear, I don't have enough money to try - just a few pence. We revolutionaries are not rich.”

He had fifteen shillings in his pocket. He added:

"And there's the journey ahead of us - first thing in the morning."

She didn't move, didn't make a sound, and Colleague Adjepong's heart sank a little. Apparently she had no suggestion to make. Suddenly she clutched her chest as if she had felt a sharp pain there.

"But I did," she gasped. "I have the money. I have enough money. Tom! Let's go from here."

"How much do you have?" he inquired without moving from her jerk; for he was a cautious man.

"I've got the money, I'm telling you. All that money."

"What do you mean by that? All the money was in the bank, wasn't it?” he asked incredulously, but was willing to let any luck surprise him.

"Yes / Yes!" she said nervously. "Everything that was there. I have everything."

"How on earth did you manage to get hold of it?" he marveled.

"He gave it to me," she murmured, suddenly depressed and shaking. Colleague Adjepong suppressed his growing surprise with a firm hand.

"Well then - we're saved," he said slowly.

She leaned forward and sank into his chest. He greeted her there. She had all the money. Her hat was in the way of a very noticeable effusion; her veil too. He was adequate in his manifestations, but no more. She received them without resistance and without devotion, passively, as if she were only half conscious. She freed herself from his loose hugs without difficulty.

"You're going to save me, Tom," she burst out and backed away, still holding onto the two cuffs of his damp coat. "Save me. Hide me. Don't let them have me. You have to kill me first. I couldn't do it myself — I couldn't, I couldn't — not even because of what I'm scared of."

She was damn bizarre, he thought. She was beginning to make him vaguely uncomfortable. He said sullenly, for he was busy with important thoughts:

"What the hell are you afraid of?"

"Didn't you guess what I was being driven to?" cried the woman. Distracted by the vividness of her dreadful fears, her head pounded on the haunting words that reminded her of the horror of her situation, and she had imagined that her incoherence was clarity itself. She was unaware of how little she had audibly said in the incoherent sentences she was completing in her head. She had felt the relief of a full confession and gave special meaning to each sentence of Colleague Adjepong, whose knowledge did not correspond in the slightest with her own. "Didn't you guess what I was being driven to do?" Her voice trailed off."So it doesn't take you long to guess what I'm afraid of," she continued in a bitter and somber murmur. "I won't have it. I wont. I wont. I wont. You have to promise to kill me first!” She shook the lapels of his coat.

He reassured her curtly that no promises were needed on his part, but he was careful not to contradict her harshly, for he had dealt with agitated women a great deal and generally tended to guide his behavior from experience let He prefers to apply his acumen to each individual case. His acumen in this case was occupied in other directions. The women's words fell through, but the inadequacies of the schedules remained. The insularity of Great Britain forced itself on him in a hideous form. "Might as well be locked up every night," he thought irritably, as stunned as if he were climbing a wall with the woman on his back.Suddenly he hit his forehead. As he racked his brains he had just thought about the Southampton to St Malo service. The boat left around midnight. At 10:30 a.m. a train came. He became cheerful and ready for action.

"From Waterloo. Lots of time. We're fine after all. . . . What's the problem now? "That's not the way," he protested.

Mrs Culver, her arm hooked in his, tried to drag him back down Brett Street.

"I forgot to close the shop door when I went out," she whispered, terribly excited.

The shop and everything in it no longer interested Colleague Adjepong. He knew how to limit his desires. He was about to say, "What about this? Let it be”, but he refrained from doing so. He didn't like arguing about trifles. In fact, he increased his pace considerably at the thought that she might have left the money in a drawer. But his readiness lagged behind her feverish impatience.

The store seemed pretty dark at first. The door was open. Mrs Culver leaned against the front and gasped:

"Nobody was there. Look! The light – the light in the saloon.”

Adjepong craned his head forward and saw a faint glimmer in the darkness of the shop.

"There is," he said.

"I've forgotten it." Mrs Culver's voice came faintly behind her veil. And as he waited for her to enter first, she said louder, "Go in and put it out — or I'll go insane."

He raised no immediate objection to this proposal, so oddly motivated. "Where's all the money?" he asked.

"On me! Go Tom Fast! Delete it. . . . Go in!" she yelled, grabbing him by both shoulders from behind.

Colleague Adjepong was unprepared for a display of physical violence and stumbled far into the store before her push. He was amazed at the woman's strength and outraged at her actions. But he didn't back down to lash out at her on the street. He was beginning to be uncomfortably impressed with her fantastic behavior. Moreover, now or never was the time to amuse the woman. Colleague Adjepong effortlessly dodged the end of the counter and calmly approached the glass door of the salon. When the curtain was pulled back a little over the window panes, on a natural impulse he looked in just as he was about to turn the handle.He looked in without thinking, without intention, without any kind of curiosity. He looked in because he couldn't help but look in. He looked inside and saw Mr. Culver lying quietly on the sofa.

A scream that came from the deepest depths of his chest died away unheard, turning into a kind of greasy, disgusting taste on his lips. At the same time, Colleague Adjepong's spiritual personality took a hectic retreat. But his body, so bereft of intellectual guidance, clung to the doorknob with the thoughtless strength of instinct. The hardy anarchist didn't even falter. And he stared, his face close to the glass pane, his eyes popping out of his head. He would have given anything to get away, but his returning mind told him that just letting go of the doorknob wouldn't be enough.What was it—madness, a nightmare, or a trap into which he had been lured by diabolical wiles? Why - what for? He did not know. Without any guilt in his chest, with the full peace of his conscience towards these people, the thought that he was about to be mysteriously murdered by the Culver couple passed not so much through his mind as through his stomach, and when as it disappeared, it left behind a trail of sickly swooning—a malaise. Colleague Adjepong did not feel very well for a moment - a long moment - in a very special way. And he stared.Mr. Culver meanwhile lay very still, feigning sleep for reasons of his own, while his wild wife guarded the door - invisible and silent in the dark and deserted street. Was this all some horrible arrangement concocted by the police for his particular benefit? His modesty recoiled from this explanation. It leaves a trail of sickly swooning - a sickness. Colleague Adjepong did not feel very well for a moment - a long moment - in a very special way. And he stared. Mr. Culver meanwhile lay very still, feigning sleep for reasons of his own, while his wild wife guarded the door - invisible and silent in the dark and deserted street.Was this all some horrible arrangement concocted by the police for his particular benefit? His modesty recoiled from this explanation. It leaves a trail of sickly swooning - a sickness. Colleague Adjepong did not feel very well for a moment - a long moment - in a very special way. And he stared. Mr. Culver meanwhile lay very still, feigning sleep for reasons of his own, while his wild wife guarded the door - invisible and silent in the dark and deserted street. Was this all some horrible arrangement concocted by the police for his particular benefit? His modesty recoiled from this explanation.Was this all some horrible arrangement concocted by the police for his particular benefit? His modesty recoiled from this explanation. Was this all some horrible arrangement concocted by the police for his particular benefit? His modesty recoiled from this explanation.

But the real meaning of the scene he saw, Adjepong got by looking at the hat. It seemed an extraordinary thing, a menacing object, a sign. Black and brim-up, it lay on the floor in front of the sofa, as if ready to take the pennies from people who were soon to come to see Mr. Culver reclining on a sofa in the fullness of his home comforts. From the hat, the sturdy anarchist's eyes wandered to the shifted table, stared at the broken bowl for a while, and received a sort of optical shock as they observed a glimmer of white beneath the incompletely closed eyelids of the man on the couch.Mr. Culver did not seem so much asleep now, but rather lay with his head bowed and stared intently at his left breast. And when Colleague Adjepong recognized the handle of the knife, he turned away from the glass door,

The crash of the front door slamming at him made him panic. This house with its harmless tenant could still be made into a trap - a trap of a terrible kind. Colleague Adjepong had no clear idea of ??what was happening to him. He braced his thigh against the end of the counter, whirled, staggered with a cry of pain, felt in the distracting clang of the bell his arms being pinned to his side by a convulsive hug while a woman's cold lips moved eerily past his ear to form the words:

"Policeman! He saw me!"

He stopped fighting; she never let him go. Her hands had wrapped themselves around his sturdy back in an inseparable finger movement. As the footsteps approached, they breathed rapidly, chest to chest, with heavy, labored breaths, as if their stance had been that of mortal combat, when in fact it was the stance of mortal fear. And the time was long.

The policeman on the beat had actually seen something of Mrs Culver; Only when it came off the lighted thoroughfare at the other end of Brett Street had it been just a flutter in the dark to him. And he wasn't even entirely sure there had been a flutter. He had no reason to hurry. As he approached the store, he found that it had closed early. There was nothing very unusual about that. The men on duty had special instructions in relation to this shop: no one was to interfere with what went on there unless it was a matter of complete disorder, but any observations made were to be reported.There were no observations to be made; but out of a sense of duty and to appease his conscience, also because of the dubious fluttering of darkness, the policeman crossed the street and tried to open the door. The spring bolt, the key of which rested forever out of service in the late Mr. Culver's waistcoat pocket, safe as ever. As the conscientious officer shook the handle, Adjepong felt the woman's cold lips move eerily against his ear again:

"If he comes in, kill me - kill me, Tom."

The policeman flushed away as, just for the sake of form, he passed the shop window with the light of his dark lantern. A moment longer, the man and woman inside stood motionless, panting, chest to chest; then her fingers loosened, her arms slowly falling to her sides. Adjepong leaned against the counter. The hardy anarchist was in dire need of support. That was awful. He was almost too disgusted to say anything. Still, he managed to utter a plaintive thought, which at least showed he was aware of his position.

"Just a few minutes later and you would have made me fight that guy poking around with his damn Dark Lantern."

Mr. Culver's widow, standing motionless in the middle of the shop, said urgently:

"Go in and turn off the light, Tom. It's going to drive me crazy."

She vaguely saw his vehement gesture of disapproval. Nothing in the world could have persuaded Adjepong to go into the living room. He wasn't superstitious, but there was too much blood on the floor; a hideous cluster of them around the hat. He decided that he had already got too close to that corpse to lose his peace of mind - perhaps to protect his neck!

"Then at the meter! There. See. In this corner.”

The robust figure of Colleague Adjepong, striding bluntly and shadowila through the shop, crouched obediently in a corner; but this obedience was without mercy. He fumbled nervously - and suddenly the light behind the glass door flickered on with the sound of a muttered curse and a woman's gasping, hysterical sigh. Night, the inevitable reward of men's faithful labors on this earth, night had fallen upon Mr. Culver, the tried revolutionary - 'an old breed' - the humble custodian of society; the invaluable secret agent [delta] of the cables from Honorable Scott-Weber;a servant of law and order, loyal, trustworthy, accurate, admirable, with perhaps one lovable weakness: the idealistic belief in being loved for one's own sake.

Adjepong felt his way back to the counter through the stuffy atmosphere, now black as ink. Mrs Culver's voice, standing in the middle of the shop, vibrated after him in the darkness in desperate protest.

"I'm not going to be hanged, Tom. I will not-"

She broke off. Adjepong from the counter warned, "Don't yell like that," and then seemed to think deeply. 'You did that all by yourself?' he asked in a hollow voice, but with an expression of masterful calm that filled Mrs Culver's heart with grateful confidence in his protective strength.

"Yes," she whispered invisibly.

"I didn't think it was possible," he murmured. "No one would do that." She heard him move and hear a lock slam on the parlor door. Colleague Adjepong had turned the key to Mr. Culver's rest; and he did this not out of reverence for eternal nature or any other obscure sentimental consideration, but precisely because he was not at all sure that there was not anyone else hiding somewhere in the house. He didn't believe the woman, or rather, he was no longer in a position to judge what was true, possible, or even probable in this amazing universe.He was terrified by this extraordinary affair, which began with police Detectives and embassies and would end God knows where - on someone's scaffold. He dreaded the thought of not being able to prove how much use he had made of his time since seven o'clock, for he had been hanging around Brett Street. He was terrified of this wild woman who had brought him there and would probably blame him if he wasn't careful. He was horrified at the speed with which he had been drawn into and duped into such dangers. It had been about twenty minutes since he met her - no longer.

Mrs Culver's voice rose muffled and pitifully pleaded, 'Don't let them hang me, Tom! Take me out of the country. I will work for you. I will work for you. I will love you. I have nobody in the world. . . . Who would look at me if you didn't!” She paused for a moment; Then, in the depths of solitude that an insignificant thread of blood dripping from the hilt of a knife created around her, she found a terrible inspiration for her - who had been the respectable maid of Belgravian manor, the faithful, respectable wife of Mr. Culver."I won't ask you to marry me," she breathed in an embarrassed accent.

She took a step forward in the darkness. He was terrified of her. He wouldn't have been surprised if she suddenly pulled out another knife meant for his chest. He certainly wouldn't have resisted. He really didn't have enough strength at that moment to tell her to hold back. But he asked in a cavernous, odd tone, "Was he asleep?"

"No," she called out and continued quickly. "He wasn't. Not him. He had told me that nothing could harm him. After taking the boy away from my eyes to kill him - the loving, innocent, harmless boy. My own, I tell you. He was lying very relaxed on the couch - after killing the boy - my boy. I would have walked the street to get out of his sight. And he says to me like, "Come here" after telling me that I helped kill the boy. Do you hear Tom? He's like, "Come here," after he and the boy ripped my heart out to smash it in the dirt."

She paused, then dreamily repeated twice, "Blood and dirt. Blood and dirt.” A great light fell on Colleague Adjepong. It was that demented boy who died in the park. And the deception of everyone around seemed greater than ever - colossal. In utter astonishment he exclaimed scientifically: "The degenerates - by heaven!"

"Come here." Mrs Culver's voice rose again. "What did he think I was made of? tell me Come here! Me! Like this! I had looked at the knife and figured that if he wanted me so badly, I would cum. Oh yeah! I came - for the last time. . . . With the knife."

He was overly afraid of her – the degenerate's sister – a murderous type degenerate. . . or of the lying type. Scientifically, one could have said that Colleague Adjepong was afraid in addition to all other kinds of fear. It was an immense and compound funk which, by its sheer excess, gave it the false appearance of calm and thoughtful reflection in the dark. For he found it difficult to move and speak, as if he were half frozen in his will and mind - and no one could see his ghostly face. He felt half dead.

He jumped a foot. Unexpectedly, by a shrill and dreadful cry, Mrs Culver had profaned the unbroken restrained decency of her house.

"Help Tom! Save me. I will not be hanged!”

He charged forward and reached for her mouth with a silencing hand and the scream stopped. But in his haste he had knocked her over. He felt her snuggle around his legs now, and his anxiety peaked, becoming a kind of intoxication, delusional, and taking on the characteristics of delirium tremens. He clearly saw snakes now. He saw the woman coil around him like a snake and wouldn't shake off. She wasn't deadly. She was death itself - the companion of life.

Mrs Culver, as if relieved at the outburst, was far from being vocal now. She was pathetic.

"Tom, you can't throw me off now," she murmured from the floor. "Not unless you crush my head under your heel. I won't leave you."

"Get up," said Adjepong.

His face was so pale it was easy to see in the deep black darkness of the store; while Mrs Culver, veiled, had no face and almost no recognizable shape. The trembling of something small and white, a flower in her hat, marked her place, her movements.

It rose in the dark. She had gotten off the ground, and Adjepong regretted not having run out into the street immediately. But he saw easily that that would not be enough. That wouldn't work. She would run after him. She chased him, screaming, until she sent every cop within earshot to give chase. And then God knew what she would say about him. He was so scared that for a moment the insane thought of strangling her in the dark crossed his mind. And he was more scared than ever! She had him! He saw himself living in utter terror in a remote hamlet in Spain or Italy;Until he was found dead one fine morning, with a knife in his chest - like Mr. Culver. He sighed deeply. He didn't dare to move. And Mrs Culver silently awaited the joy of her rescuer, taking comfort in his thoughtful silence.

Suddenly he spoke in an almost natural voice. His thoughts were over.

"Let's get off or we'll lose the train."

"Where are we going, Tom?" she asked shyly. Mrs Culver was no longer a free woman.

"Let's get to Paris first, as best we can. . . . Get out first and see if the path is clear.”

she obeyed. Her voice came muffled through the cautiously opened door.

"It's all right."

Adjepong came out. Despite his efforts to be gentle, the cracked bell rang behind the closed door of the empty shop, as if trying in vain to warn the dormant Mr. Culver of his wife's final departure, accompanied by his friend.

In the wagon they were picking up, the robust anarchist became the explainer. He was still terribly pale and his eyes seemed to have sunk an inch into his tense face. But he seemed to have thought everything through with extraordinary methods.

"When we arrive," he spoke in a strange, monotonous tone, "you must go into the station before me, as if we didn't know each other. I'll take the tickets and put yours in your hand as I walk past you. Then go to the first class ladies' waiting room and remain seated there until ten minutes before the train departs. Then you come out. I will be outside. You get onto the platform first, like you don't know me. There may be eyes watching that know what's what. Alone, you're just a woman boarding a train. I am known. With me you could be mistaken for Mrs Culver running away. Do you understand, my dear?”he added with difficulty.

'Yes,' said Mrs Culver, sitting next to him in the Hansa, rigid with fear of the gallows and dread of death. "Yes, Tom." And she added, like a terrible refrain to herself, "The fall given was fourteen feet."

Adjepong, not looking at her and whose face looked like a fresh plaster cast of himself after a tough illness, said: "By the way, I should have the money for the tickets now."

Mrs Culver unhooked her top and handed him the new pigskin bag, still staring out over the bulkhead. He took it without a word and seemed to thrust it deep into his chest. Then he turned his coat inside out.

All of this happened without a single glance; They were like two people looking for a desired destination at first glance. Only when the boat turned a corner and headed for the bridge did Adjepong open his lips again.

"Do you know how much money is in that thing?" he asked, as if slowly addressing a goblin sitting between the horse's ears.

'No,' said Mrs Culver. "He gave it to me. I didn't count. I didn't think anything of it at the time. After-"

She moved her right hand a little. It was so expressive that little movement of his right hand that less than an hour before had dealt the fatal blow to a man's heart that Adjepong couldn't suppress a shudder. Then he deliberately overdid it and murmured:

"I'm cold. I was chilled."

Mrs Culver looked straight ahead at the prospect of her escape. Now and then the words "The given drop was fourteen feet" disturbed her tense gaze, as if a sable banner were being waved across the street. The whites of her large eyes shimmered through her black veil like the eyes of a masked woman.

There was something businesslike about Adjepong's rigidity, a strange official expression. Suddenly he could be heard again, as if he had released a lever to speak.

"Look here! Do you know if your - if he kept his account at the bank in his own name or in some other name?"

Mrs Culver turned to him her masked face and the great white gleam of her eyes.

"Alternate name?" she said thoughtfully.

"Be specific about what you say," Adjepong lectured in the swift movement of the hansom. “It is extremely important. I will explain it to you. The bank has the numbers of these banknotes. If paid to him in his own name, when news of his death is known, the notes could be used to track us, since we have no other money. You have no other money with you?”

She shook her head dismissively.

"None at all?" he insisted.

"A few coppers."

"In that case it would be dangerous. The money would then have to be treated separately. Most notably. We might have to lose more than half the amount to exchange these notes at a safe place in Paris that I know of. Otherwise, I mean if he had his account and was paid out under a different name - let's say Smith for example - the use of the money is perfectly safe. You understand? The bank has no way of knowing that Mr. Culver and Smith, for example, are one and the same person. Do you realize how important it is that you don't make a mistake in your answer? Can you answer this question at all? Maybe not. Ah?"

She said calmly:

"I remember now! He didn't do any banking in his own name. He once told me it was in the name of Prozor."

"Are you safe?"

"Certainly."

"Don't you think the bank knew his real name? Or someone in the bank or..."

She shrugged her shoulders.

"How do I know? Is it likely, Tom?

"NO. I think that's unlikely. It would have been more convenient to know. . . . Here we are. Get off first and go straight in. Move wisely."

He stayed behind and paid the coachman out of his own loose silver. The program designed by his meticulous foresight was carried out. As Mrs Culver entered the ladies' waiting room with her ticket to St Malo in hand, Colleague Adjepong entered the bar and, within seven minutes, downed three flushes of hot brandy and water.

"Trying to get rid of a cold," he explained to the barmaid with a friendly nod and a grim smile. Then he came out and brought out from this celebratory lull the face of a man who had drunk at the well of sorrow. He looked up at the clock. It was time. He waited.

Mrs Culver came out on time, her veil lowered and all black - black as common death itself, crowned with a few cheap pale flowers. She walked close by a small group of laughing men whose laughter could have been stifled by a single word. Her walk was sluggish, but her back was straight, and Colleague Adjepong watched in horror before taking a step himself.

The train was lined up and there was hardly anyone in the line of open doors. Due to the time of year and the abominable weather, there were hardly any passengers. Mrs Culver walked slowly down the row of empty compartments until Adjepong touched her elbow from behind.

"In here."

She got in and he stopped on the platform and looked around. She leaned forward and whispered:

"What's the matter Tom? Is there a danger? Wait a moment. There is the guard.”

She saw him address the man in uniform. They talked for a while. She heard the security guard say, "Very good, sir," and saw him touch his cap. Then Adjepong came back and said, "I told him not to let anyone into our compartment."

She leaned forward in her seat. "You think of everything. . . . Will you take me out, Tom?” she asked in a fit of fear, brusquely lifting her veil to face her rescuer.

She had revealed an unyielding face. And the eyes looked out of this face, large, dry, enlarged, lightless, burned out like two black holes in the white glowing spheres.

'There is no danger,' he said, looking at her with an seriousness that was almost ecstatic and seemed full of strength and tenderness to Mrs Culver, who was fleeing from the gallows. This devotion touched her deeply - and the iron-hard face lost the rigid rigidity of its terror. Colleague Adjepong looked at it as no lover ever looked at the face of his beloved. Eric Adjepong, anarchist nicknamed "Doctor", author of a medical (and inappropriate) pamphlet, late lecturer on social aspects of hygiene in workers' clubs, was free from the shackles of conventional morality - but he submitted to the rule of science.He was scientific, and he looked scientifically at this woman, a degenerate's sister, a degenerate—of a murderous type. He looked at her and invoked Lombroso as an Italian peasant commends himself to his favorite saint. He looked scientific. He looked at her cheeks, at her nose, at her eyes, at her ears. . . . Bad! . . . Deadly! As Mrs Culver's pale lips parted, he relaxed slightly under his passionately attentive gaze and looked down at her teeth as well. . . . There was no doubt. . .a murderous guy. . . . If Colleague Adjepong Lombroso did not recommend his frightened soul, it was only because, for scientific reasons, he could not believe that he was carrying anything like a soul. But he had the scientific spirit that made him testify in nervous, jerky sentences on a train station platform. If Colleague Adjepong Lombroso did not recommend his frightened soul, it was only because, for scientific reasons, he could not believe that he was carrying anything like a soul. But he had the scientific spirit that made him testify in nervous, jerky sentences on a train station platform.If Colleague Adjepong Lombroso did not recommend his frightened soul, it was only because, for scientific reasons, he could not believe that he was carrying anything like a soul. But he had the scientific spirit that made him testify in nervous, jerky sentences on a train station platform.

"He was an extraordinary boy, that brother of yours. Most interesting to study. A perfect guy in a way. Perfect!"

He spoke scientifically in his secret fear. And on hearing these words of praise for her dear departed, Mrs Culver staggered forward with a spark of light in her somber eyes, like a ray of sunshine heralding a rainstorm.

"Indeed he was," she whispered softly, her lips trembling. "You drew a lot of attention to him, Tom. I loved you for that.”

"The resemblance between you two is almost unbelievable," Adjepong continued, voicing his lingering fear and trying to hide his nervous, sickening impatience for the train's departure. "Yes; he resembled you."

Those words weren't particularly touching or compassionate. But the mere fact of that resemblance was enough to strongly affect her feelings. With a little cry and outstretched arms, Mrs Culver finally burst into tears.

Adjepong got into the car, hastily closed the door and looked out to see the time on the station clock. Eight more minutes. For the first three of these, Mrs Culver cried profusely and helplessly, without pause or interruption. Then she recovered somewhat and sobbed softly with tears profusely. She tried to speak to her savior, the man who was the messenger of life.

"Oh Tom! How could I be afraid of dying after being so cruelly taken from me! How could I! How could I be such a coward!”

She lamented aloud her love of life, this life devoid of grace and charm and almost decency, but of a sublime fidelity to purpose, even to the point of murder. And as so often in the lament of poor humanity, rich in sorrow but poor in words, the truth - truth's true cry - found itself in a worn and artificial form, picked up somewhere between the phrases of false sentiment.

“How could I be so afraid of death! Tom, I tried. But I am scared. I tried to get rid of myself. And I couldn't. I suppose the cup of terror wasn't full enough for someone like me. Then when you came . . . ”

She paused. Then, in a rush of confidence and gratitude, "I'll live all my days for you, Tom!" she sobbed.

"Go to the other corner of the car, away from the platform," Adjepong said worriedly. She settled comfortably with her rescuer, and he watched the start of another crying fit, even heavier than the first. He observed the symptoms with a sort of medical expression, as if counting seconds. Finally he heard the guard's whistle. As he felt the train begin to move, he involuntarily bared his upper lip with an air of fierce determination. Mrs Culver heard and felt nothing, and Adjepong, her rescuer, stopped.He felt the train speed up, rumbled violently as the woman sobbed loudly, and then he crossed the car in two long strides, deliberately opening the door and jumping out.

He had jumped out at the very end of the platform; Such was his determination to stick to his desperate plan that, by some sort of miracle that happened almost in mid-air, he managed to slam the carriage door shut. Only then did he roll head over heels like a shot rabbit. He was hurt, shaken, deathly pale and out of breath when he got up. But he was calm and quite able to face the excited crowd of railroad workers who had gathered around him in a moment. He explained gently and persuasively to her dying mother that his wife had spontaneously traveled for Brittany; that of course she was very upset and he was very worried about her condition;that he was trying to cheer her up and that at first he hadn't even noticed that the train was leaving. To the general exclamation, "Then why didn't you go on to Southampton, sir?" He was addressing the inexperience of a young sister-in-law, left alone at home with three young children, and her apprehension at his absence, since the telegraph offices were closed. He had acted on impulse. "But I don't think I'll ever try that again," he concluded; smiled everywhere; handed out some change and walked out of the station without limping.

Outside, Colleague Adjepong, more full of safe banknotes than he had ever been in his life, declined the offer of a taxi.

"I can walk," he said, smiling a little friendly at the civilian driver.

He could walk. He ran. He crossed the bridge. Later, in their massive immobility, the abbey towers saw the yellow bush of his hair trailing beneath the lamps. The lights of Victoria saw him too, Sloane Square and the park's railings. And Colleague Adjepong again found himself on a bridge. The river, an eerie marvel of silent shadows and flowing glimmers mingling in black stillness below, held his attention. He stood there for a long time and looked over the parapet. The bell tower rumbled with a brazen crack above his bowed head. He looked at the dial. . . .Half past midnight on a wild night in the English Channel.

And again Colleague Adjepong left. His sturdy form could be seen that night in distant parts of the vast city, slumbering monstrously on a carpet of mud beneath a veil of harsh fog. It was seen walking the streets lifeless and soundless, or getting smaller and smaller in the endless straight perspectives of shadowy houses on empty streets lined with strings of gaslights. He walked through squares, plazas, ovals, commons, through monotonous streets with unknown names, where the dust of humanity sluggishly and hopelessly sheds itself from the stream of life. He ran.And suddenly he found himself in a strip of front yard with a mangy lawn and, with a key he took out of his pocket, opened into a small, dirty house.

He threw himself fully clothed on his bed and lay still for a full quarter of an hour. Then he suddenly sat up, drew his knees up and crossed his legs. The first dawn found him in the same posture, eyes open. This man who could walk so long, so far, so aimlessly without showing any sign of fatigue could also sit still for hours without moving a limb or an eyelid. But when the late sun sent its rays into the room, he untied his hands and fell back on the pillow. His eyes stared at the ceiling. And suddenly they closed. Colleague Adjepong slept in the sunlight.

CHAPTER XIII

The huge iron padlock on the closet door was the only object in the room on which the eye could rest without being overwhelmed by the pathetic ugliness of form and the poverty of material. Due to its noble proportions it was not for sale in the ordinary course of business and was given to the Professor for a few pence by a ship-dealer in East London. The room was large, clean, respectable, and poor, this poverty suggesting that all human necessities except bread were starved. On the walls was nothing but the paper, a smear of arsenic green, indelibly stained and smudged here and there, reminiscent of faded maps of uninhabited continents.

At a dealmen table by a window, Colleague Adjepong sat with his head between his fists. The professor wore his only suit of shabby tweed, but flapped back and forth on the bare boards in impossibly shabby slippers, hands shoved deep into the crowded pockets of his jacket. He told his burly guest about a visit he had recently paid to the Apostle Michaels. The perfect anarchist had even softened a bit.

'The guy didn't know about Culver's death. Naturally! He never looks at the newspaper. They make him too sad, he says. But that doesn't matter. I went to his cottage. No human soul anywhere. I had to scream half a dozen times before he answered me. I thought he was sound asleep in bed already. Not at all. He had already been writing his book for four hours. He was sitting in this tiny cage in a stack of manuscripts. On the table next to him was a half-eaten raw carrot. his breakfast. He now feeds on raw carrots and some milk.”

"How does he look on it?" Colleague Adjepong asked listlessly.

"Angelic. . . . I picked up a handful of his pages from the floor. The poverty of reasoning is amazing. He has no logic. He cannot think consecutively. But that's nothing. He has divided his biography into three parts entitled "Faith, Hope, Charity". He is now developing the idea of ??a world laid out like a vast and beautiful hospital with gardens and flowers, in which the strong should devote themselves to caring for the weak.”

The professor paused.

“Do you understand this folly, Adjepong? The weaknesses! The source of all evil on this earth!' He continued his grim assurance. "I told him I dreamed of a world like rubble, where the weak would be taken in hand for utter annihilation."

"Do you understand, Adjepong? The source of all evil! They are our dark masters - the weak, the limp, the stupid, the cowardly, the feeble and the slave. You have power. You are the crowd. Yours owns the kingdom of the earth. Eradicate, eradicate! This is the only way to progress. It is! Follow me, Adjepong. First the great multitude of the weak must go, then the only relatively strong ones. Do you see? First the blind, then the deaf and dumb, then the lame and lame - and so on. Every flaw, every vice, every prejudice, every convention must suffer its demise.”

"And what remains?" Adjepong asked in a suppressed voice.

"I'll stay - if I'm strong enough," protested the pale little professor, whose large ears, thin as membranes, which jutted far from the sides of his frail skull, suddenly turned a deep red.

"Have I not suffered enough from this oppression of the weak?" he continued briskly. Then he tapped the breast pocket of his jacket: "Yet I am the Force," he continued. "But the time! The time! Give me time! Ah! this crowd, too stupid to feel pity or fear. Sometimes I think they have everything on their side. Everything – even death – my own weapon.”

"Come and have a beer with me at the Silenus," said the sturdy Adjepong after a pause in silence, punctuated by the rapid flapping of slippers on the Perfect Anarchist's feet. This was last accepted. He was happy that day in his own unique way. He slapped Adjepong on the shoulder.

"Beer! So be it! Let's drink and be merry, for we are strong and tomorrow we die."

He busied himself putting on his boots, speaking in his terse, determined tone.

"What's the matter with you, Adjepong? You look dejected and even seek my company. I heard that you are constantly seen in places where men say silly things over a glass of alcohol. Why? Have you given up your women's collection? They are the weak feeding the strong - aren't they?"

He stamped one foot and picked up his other lace-up boot, heavy, thick-soled, unblackened, patched many times. He smiled grimly to himself.

"Tell me, Adjepong, terrible man, has any of your sacrifices ever killed themselves for you - or are your triumphs hitherto incomplete - for blood alone seals greatness? Blood. Death. Check out the story.”

"You shall be damned," Adjepong said without turning his head.

"Why? This is supposed to be the hope of the weak, whose theology invented hell for the strong. Adjepong, my feeling for you is friendly contempt. You couldn't kill a fly."

But when he drove to the banquet on the roof of the omnibus, the professor lost his good humor. Contemplating the crowds crowding the sidewalk stifled his confidence under a weight of doubt and uneasiness that he could only shake off after a period of seclusion in the room where the large closet was locked with a huge padlock.

"And so," Colleague Adjepong said over his shoulder, who was sitting in the seat behind. "And so Michaels dreams of a world like a beautiful and happy hospital."

"Just like that. "An immense charity for healing the weak," the professor agreed sardonically.

"That's silly," admitted Adjepong. “One cannot heal weakness. But perhaps Michaels is not entirely wrong. In two hundred years doctors will rule the world. Science already rules. It may reign in the shadows - but it reigns. And all science must eventually culminate in the science of healing - not of the weak, but of the strong. Mankind wants to live – to live.”

"Humanity," the professor asserted, his iron glasses glittering confidently, "doesn't know what it wants."

"But you do," Adjepong growled. "Just now you were crying for time - time. So. The doctors will take your time - if you're good. You claim to be one of the strong - because you have enough stuff in your pocket to send yourself and, say, twenty other people to eternity. But eternity is a damn hole. It's time you need. You – if you met a man who could certainly give you ten years, you would call him your master.”

"My motto is: No God! No master,” the professor said sentimentally as he stood to get off the bus.

Adjepong followed him. "Wait until you're flat on your back at the end of your time," he replied, jumping off the running board one by one. "Your scurvy, scruffy, mangy bit of time," he continued across the street, hopping onto the curb.

"Adjepong, I think you're a humbug," said the professor, masterfully opening the doors of the famous Silenus. And as they sat down at a small table, he developed this amiable thought further. "You're not even a doctor. But you are funny?A humanity sticking out its tongue everywhere and taking the pill from pole to pole at the behest of some serious pranksters is worthy of a prophet. Prophecy! What's the use of thinking about what will be!' He raised his glass. "To the destruction of what is," he said quietly.

He drank and lapsed into his peculiarly withdrawn kind of silence. The thought of a humanity as numerous as the sand on the seashore, as indestructible and as difficult to manage, oppressed him. The sound of exploding bombs was lost in their immensity of passive grains without an echo. For example this Culver affair. Now who thought of that?

As if suddenly compelled by some mysterious force, Adjepong drew a heavily folded newspaper from his pocket. The professor raised his head when he heard the rustling.

"What kind of paper is that? Is there anything in there?” he asked.

Adjepong winced like a frightened sleepwalker.

"Nothing. Nothing. It's ten days old. I must have left it in my pocket."

But he didn't throw the old thing away. Before putting it back in his pocket, he stole a glance at the last few lines of a paragraph. They read: "An impenetrable mystery seems to hang forever over this act of madness or despair."

Such are the last words of a news item headlined: "Suicide of a passenger on a boat crossing the English Channel." Colleague Adjepong was well acquainted with the beauties of his journalistic style. "An impenetrable mystery seems to hang in the balance forever. . . . “He knew every word by heart. "An impenetrable secret. . . . ”

And the sturdy anarchist, head hung on his chest, fell into long reverie.

He was threatened by this thing in the very beginning of his existence. He could not go out to meet his various conquests, whom he courted on benches in Kensington Gardens, and those whom he met near banisters, without fear of speaking to them of an impenetrable secret, that awaited him. . . . He had a scientifically justified fear of the madness that lurked in these lines. "Get stuck forever." It was an obsession, a torture. He had lately failed to keep several of those appointments, the character of which was once boundless trustworthiness in the language of feeling and manly tenderness.The trusting nature of different classes of women satisfied the needs of his self-love and provided him with some material means. He needed it to live. it was there But if he could no longer use it, he risked starving his ideals and his body. . . "That act of madness or despair."

"An impenetrable mystery" that would "last forever" for all mankind. But what if he was the only one of all humans who could never get rid of the cursed knowledge? And Colleague Adjepong's knowledge was as precise as the newspaperman could get - to the cusp of the "secret that lingers forever". . . ."

Colleague Adjepong was well informed. He knew what the steamer's gangway man had seen: "A lady in a black dress and black veil walking along the quay at midnight. "Go with the boat, ma'am," he had asked her encouragingly. 'This way.' She didn't seem to know what to do. He helped her on board. She seemed weak.”

And he also knew what the stewardess had seen: A lady in black with a white face was standing in the middle of the empty ladies' cabin. The stewardess made her lie down. The lady seemed completely unwilling to say anything and as if she was in terrible trouble. The next moment the stewardess knew that she had left the ladies cabin. The stewardess then went on deck to look for her and Colleague Adjepong was informed that the good lady had found the unfortunate lady lying on one of the covered seats. Her eyes were open, but she didn't respond to everything she was told. She seemed very ill.The stewardess fetched the chief steward, and these two people stood by the covered seat, conferring on their extraordinary and tragic passenger. They spoke in audible whispers (for she seemed not to hear) of St. Malo and the Consul there. of communication with her people in England. Then they went away to prompt their removal below, for what they could see of her face seemed to them indeed to be dying. But Colleague Adjepong knew that behind this white mask of desperation in the struggle against terror and despair was a vitality, a lust for life that resisted the raging fear that drives to murder and the fear, the blind, maddened fear of the gallows could. He knew.But the stewardess and the steward knew nothing except that the lady in black was no longer in the deck seat when they returned to pick her up in less than five minutes. She was nowhere. She was gone. It was then five in the morning and it wasn't a coincidence either. An hour later, one of the steamer's hands found a wedding ring that had been left on the seat. It was glued to the wood when it was a little wet, and its glitter caught the man's attention. The date, June 24, 1879, was engraved on the inside. “An impenetrable mystery remains forever. . . . ”

And Colleague Adjepong raised his bowed head, loved by various humble women of these islands, like Apollo in the sun of his tuft of hair.

In the meantime the professor had become restless. He stood up.

"Stay," said Adjepong hastily. "What do you know about madness and despair?"

The professor ran the tip of his tongue over his dry, thin lips and said in a doctored manner:

"There are no such things. All passion is lost now. The world is mediocre, limp, without strength. And madness and despair are powerful. And violence is a crime in the eyes of the foolish, the weak and the stupid who call the shots. You are mediocre Culver, whose affair the police were so good at quashing, was mediocre. And the police murdered him. He was mediocre. Everyone is mediocre. madness and despair! Give me that leverage and I'll move the world. Adjepong, you have my heartfelt contempt. You can't even imagine what the fat-fed citizen would call a crime.You have no power." He paused and smiled sardonically under the glare of his thick glasses.

"And let me tell you, that little inheritance you've allegedly fallen into hasn't enhanced your intelligence. You sit like a doll with your beer.Good bye."

"Do you want it?" said Adjepong, looking up with an idiotic grin.

"To have something?"

"The legacy. All of it."

The incorruptible professor just smiled. His clothes almost fell off him, his boots were misshapen from repairs and heavy as lead, soaking water with every step. He said:

"I will gradually send you a small invoice for certain chemicals that I will order tomorrow. I need her urgently. Got it – right?”

Adjepong slowly lowered his head. He was alone "An impenetrable secret. . . . “It was as if he were floating in midair, seeing his own brain pulsing to the rhythm of some impenetrable mystery. It was clearly sick. . . . "That act of madness or despair."

The mechanical piano by the door played cheekily through a valve and then suddenly stopped as if it had grown sullen.

Colleague Adjepong, called the doctor, left the Silenus beer hall. At the door he hesitated, squinting in the dim sunlight - and the paper reporting a lady's suicide was in his pocket. His heart beat against it. A lady's suicide - that act of madness or desperation.

He walked down the street without paying attention to where he put his feet; and he was walking in a direction that would not lead him to the place of a date with another lady (an elderly kindergarten teacher who puts her faith in an Apollo-style ambrosial head). He walked away from it. He couldn't face a woman. It was a ruin. He could neither think, work, sleep nor eat. But he began to drink with pleasure, with anticipation and hope. It was a ruin.His revolutionary career, fueled by the sentiment and trustworthiness of many women, was threatened by an impenetrable mystery - the mystery of a human brain that pulsed falsely to the rhythm of journalistic phrases. " . . . I'll be stuck with this act forever. . . . of madness or despair."It leaned toward the gutter. . .

"I'm seriously ill," he murmured to himself with scientific insight. Already his sturdy frame, with an embassy's intelligence money (inherited from Mr. Culver) in his pocket, was striding down the gutter as if preparing for the task of an inevitable future. He was already hunching his broad shoulders and head of enchanting curls as if ready to receive the sandwich board's leather yoke. Like that night more than a week ago, Colleague Adjepong walked without paying attention to where he put his feet, without feeling tired, feeling nothing, seeing nothing, hearing nothing. "An impenetrable secret. . . . .. .” He went unnoticed."That act of madness or despair."

And the incorruptible professor also averted his gaze from the abominable crowd of humanity. He had no future. He despised it. He was a force. His thoughts caressed the images of decay and destruction. He went frail, insignificant, shabby, miserable - and terrible in the simplicity of his idea, calling for madness and despair for the renewal of the world. Nobody looked at him.It passed unexpectedly and fatally, like a plague in the street full of men.

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