"But who is Clubfoot?" I questioned.
My brother furrowed his brows anxiously.
"Des," he said, "I don't know. He is certainly not a regular official of the German Intelligence like Steinhauer and the others. But I have heard of a clubfooted German on two occasions ... both were dark and mysterious affairs, in both he played a leading role and both ended in the violent death of one of our men."
"Then Tracy and the others...?" I asked.
"Victims of this man, Des, without any doubt," my brother answered. He paused a moment reflectively.
"There is a code of honour in our game, old man," he said, "and there are lots of men in the German secret service who live up to it. We give and take plenty of hard knocks in the rough-and-tumble of the chase, but ambush and assassination are barred."
He took a deep breath and added:
"But the man Clubfoot doesn't play the game!"
"Francis," I said, "I wish I'd known something of this that night I had him at my mercy at the Esplanade. He would not have got off with a cracked skull ... with one blow. There would have been another blow for Tracy, one for Arbuthnot, one for the other man ... until the account was settled and I'd beaten his brains out on the carpet. But if we meet him again, Francis, ... as, please God, we shall! ... there will be no code of honour for him ... we'll finish him in cold blood as we'd kill a rat!"
My brother thrust out his hand at me and we clasped hands on it.