"I am a detective. You are my prisoner. I arrest you for wilful murder."
Then I saw that the men who had been standing at the foot of the steps, and who now, uninvited, were entering the house, were constables.
[BOOK II.--THE CLUB.]
(The Tale is told by Reginald Townsend, Esq.)
CHAPTER X.
[THE HONOUR OF THE CLUB.]
I had not a notion that it would be Louise, that evening at the club--not the very faintest! How could I have? I did not know that the lot would fall to me. I was the first to draw. When I saw that the card which I had drawn was black, and that on it were inscribed, in gleaming crimson letters, the words, "The Honour of the Club," it gave me quite a start. Of course I knew that the odds were equal. But, somehow or other, I had never expected to draw the thing. I held it up in front of me.
"Gentlemen, the Honour of the Club is mine."
Pendarvon, in the chair, stood up. The others all rose with him.
"Gentlemen of the Murder Club, charge your glasses to the brim." They filled them with neat brandy. Pendarvon turned to me, holding his tumbler above his head.