“Why, Il Passero, of course,” replied the man, whose wife addressed him affectionately as Beppo.
“Who is Il Passero, pray?”
“Well, you know him surely. Il Passero, or The Sparrow. We call him so because he is always flitting about Europe, and always elusive.”
“The police want him, I suppose.”
“I should rather think they do. They have been searching for him for these past five years, but he always dodges them, first in France, then here, then in Spain, and then in England.”
“But what is this mysterious and unknown friend of mine?”
“Il Passero is the chief of the most daring of all the gangs of international thieves. We all work at his direction.”
“But how did he know of my danger?” asked Hugh, mystified and dismayed.
“Il Passero knows many strange things,” he replied with a grin. “It is his business to know them. And besides, he has some friends in the police—persons who never suspect him.”
“What nationality is he?”