"May I not tell the story of my life in my own way? To Australia then I went, and there for a score of years I stayed. And as with time the wound in my heart healed I married, and children were born to me. Then death came, and my wife was taken from me, and I put the past behind me and returned to this land. But in that whence I had come I had found a way to Paradise—a way to drown the past and revel in the present. I had learned to love the poppy. It became the emblem of my later life—the anodyne of every sorrow. I sought it here, for life without opium was no longer possible. I found it at the hands of one Mother Mandarin——"
"What, you too, then, know that old hag!"
"Beneath her roof I have dreamed the sweetest dreams, beside her—a very Jezebel—I dwelt for long in Paradise. But now I am in Hell. They chase me constantly, relentlessly. But so far They have not caught me. Horror! when they do! Your uncle, too, loved his opium. We met there, and I came to understand him more. Twin sister to his love for opium was his love for crime. He had a passion for its mysteries, and lacked only the courage of a past master. He probed in the depths—together we probed in the depths—he paying me. I was a seeker of criminals for him. It was my work to hunt them out and bring them to him as to one who was an appreciator. For the fulfilling of my task he paid me three hundred pounds a year. He used to say he longed to kill—to be a spiller of human blood."
"Man—you're mad!"
"Small wonder if I were—but I am not. These things that I tell you are true, friend. Your uncle was the criminal's comrade. He sheltered him and paid large sums of money to his kind. I was his tool in this as all through life. At Lesser Thorpe I used to visit him. I was there that Christmas night when Nemesis o'ertook him, and he met with death at the hand of one of those whom he so sought. No soul knew I was there. But I knew all—of Miriam Crane—of Jabez Crane—of Gerald Arkel, aye, and of yourself. For I had been set my task and had fulfilled it, and the secret of Miriam Crane's past life was in my keeping and in my master's. I knew her brother for a murderer—he had killed a sergeant in your regiment."
"I know—I know all about that—go on."
"Softly, friend. As he had held me for so many years so did Barton hold Miriam Crane—in his power—in the hollow of his hand. So did he hold Jabez Crane, who too loved the drug. We met at Mother Mandarin's. And now I approach what you would know. The grandson of the woman Mandarin was a thief—an expert criminal. He heard speak of Lesser Thorpe, and Barton, and Jabez, and his sister. And he took himself down there to find what he could find. He made excuse of going at Jabez' bidding to warn his sister he would come. His name was Shorty. He was the genius of evil. He was the accomplice of Jabez in many crimes."
"I know they tried to rob my uncle one night on Waterloo Bridge," put in the Major, who, in spite of himself, was becoming excited. The man's narrative, strange as it was, was beginning to convince him.
"I watched this sinful youth, for I knew his lust for gold. On Christmas night I took me to the Manor House to warn George Barton of that which I knew threatened him. But, as I learned, all too late, Shorty followed me. He concealed himself behind a buttress near the library window and heard our converse there. And when I left he entered and hid himself away, for I left and entered always by the window on the terrace, so that no soul should know."
"But how, man?—how could he get into the library while you and my uncle were there without your seeing him?"