By chance the little throng of people here became thicker for a few moments and then ceased. Lutchester drew a little sigh of relief as he saw before him almost an empty pavement. Then, just as he was relapsing once more into thought, some part of his subconscious instinct suddenly leaped into warning life. Without any actual perception of what it might mean, he felt the thrill of imminent danger, connected it with that soft footfall behind him, and swung round in time to seize a deadly uplifted hand which seemed to end in a shimmer of dull steel. His assailant flung himself upon Lutchester with the lithe ferocity of a cat, clinging to his body, twisting and turning his arm to wrest it free. It was a matter of seconds only before his intended victim, with a fierce backward twist, broke the man's wrist and, wrenching himself free from the knees which clung around him, flung him forcibly against the railings which bordered the pavement. Lutchester paused for a moment to recover his breath and looked around. A man from the other side of the street was running towards them, but no one else seemed to have noticed the struggle which had begun and finished in less than thirty seconds. The man, who was half-way across the thoroughfare, suddenly stopped short. He shouted a warning to Lutchester, who swung around. His late assailant, who had been lying motionless, had raised himself slightly, with a revolver clenched in his left hand. Lutchester's spring on one side saved his life, for the bullet passed so close to his cheek that he felt the rush and heat of the air. The man in the center of the road was busy shouting an alarm vociferously, and other people on both sides of the thoroughfare were running up. Lutchester's eyes now never left the dark, doubled-up figure upon the pavement. His whole body was tense. He was prepared at the slightest movement to spring in upon his would-be murderer. The man's eyes seemed to be burning in his white face. He called out to Lutchester hoarsely. "Don't move or I shall shoot!" He looked up and down the street. One of the nearest of the hastening figures was a policeman. He turned the revolver against his own temple and pulled the trigger.... Lutchester and a policeman walked slowly back along Fifth Avenue. Behind them, a little crowd was still gathered around the spot from which the body of the dead man had already been removed in an ambulance. "I really remember nothing," Lutchester told his companion, "until I heard the footsteps behind me, and, turning round, saw the knife. This is simply an impression of mine--that he might have descended from the car which passed me and stopped just round the corner of that street." "He's a chauffeur, right enough," the inspector remarked. "It don't seem to have been a chance job, either. Looks as though he meant doing you in. Got any enemies?" "None that I know of," Lutchester answered cautiously. "Why, the car's there still," he added, as they reached the corner.