“I started with terror and felt something hurt the hand which all the time had been gripping the revolver in my pocket. It was the tense pressure of my finger on the weapon. “The man nodded and smiled at me again. I gasped, feeling certain that my hour had come. With the fascination of a man trapped and bound, I saw him bend sideways and put his hand into his hip pocket. Instantly--I know not how--there was a deafening report in the carriage, and a film of smoke floated between me and him. He sank to the floor. He rolled slightly with his last gasp, his arm outflung. I had killed him! I stood fixed with horror. In his hand was--not a revolver, but a tobacco-pipe. “For a moment my senses left me. I knew nothing. I was brought to consciousness by a sharp pain in my leg. The white dog held me in a savage grip, growling in a manner frightful to hear. Frenzy overcame me; I kicked and fought in vain. Then, suddenly recollecting the revolver in my hand, I pressed it to his head and fired. I was free. Free? No, trapped in the swaying carriage splashed with blood, its floor heaped with the large body of the man I had killed. The train was racing along at top speed. In five or ten minutes more we should stop and the crime would be discovered. Mad with horror, I rushed to the door, opened it, flung myself into the black night. I remember the roar of the train passing me as I rolled down the embankment, have an impression of a bright light whisked away, and then I lost consciousness. “When my senses returned, I saw the light in your house. Clambering over a wall, I made my way to it, fainting, scarce able to walk, but frantic, it seemed to me, for help. You kindly took me in. For the moment I have respite, but ‘they’ have triumphed. By their cunning manipulation of the forces behind Life, I have been tricked into murdering one who to all outward semblance was an innocent man. In a day or two I shall be standing in the dock, and finally my life will be violently cut short by my fellow-men, accompanied by every circumstance of ignominy. Fully, indeed, are they revenged! “Now, sir, you know my story; and if, after hearing it, you care to call in the local police----” * * * * * * At that moment there was a sound of carriage-wheels on the road. They stopped just in front of the house. The stranger sprang to his feet. His eyes swept round the room in a swift, panic-stricken quest for concealment. Then, crying: “No! They shall not take me! They shall not take me!” he rushed from the room. Mr. Gilchrist, still spellbound by the story to which he had been so intently listening, stood for a moment as though paralyzed, staring at the open door. A familiar whistle from outside, a cheery call--“Gilchrist! Gilchrist!”--gave him back his faculties. It was Williamson--thank God!