After some demur this was agreed to; and I went to the desk and wrote the duplicate letter, and was careful to fold it up so that Maral should not miss the strip of paper I had annexed. While I was writing, Barosa paced up and down the room thinking. The fact that there was a traitor somewhere among the followers disquieted him profoundly. And when I had finished he came up to me and said with intense earnestness: “You have some definite purpose in keeping that letter, Mr. Donnington?” “Naturally. I mean to try and find the writer of it.” “Are you sure there is no one you suspect?” “I do not know all your followers; if there is any one among them who seeks to prevent my getting----” He broke in, with an impatient motion of the hand. “Do you give me your word you have no positive suspicion?” “Is that a question you should expect me to answer? I am not one of you, and I have no interest whatever in your cause. If I am anxious to discover the writer, it is for my own purposes not yours.” “We are helping you in trusting that to you.” “Take it back if you will;” and I held it out. He shook his head and did not take it. “If you find out the truth you will tell me?” he asked. “I make no promise. I may or I may not, but frankly that will turn upon my own concerns, not upon yours.” “You are very straight,” he said, with a slow hesitating smile, much more suggestive of vexation than mirth. “I think we had better leave it there. It is not improbable that if I do get at the truth I may need your help. In that case I shall come to you.” “I should like something more definite.” I shook my head. “Not yet, at any rate,” I said. “I may visit you?” “At any time you please. And now, I’ll be off.” While we had been speaking Maral was taking papers from the desk, and as he turned and held out his hand to bid me good-night, we heard the sound of loud knocking at the door of the house. “What can that be?” he exclaimed nervously. The next moment the room door was thrust open and the young fellow who had played the part of informer rushed in. “The police!” he gasped. “The house is surrounded. All the rest have gone.” Barosa did not turn a hair, but Maral, suddenly grey with fear, tossed up his hands and dropped into his chair with a sigh of despair. “Are they really the police this time?” I asked. He nodded. “More of the same man’s work,” he said with grim concentrated passion, and carried away for the moment by his feelings, he clenched his fists and uttered a vehement oath. I should have sworn too, no doubt, if I had been in his place. But I was thinking of myself and what I was going to do. It was a tight corner for us all. In the pause the knocking was repeated more noisily and peremptorily than before. CHAPTER XI POLICE METHODS At the second summons Barosa roused himself. “What will you do, Mr. Donnington. We have a secret means of leaving the house and----”