Up the driveway a touring-car approached, and though it limped on a flat tire, it approached at reckless speed. The two men in the front seat were white with dust; their faces, masked by automobile glasses, were indistinguishable. As though preparing for an immediate exit, the car swung in a circle until its nose pointed down the driveway up which it had just come. Raising his silk mask the one beside the driver shouted at Judge Van Vorst. His throat was parched, his voice was hoarse and hot with anger. “A gray touring-car,” he shouted. “It stopped here. We saw it from that hill. Then the damn tire burst, and we lost our way. Where did he go?” “Who?” demanded Van Vorst, stiffly, “Captain McCoy?” The man exploded with an oath. The driver with a shove of his elbow, silenced him. “Yes, Captain McCoy,” assented the driver eagerly. “Which way did he go?” “To New York,” said Van Vorst. The driver shrieked at his companion. “Then, he's doubled back,” he cried. “He's gone to New Haven.” He stooped and threw in the clutch. The car lurched forward. A cold terror swept young Van Vorst. “What do you want with him?” he called “Who are you?” Over one shoulder the masked face glared at him. Above the roar of the car the words of the driver were flung back. “We're Secret Service from Washington,” he shouted. “He's from their embassy. He's a German spy!” Leaping and throbbing at sixty miles an hour, the car vanished in a curtain of white, whirling dust. Chapter 9. THE CARD-SHARP I had looked forward to spending Christmas with some people in Suffolk, and every one in London assured me that at their house there would be the kind of a Christmas house party you hear about but see only in the illustrated Christmas numbers. They promised mistletoe, snapdragon, and Sir Roger de Coverley. On Christmas morning we would walk to church, after luncheon we would shoot, after dinner we would eat plum pudding floating in blazing brandy, dance with the servants, and listen to the waits singing “God rest you, merry gentlemen, let nothing you dismay.” To a lone American bachelor stranded in London it sounded fine. And in my gratitude I had already shipped to my hostess, for her children, of whose age, number, and sex I was ignorant, half of Gamage's dolls, skees, and cricket bats, and those crackers that, when you pull them, sometimes explode. But it was not to be. Most inconsiderately my wealthiest patient gained sufficient courage to consent to an operation, and in all New York would permit no one to lay violent hands upon him save myself. By cable I advised postponement. Having lived in lawful harmony with his appendix for fifty years, I thought, for one week longer he might safely maintain the status quo. But his cable in reply was an ultimatum. So, on Christmas eve, instead of Hallam Hall and a Yule log, I was in a gale plunging and pitching off the coast of Ireland, and the only log on board was the one the captain kept to himself.