The train was now rushing down the incline, and in a few moments would be at Newton Abbot, the junction for Torquay. Without a word, my companion suddenly sprang to his feet, and taking a railway key from his pocket, went out into the corridor and locked both doors at either end of the carriage so that no one could pass along. Then, returning to me, he said-- "Perhaps it would be better, Mr Kemball, if you went into the next compartment while we are stopping. We must not appear to have knowledge of each other." Scarcely had I time to enter the adjoining compartment when the train pulled up. I lit a cigarette, and sat gazing lazily out of the window, when, sure enough, the man in the straw hat who had travelled in the rear of the train strolled aimlessly along, and as he passed the compartment occupied by Dawnay glanced in to satisfy himself that he was still there. The wait was long, for the corridor coaches from Torquay for London were being joined on. But at last we moved off again, and as soon as we did so I returned to the mysterious fugitive. "Tell me, Mr Dawnay, something concerning Mr Arnold," I urged earnestly, without preamble. "He did me the honour of entrusting me with certain purely personal matters, but gave me no information as to who or what he was." "Melvill Arnold was a most remarkable person," declared the man in the red tie. "He divided his time between life in London and exploring the remains of the extinct civilisation in Egypt." "Then he lived in Egypt?" "Mostly in the deserts. His knowledge of Egyptology was, perhaps, unequalled. The last letter I received from him was from El Fasher, in Darfur." "Arnold was not his real name?" "Not exactly his baptismal one," laughed Dawnay, lightly. "It would hardly have suited him to use that!" "What was it? Is there any reason why I should not know?" "Yes. I am scarcely likely to betray my dead friend, Mr Kemball." I was silent beneath his stern rebuke. At one moment I felt repulsion when I gazed upon his pimply face, yet at the next I experienced a curious sense of fascination. The mystery of it all had become most tantalising. Thought of the bronze cylinder and what it might contain flashed across my mind, whereupon I asked whether Arnold had had any permanent address in London. "No. I usually wrote to him to the Poste Restante at Charing Cross. He was an elusive man always, and when in London--which was on very rare occasions--seemed to change his abode each day. He boasted that he never slept two nights running in the same bed. He had reasons for that--the same reasons, truth to tell, that I had." "He feared the police--eh?" Dawnay's fat face relaxed again into a grim smile. "But now that Arnold is dead I have to secure my own safety," he exclaimed quickly. "I'm in an infernal trap here in this train. I may be arrested when I step out of it--who knows?" "And would arrest entail serious consequences?" I asked slowly, my eyes fixed upon his.