Birdie had tumbled down the front steps, moaning aloud with apprehension. There wasn't much mettle in Birdie Sands--gutter-born, gutter-reared, and gutter-minded, he was totally unfitted to play any more blackguardly part than that of the petty sneak-thief. And what he'd gone through that night had shivered his brittle nerves to fragments. He'd killed a man, and you could be hanged for that.... The ghastly sight he had seen in Fleet Street haunted his vision. And then the girl--that had been the final straw that broke him down. The splits'd say he was a party to that crime, too. And he knew, or divined instinctively, what fate was in store for her.... "Gawd, let me get aw'y!" he mumbled, panting. "P'r'aps they'd let me off wiv a laggin' if I syved _'er_.... I 'ad a sister once...." His chest felt as if it was bursting, and a steel band seemed to have tightened round his heart. His legs were like lead. He was travelling terribly slowly now, as though in a nightmare. Athletic training had never entered his life, and chain-smoking had ruined whatever natural stamina he had ever possessed. He couldn't keep up that killing pace.... Would they follow him through the streets? The thought almost made his knees give out like over-heated bearings. For some unknown reason it didn't occur to him to shout for help. Morini opened the front door and looked up and down the road. He had moved fast. Birdie was not seventy feet away, running flat-footedly, with his elbows splayed out and his head down, all but done in already. To shoot would be suicidal--it would bring the whole neighbourhood about their ears in two shakes. Morini knew a better way than that. He dropped his gun into his pocket and brought his hand out again with a long, heavy, but beautifully balanced knife. He poised it in his palm; and then, as Birdie passed under the full glare of a street lamp, Gat's arm went back and came forward again with amazing speed.... The knife flashed out with a low _whuu-uit_! He saw the flickering sheen of it as it skimmed away like a darting splash of quicksilver, saw Birdie go down with the haft of it sticking out between his shoulder-blades, heard Birdie's shuddering scream gurgle away into an awful sob.... Morini stepped back into the hall and closed the door without a sound. CHAPTER XXIV VISITORS FOR JOAN Long after midnight Joan Sands had sat curled up on the chesterfield. Through the open window had come the thunder of the Piccadilly explosion, but she had not even gone to the window to try and find out the meaning of the noise and shouting. Something dreadful had happened, and the Triangle was in it. One didn't have to be a clairvoyant to realise that without making a personal inspection. And where the Triangle went Jimmy went--even to the gallows....