I stopped my crying, and laying my hands on his knees said, "Dirk, what is it? Why do you want to kill me?" "Little kid Tommy" was all he could say, repeating it over and over. He thrust a hand through my hair, tenderly enough for such a great rough fellow, and bending my head back looked at me earnestly and enquiringly. At last he fetched a heavy breath and said, "Yus, it's little kid Tommy, an' no mistake. But it beats me; it beats me." I understood nothing of the matter that was troubling him. I was utterly without a clue to the mystery. I could only say, "Tell me, Dirk; what is it?" It was a long time before he answered, "Wull, kiddy, I was on his track, an' I thought I'd got him at last; but it was you I nabbed, though hell knows how it chanced." "Who was he?" I asked. But before he replied I knew whom he meant. "Have you forgotten, kiddy?" he asked. "The King's Man." "You found him?" I questioned. "I've hunted him high an' low," he replied, "an' I've had my fingers on him, _so_!" He clawed the air about my throat. "But he's slipped through every time, blast him! He's got as many shapes as a cloud in a gale, an' as many voices as the wind; so when they telled me you was only a nipper I grinned to meself an' said nothing. You see I thought I had him safe. But it beats me, it does." He shook his head sorrowfully. I was beginning to understand something of the mystery, and suddenly everything seemed clear as though I had followed it in a book. "Dirk," I cried, "I know how it was. He was hiding in the corner. He was chasing me. An officer, you know. I'd run away from school. Then I suppose he heard you after him, and lay low. And I heard you and thought it was him. So I hid there in the doorway. And then I felt him there and got frightened, and jumped out, and you nabbed me instead." I ended breathlessly: "You see, you see." He scratched his head somewhat bewildered, and said, "Here, kiddy, just say that lot again." So I began at the beginning, and explained how the officers were after me, and how I had heard footsteps and taken cover, till comprehension dawned on him at last. "That's him," I concluded, "that's the King's Man; the officer who was waiting there for me." Dirk sat there weighing the matter in his mind, and presently exclaimed, "An' it were you, Tommy, I've been keeping in that filthy hole, starving you an' gagging you an' frightening you an' all." "Nothing," I said, "nothing," and to ease his mind added: "Don't you see, if you hadn't nabbed me the officer would have had me instead, and I should have been back in the cells again." "That's a brave thing to say, kiddy," he exclaimed fervently, and seized my hand, till I nearly cried with the pain of a friendly grip. "Wull," he added releasing me, and thumping his fist on his knee, "I'll go an' find him again, an' I'll catch him next time. An' then I'll.... You know what I meant doing?" he broke off fiercely. "Yes," I said.