The Major was less old than he had fancied at first; he was more worn than aged. Illness or tragedy might have whitened him. It was even possible that he had made himself up for the part he was playing. His eyes were clear, and his hands virile. With the mustache and imperial removed——
“Major Cleasby, you ask me to accept a great deal on your bare word,” he said politely. “You come to me with nothing to introduce you but the most briefly formal letter. The moment you enter my room, before you'll have anything to do with me, you inspect every hiding-place as though I were a counterfeiter or an anarchist. You boldly announce to me that ever since I landed in England you've had me followed and observed. You use the results of your spying as a kind of blackmail to induce me to present you with the sort of evidence for which you're searching. You trick me into telling you about a shipboard flirtation with a woman whom you say you want convicted of murder. No sooner have I told you, than you declare that you yourself are married to her. I ought to refuse to allow this interview to go further without calling in a lawyer. I don't mean to be offensive, but your kaleidoscopic changes put a strain on my credulity. I can't believe your story that you're a secret service agent endeavoring to get your wife executed. When men tire of matrimony, they find less ingenious methods of recovering their bachelorhood.”
The Major smiled with his patient air of affability. “It isn't my bachelorhood that I'm trying to recover. It's my——”
“If you don't mind,” Hindwood cut in, “I'd like to finish my say first. One of the things that you may not have learned is that I'm here on a mission of international dimensions. It concerns more than one of the governments of Europe. I can't afford to have my name mixed up in a scandal and, what's more, I can bring influences to bear to prevent it from being introduced. You may be anything you like; whatever you are cuts no ice. I'm through with you and with whatever you may imagine took place on the Ryndam. You seem to think that I'm concealing a guilty knowledge that would enable you to bring this Gorlof woman to trial. You're on the wrong tack. I have no such knowledge. The longer you stay here, the more you waste my time.” The Major was on the point of answering when the telephone rang shrilly. Grateful for a diversion, Hindwood crossed the room. As he unhooked the receiver, he glanced across his shoulder, “Excuse me.”
“Is this Mr. Hindwood?”
“It is.”
It was the hotel operator asking.
“There's a call for you, sir. It's from some one who's not on a newspaper. Will you take it?”
“Certainly.”
There was a pause while the connection was being made; then a foreign voice, a woman's, questioned, “Eees thees Meester Hindwood? Eef you please, one meenute. A lady wants to talk wiz you.”