The doctor turned for a moment deliberately round and looked at his companion. He was a heavy-browed, unimaginative, quiet-living man. The things which passed before his eyes counted with him, and little else. The thousand pounds which he was taking home was more than he had been able to save throughout his life. To him it represented immense things. He would probably not spend a dollar more, or indulge in a single luxury, yet the money was there in the background, a warm, comforting thing. "You have still," he said, "a desperate part to play. Can you tell me honestly that you enjoy it, that you have no fear?" Jocelyn Thew repeated the word almost wonderingly. "Fear! Do you really know me so little, my friend of few perceptions? Listen and I will confess something. I have fought for my life at least a dozen times, fought against odds which seemed almost hopeless. I have seen death with hungry, outstretched arms, within a few seconds' reach of me, but I have never felt fear. I do not know what it is. The length of one's life is purely a relative thing. It will come in ten or twenty years, if not to-morrow. Why not to-morrow?" "If you put it like that," Gant grunted, "why not to-day?" "Or at any moment, if you will. I am quite ready, as ready as I ever shall be. If I fail to bring off what I desire within the next few days, there will be an end of me. Do I look as though I were worrying about that?" "You don't indeed," the doctor agreed. "You ought to have been in my profession. You might have become the greatest surgeon in the world." Jocelyn Thew shrugged his shoulders. "Even that is possible," he admitted. "Unfortunately, there was a cloud over my early days, a cloud heavy enough even to prevent my offering my services to the world through the medium of any of the recognized professions. So you see, Gant, I had to invent one of my own. What would you call it, I wonder?--Buccaneer? Adventurer? Explorer? Perhaps my enemies would find a more unkind word.--Now you had better step in and take your seat. Behold the creatures of our friend Brightman and the satellites of the aristocratic Crawshay close in upon us! They listen for farewell words. Is this your carriage? Very well. Here comes your porter, hungry for remuneration. Shall I give them a hint, Gant?" There flashed in the hunted man's eyes for a moment a gleam of almost demoniacal humour. Gant glowered at him. "You are mad!" he exclaimed.