"Exactly--I am deliberately admitting that I am, in a sense, an accessory," he said with a smile. "I must ask you to accept the extraordinary situation, the cause of which will be apparent to you at the successful conclusion of your labours. The Alpha Triangle, then," he went on, "from being a purely revengeful society, became an acquisitively criminal one. I ask you to take my word on that score, for although the Triangle has committed no acquisitive crimes up to date, I have every reason to believe that it will make up for the deficiency in the future. This transition, already an accomplished fact--in the spirit, if not in the deed--must have already occurred to you as a probability. What, indeed, could be more natural than that such an organisation, having established a powerful and unscrupulous society for taking its vengeances, should visualise the possibilities for material gain latent in such a society? The power is there--a power, Captain Arden, which, if you knew its magnitude and the utter, cold, superhuman inflexibility of the man who controls it, might make even you, in spite of your reputation for physical prowess and indomitable courage, turn back from the task you seem so eager to undertake." For all the precise, calculated levelness of Lord Hannassay's voice, there was an earnestness behind his pedantic sentences that pricked the small hairs on the nape of Storm's neck like a chill wind. And yet this was a purely reflex sensation, for Storm smiled lightly and flicked the ash from his cigarette with leisured care. "I'll take the risk," he drawled. Lord Hannassay nodded slowly. "I thought you would," he said. "You're the sort that would." "And that's not what they call 'sand,' either," said Storm, and his mocking smile flitted elusively across his lips. "I'll give it you, Lord Hannassay, straight, that I'd rather tackle anything else under the sun than this Triangle business. And I could throw in my hand--I'm not a detective, and I'm not even in Special Branch regularly. I stay on simply because it's a challenge. I've got some sort of a reputation among disreputable people--_Storm won't be beat till he's buried, and maybe not then_, they'll tell you. And they've got it all wrong! It's pride--arrogance--conceit--anything you care to call it. But all it stews down to is just that I'm too bucked with myself--it'd break my heart to have to admit I was beaten! I'd sooner go down fighting, because if I'm beaten that way I'll never have to admit it." He spoke without a trace of affectation, and yet it was an analysis he had never made to anyone in his life before. Later, Lord Hannassay knew the reason for that frankness, yet even at the time Storm's simple directness appealed to him. The peer rose and held out his hand.