THE UNTRODDEN SUMMIT OF MOUNT SARMIENTO, WHICH THE AUTHOR WAS PREVENTED FROM REACHING BY A SUDDEN STORM.
From a Photograph.
[The Spider's Web.]
AN UNDERGRADUATE'S STRANGE STORY.
Told by "Cecil Addington" and Set Down by George A. Raper.
A remarkable drama of modern life, showing the pitfalls that lie in wait for well-connected and inexperienced young men, and that even to-day, in the heart of London, a man may go in peril of his life. For obvious reasons the names of the people concerned have been changed, but the correct names of all the parties have been supplied to us in confidence.
I write this record of a strange chapter in my life with a double motive. It may serve, firstly, as a warning to others who find themselves placed in what I once regarded as my enviable position. Secondly, it ought to have a wider usefulness in opening people's eyes to the very real dangers that lurk under the surface of London life. Had anyone told me, two years ago, that a man living in peaceful England could be in daily danger of assassination at the hands of an organized gang of villains, I should have found no words strong enough to express my disbelief. Still less would I have supposed that I, Cecil Addington, a strong, vigorous young Englishman, would ever go about in constant dread of murderous violence. Many who read my story will treat it as the outcome of a disordered imagination and refuse to believe that the forces of civilization are powerless to protect a man whose death has been deliberately planned. I wish I could share this belief; but, unfortunately, my experience points the other way. I have come to know that there are to-day, in London, men who would not hesitate to commit murder if it could be done without undue risk to themselves, and who have enough devilish ingenuity to reduce that risk almost to vanishing-point.
But I had better begin at the beginning and tell my story simply and straightforwardly, just as it happened, merely warning the reader that, though I am relating actual facts, I have, for obvious reasons, used fictitious names.