Captain Dillon noticed it, and his frown relaxed. He sat down at the opposite side of the table, gazing across it and saying: “Your name is Rohan, is it?” “Yes, sir. Michael Rohan, sir,” said he huskily. “Who sent you here?” “I’m to see Captain Dillon, sir; no one else. If----” “I am Captain Dillon.” “Oh, is that so, sir?” Rohan asked, gazing. “I ought to have known it, mebbe. Who else is here, sir?” “Nobody,” Captain Dillon said curtly. “I live alone in this flat. Come to the point, my man. What do you want of me?” “I’m not after wanting anything, sir,” replied Rohan, drawing nearer the table. “It’s them that sent me.” “Who are they? Why did they send you?” “I’m not to mention any names, sir. I’m sent here only to tell you what they want--and to find out what you are willing to give up for it.” Captain Dillon turned wary. He was not a man to be easily led into a trap. He frowned again, saying a bit sternly: “You must be more explicit, Mr. Rohan. I’m not good at guessing riddles. I don’t know at what you’re driving.” “You don’t, eh?” Rohan’s eyes took on a curious leer. “I certainly do not,” Dillon insisted. “You was beat up a few nights back, wasn’t you?” “Yes, by two cowardly thugs.” “Three, sir, was the number,” said Rohan. “But that don’t matter. You lost something, didn’t you?” “A small quantity of blood--nothing more.” Rohan spread his arms on the table and lurched a little nearer. “Tell that to the marines, sir,” said he, with a sinister nod. “You know what I mean, sir, and I know you know it. You’d better meet me halfway, too, Captain Dillon, or I might as well take myself out the way I came in. You’ve nothing to fear from me, sir, and I don’t fear you. I wasn’t one of the three, and I can prove it--but I came from them. If there is nothing doing, sir, I’ll go back and tell them so.” Michael Rohan appeared about to do so, in fact, but Dillon checked him with a gesture. “Stop a moment,” said he. “What do your rascally friends want?” “Money,” said Rohan shortly. “For what?” “For what you lost that night.” “How much money?” “All that you’ll give. That’s what I’m to find out.” “But I don’t know you, Rohan, from a side of leather,” Captain Dillon said, with a growl. “What evidence have I that you were sent by those three scoundrels? I’m not buying a cat in a bag, nor dealing with any known agent. You may, for all I know, be a detective in disguise.” Rohan shrugged his rounded shoulders and grinned derisively. “There’s nothing in that, sir,” said he. “I can give you proof enough.” Captain Dillon’s squinted eyes took on a gleam of eagerness. “What proof?” he demanded. “You’re alone here, you say?” Rohan glanced around again toward the hall and bedrooms. “Yes, on my word,” Dillon earnestly declared. “Got a gun on you? Stand up, sir, and lift your jacket.” “I have one,” Dillon admitted.