“Sehr wohl, Herr Doktor!” Clubfoot turned to Desmond. “We’ll settle the girl later!” “You . . . you ruffian,” exclaimed Desmond. “I believe you’ve done it before!” Clubfoot, his big body shaking with silent laughter, did not reply, but stood up. Once again Desmond, despite his desperate plight, marvelled at the prodigious size of the man, his immensely massive shoulders and his great arms, as sinewy, as disproportionately long, as the arms of some giant orang-outang. The door opened and Heinrich appeared. Behind him, escorted by two other men, was Vera. Desmond had no time to exchange a word with her, for the three men, on a sign from Grundt, instantly hustled him under the open trap and adjusted the noose about his neck. Now Grundt was speaking; but Desmond did not look at him. His eyes were on the clock. “To show you that I do not act by proxy,” Clubfoot snarled, “I am going to hang you with my own hands. And when your cursed brother’s turn arrives, I shall tell him, before he dies—and his death shall be terrible, I promise you, because of that bullet he once fired into me—I shall tell him how you dangled, throttling, from that beam above. I owe your country a grudge, you snivelling Englishman, and, bei Gott! I’m going to have my pound of flesh. Every time my vengeance falls, I exult! Donnerwetter! If you had heard Branxe grunt when I gave him the knife! If you had heard how that dog Wilbur screamed when I thrust him before the incoming train! And now, bei Gott! it’s you!” He grasped the rope. As the long spatulate fingers closed on it, Desmond saw the bony sinews stretch taut among the black thatch on the back of the cripple’s hands. He heard his heavy boot thump on the floor . . . A voice cried from the doorway: “Hands up, Grundt!” Then, with a sudden smash of glass, the room was plunged into darkness. With a deafening explosion a pistol spoke, a woman screamed piercingly, and a door slammed. Then suddenly the room was brightly lighted. The place seemed full of men. Francis Okewood, in motor-cyclist overalls heavily splashed with mud, was at Desmond’s side, swiftly slashing at the ropes that bound him. “Good old Francis!” murmured Desmond. “I knew you wouldn’t fail me. But, dash it all, you cut it rather fine!” He looked rapidly round the room. His glance took in Vera, pale and affrighted, and her escort, surrounded by plain-clothes men. But of Clubfoot and of Heinrich there was no sign. Even as he looked, from the Jacobean cupboard, the doors of which stood open, a large, red-faced man hastily scrambled. Desmond knew him of old. It was Detective-Inspector Manderton, of Scotland Yard. Behind him followed O’Malley. “I’m very much afraid he’s given us the slip,” the Inspector said. “It’s a secret passage leading to the next house with a locked steel door between. Come on, some of you!” And he hurried out, taking two of his men with him.