"I do not know why you have come," he answered, forming each word precisely. "I have done nothing wrong. I am an honest newsagent. There is only my wife, daughter, son, lodger in house." "You are a receiver of stolen goods," answered Foyle, something, it must be confessed, at a venture. "Don't trouble to deny it, Mr. Israels. We're not after you this time--not if you treat us fairly. What about this lodger of yours? Have you bought him a typewriter lately?" "Yes--yes. I help you all I can," protested the Jew, with an eagerness that deceived neither of the detectives. There is no class of liar so abysmal as the East-end criminal Jew. They will hold to a glib falsehood with a temerity that nothing can shake. If there is no necessity to lie, they lie--for practice, it is to be presumed. The best way to extract a truth is to make a direct assertion by the light of apparent knowledge and so sometimes obtain assent. Foyle knew the idiosyncrasies of the breed. Hence the threat in his demand. "I bought a typewriter--yes," went on Israels. "I think he was honest. Didn't seem as though police after him." "Which room is he in?" Israels jerked a thumb upwards. "Next landing. Door on left," he ejaculated nervously. The superintendent pushed by the man. He knew that the critical moment had come. With his quick judgment of men he had summed up Mr. Israels. Whatever the Jew's morals, it was evident that he had a wholesome respect for his own oily skin. He would not risk himself to save the neck of another man. Foyle's intentions were simple. He would steal quietly up the second flight of stairs, burst the door open if it were locked, and seize the man he was in search of in his sleep. But his plans were frustrated. He had not taken two steps when a woman peeped from an adjoining room. He caught one glimpse of her in the semi-darkness with a police whistle at her lips. He sprang forward, and as he did so a shrill, ear-piercing blast rang out. Green was close behind him. She shrieked as the detective tore the whistle from her, and he felt her slender figure entwine itself about him. Down he went, with his companion on top of him, and another woman's loud hysterical cries added to the pandemonium. Foyle picked himself up and, lifting the girl bodily, flung her without ceremony into the room from which she had emerged. From above a voice shouted something, and a knife whizzed downwards and struck quivering in the bare boards of the landing, grazing Green's shoulders.