tream. Beyond that lay the moor, and in five minutes I was deep in bracken and heather. Soon I was round the shoulder of the rise, and in the little glen from which the mill laid flowed. Ten minutes later my face was in the spring, and I was soaking down pints of the blessed water. But it did not stop till I had put half a dozen miles between me and that accursed dwelling. Chapter 7 The Dry Fly Fisherman I sat down on a hill-top and took stock of my position. I wasn't feeling very happy, for my natural thankfulness at my escape was clouded by my severe bodily discomfort. Was lentitite fumes had fairly poisoned me, and the baking hours on the dove-cut hadn't helped matters.  Also my shoulder was in a bad way. At first I thought it was only a bruise, but it seemed to be swelling, and I had no use of my left arm. My plan was to seek Mr. Turnbull's cottage, recover my garments, and especially Scudder's Notebook, and then make for the main line and get back to the south. It seemed to me that the sooner I got in touch with the Foreign Office man, Sir Walter Bullivant, the better. I didn't see how I could get more proof than I had got already. He must just take or leave my story. And anyway, with him I would be in better hands than those devilish Germans. I had begun to feel quite kindly towards the British police. It was a wonderful starry night, and had not much difficulty about the road. Sir Harry's map had given me the lie of the land, and all I had to do was to steer a point or two west of southwest to come to the stream where I had met the roadmen. In all these travels I never knew the names of the places, but I believe this stream was no less than the upper waters of the River Tweed. I calculated I must be about eighteen miles distant, and that meant I could not get there before morning. So I must lie up a day somewhere, for I was too outrageous a figure to be seen in the sunlight. I had neither coat, waistcoat, collar, nor hat. My trousers were badly torn, and my face and hands were black with the explosion. I daresay I had other beauties, for my eyes felt as if they were furiously bloodshot. Altogether I was no spectacle for God-fearing citizens to see on a high road. Very soon after daybreak I made an attempt to clean myself in a hill-burn, and then approached a herd's cottage, for I was feeling the need of food. The herd was away from home, and his wife was alone, with no neighbour for five miles. She was a decent old body, and a plucky one, for though she got a fright when she saw me, she had an axe handy, and would have used it on any evil doer. I told her that I had had a fall, I didn't say how, and she saw by my looks that I was pretty sick. Like a true Samaritan she asked no questions, but gave me a bowl of milk with a dash of whiskey in it, and let me sit for a little by her kitchen fire. She would have bathed my shoulder, but it ached so badly I would not let her touch it. I don't know what she took me for, a repentant burglar, perhaps, for when I wanted to pay her for the milk and tinder to sovereign, which was the smallest coin I had, she shook her head and said something about giving it to them that had a right to it. At this I protested so strongly that I think she believed me honest, for she took the money, and gave me a warm new plaid for it, and an old hat of her mans. She showed me how to wrap the plaid around my shoulders, and when I left that cottage I was the living image of the kind of Scotsman you see in the illustrations to Byrne's poems, but at any rate I was more or less clad. It was all as well, for the weather changed before mid-day to a thick drizzle of rain. I found shelter below an overhanging rock in the crook of a Byrne, where a drift of dead bracken's made a tolerable bed. There I managed to sleep till nightfall, waking very cramped and wretched, with my shoulder gnawing like a toothache. I ate the oatcake and cheese the old wife had given me, and set out again just before the darkening. I pass over the miseries of that night among the wet hills. There were no stars to steer by, and I had to do the best I could from my memory of the map. Twice I lost my way, and I had some nasty falls into peat bogs. I had only about ten miles to go as the crow flies, but my mistakes made it nearer twenty. The last bit was completed with set teeth, and a very light and dizzy head, but I managed it, and in the early dawn I was knocking at Mr. Turnbull's door. The mist lay close and thick, and from the cottage I could not see the high road. Mr. Turnbull himself opened to me, sober and something more than sober. He was primely dressed in an ancient but well-tended suit of black. He had been shaven not later than the night before. He wore a linen collar, and in his left hand he carried a pocket-bible. At first he did not recognize me. Pue Argi that comes Stravagan here on the Sabbath morning, he asked. I had lost all count of the days, so the Sabbath was the reason for this strange decorum. My head was swimming so wildly that I could not frame a coherent answer, but he recognized me, and he saw that I was ill. I got my specs, he asked. I fetched them out of my trouser pocket and gave them them. You had come for your jacket and waistcoat, he said. Coming by, lush man, yet terrible done, either legs. Hot up till I get you to a chair. I perceived I was in for a bout of malaria. I had a good deal of fever in my bones, and the wet night had brought it out. While my shoulder and the effects of the fumes combined to make me feel pretty bad. Before I knew, Mr. Turnbull was helping me off with my clothes, and putting me to bed in one of the two cupboards that lined the kitchen walls. He was a true friend in need, that old roadman. His wife was dead years ago, and since his daughter's marriage he lived alone. For the better part of ten days he did all the rough nursing I needed. I simply wanted to be left in peace while the fever took its course, and when my skin was cool again I found that the bout had more or less cured my shoulder. But it was a baddish go, and though I was out of bed in five days, it took me some time to get my legs again. He went out each morning, leaving me milk for the day, and locking the door behind him, and came in in the evening to sit silent in the chimney corner. Not a soul came near the place. When I was getting better he never bothered me with a question. Several times he fetched me a two days old Scotsman, and I noticed that the interest in the Portland Place murder seemed to have died down. There was no mention of it, and I could find very little about anything, except a thing called the General Assembly, some ecclesiastical spree I gathered. One day he produced my belt from a lock-fast drawer. There's a terrible heap of silver in it, he said. He had better count it to see its odd air. He never even sought my name. I asked him if anybody had been around making inquiries, subsequent to my spell at the road-making. I, there was a man in a motor-car. He spired where he had taken my place that day, and I let on I thought him daft. But he kept it on at me, and saying I said he might be thinking, oh my God, brother, fray the clooch that Wiles lent me a hawn. He was a worse-looking soul, and I could not understand the half of his English tongue.  That was not till the twelfth day of June, and as luck would have it a drover went past that morning taking some cattle to Moffat. He was a man named Hislop, a friend of Turnbull's, and he came in to his breakfast with us and offered to take me with him. I made Turnbull accept five pounds for my lodging and a hard job I had of it. There never was a more independent being. He grew positively rude when I pressed him and shy and red, and took the money at last without a thank you.  You would have thought from our leave taking that we had parted in disgust. Hislop was a cheery soul who chattered all the way over the pass and down the sunny Vale of Anon. I talked of Galloway markets and sheep prices, and he made up his mind I was a pack shepherd from those parts, whatever that may be. My plaid and my old hat, as I have said, gave me a fine theatrical scots look, but driving cattle is a mortally slow job, and we took the better part of the day to cover a dozen miles. If I had not had such an anxious heart I would have enjoyed that time. It was shining blue weather, with a constantly changing prospect of brown hills and far green meadows, and a continual sound of larks and curlews and falling streams. But I had no mind for the summer, and little for Hislop's conversation, for as the fateful fifteenth of June drew near I was overweight with the hopeless difficulties of my enterprise. I got some dinner in a humble moth at Public House, and walked the two miles to the junction on the main line. The night express for the south was not due till near midnight, and to fill up the time I went up on the hillside and fell asleep, for the walk had tired me. I all but slept too long and had to run to the station and catch the train with two minutes to spare. The feel of the hard third-class cushions and the smell of tobacco cheered me up wonderfully. At any rate, I felt now that I was getting to grips with my job. I was decanted at crew in the small hours and had to wait till six to get a train for Birmingham. In the afternoon I got to Reading and changed into a local train which journeyed into the deeps of Berkshire. Presently I was in a land of lush water meadows and slow, reedy streams. About eight o'clock in the evening a weary and travel-stained being across between a farm labourer and a vet, with a checked black and white plaid over his arm, for I did not dare to wear it south of the border, descended at the little station of Artinswell. There were several people on the platform and I thought I had better wait to ask my way till I was clear of the place. The road led through a wood of great beaches and then into a shallow valley, with the green backs of downs peeping over the distant trees. After Scotland the air smelt heavy and flat, but infinitely sweet for the limes and chestnuts and lilac bushes were domes of blossom. Presently I came to a bridge below which a clear slow stream flowed between snowy beds of water-butter-cups. A little above it was a mill and the lasher made a pleasant cool sound in the scented dusk. Somehow the place soothed me and put me at my ease. I fell to whistling as I looked into the green depths, and the tune which came to my lips was Annie Lorry. A fisherman came up from the water-side, and as he neared me he too began to whistle. The tune was infectious, for he followed my suit. He was a huge man in untidy old flannels and a wide-brimmed hat, with a canvas bag slung on his shoulder. He nodded to me, and I thought I had never seen a shrewder or better-tempered face. He leaned his delicate ten-foot split cane rod against the bridge and looked with me at the water. Clear, isn't it? he said pleasantly. I back our kinnit any day against the test. Look at that big fellow. Four pounds if he's an ounce, but the evening rise is over, and you can't tempt him. I don't see him, said I. Look there! A yard from the reeds just above that stickle. I've got him now. You might swear he was a black stone. So, he said, and whistled another bar of annie-larry. Twis'd in's the name, isn't it? He said over his shoulder, his eyes still fixed on the stream. No, I said. I mean to say, yes. I'd forgotten all about my alias. It's a wise conspirator that knows his own name, he observed, grinning broadly at a moor-hin that emerged from the bridge's shadow. I stood up and looked at him, at the square cleft jaw and broad, lined brow in the firm folds of cheek, and began to think that here, at last, was an ally worth having. His whimsical blue eyes seemed to go very deep. Suddenly, he frowned. I call it disgraceful, he said, raising his voice.  You can get a meal from my kitchen, but you'll get no money from me. A dog-cart was passing, driven by a young man who raised his whip to salute the fisherman, when he had gone, he picked up his rod.  Wait five minutes, and then go round to the back door. And with that, he left me. I did as I was bidden. I found a pretty cottage with a lawn running down to the stream and a perfect jungle of gilder-rose and lilac flanking the path. The back door stood open, and a grave butler was awaiting me. Come this way, sir, he said, and he led me along a passage and up a back staircase to a pleasant bedroom looking towards the river. There I found a complete outfit laid out for me, dress-clothes with all the fixings, a brooch, and a white coat. Brown flannel suit, shirts, collars, ties, shaving things and hairbrushes, even a pair of patent shoes. Sir Walter thought as how Mr. Reggie's things would fit you, sir, said the butler. He keeps some clothes here, for he comes regular on the weekends. There's a bathroom next door, and I've prepared a hot bath. Dena and Afanawa sir, Yolia the gong. The grave being withdrew, and I sat down in a shins-covered, easy chair, engaped. It was like a pantomime to come suddenly out of Begirdim into this orderly comfort. Obviously, sir Walter believed in me, though why he did I could not guess. I looked at myself in the mirror and saw a wild, haggard brown fellow, with a fortnight's ragged beard and dust in ears and eyes, colorless, vulgarly shirted, with shapeless old tweed clothes and boots that had not been cleaned for the better part of a month. I made a fine tramp and a fair drover, and here I was, ushered by a prim butler into this temple of gracious ease, and the best of it was that they did not even know my name. I resolved not to puzzle my head, but to take the gifts the gods had provided. I shaved and bathed luxuriously, and got into the dress-clothes and clean, crackling shirt, which fitted me not so badly. By the time I had finished the looking-glass showed a not unpurseable young man. Sir Walter awaited me in a dusky dining-room, where a little round table was lit with silver candles. The sight of him, so respectable and established and secure, the embodiment of law and government and all the conventions, took me aback and made me feel an interloper. He couldn't know the truth about me, or he wouldn't treat me like this. I simply could not accept his hospitality on false pretenses. I'm more obliged to you than I can say, but I'm bound to make things clear, I said. I'm an innocent man, but I'm wanted by the police. I've got to tell you this, and I won't be surprised if you kick me out. He smiled. That's all right. Don't let that interfere with your appetite. We can talk about these things after dinner. I never ate a meal with great relish, for I had had nothing all day but railway sandwiches. Sir Walter did me proud, for we drank a good champagne and had some uncommon fine port afterwards. It made me almost hysterical to be sitting there, waited on by a footman and a sleek butler, and remember that I had been living for three weeks like a brigand with every man's hand against me. I told Sir Walter about tiger fish in the Zambezi that bite off your fingers if you give them a chance, and we discussed sport up and down the globe, for yet hunted a bit in his day. We went to his study for coffee, a jolly room full of books and trophies and untidiness and comfort. I made up my mind that if ever I got rid of this business and had a house of my own, I would create such a room. Then when the coffee cups were cleared away, and we had got our cigars lit, my host swung his long legs over the side of his chair and bade me get started with my yarn. I've obeyed Harry's instructions, he said, and the bribe he offered me was that you would tell me something to wake me up. I'm ready, Mr. Hane. I noticed with a start that he called me by my proper name. I began at the very beginning. I told if my board had been London, in the night I'd come back to find Scudder jibbering on my doorstep. I told him all Scudder had told me about Corolla Dee's and the Foreign Office Conference, and that made him purse his lips and grin. Then I got to the murder, and he grew solemn again. He heard all about the milkman and my time in Galloway and my deciphering Scudder's notes at the inn. You've got them here, he asked sharply, and drew a long breath when I whipped the little book from my pocket. I said nothing of the contents. Then I described my meeting with Sir Harry and the speeches at the hall. At that he laughed uproariously. Harry talked dash nonsense, did he? I quite believe it.  Go on, Mr. Hane. My day as a roadman excited him a bit, he made me describe the two fellows in the car very closely, and seemed to be raking back in his memory.  But the old man in the Moorland house solemnized him. Again I had to describe every detail of his appearance. Bland and bald-headed and hooded his eyes like a bird. He sounds like a sinister wild fowl. And you dynamited his hermitage after he saved you from the police. Spirited piece of work that. Presently I reached the end of my wanderings. He got up slowly and looked down at me from the hearth-rug. You may dismiss the police from your mind, he said. You're in no danger from the law of this land. Great Scott! I cried. Have they got the murderer? No. But for the last fortnight they have dropped you from the list of possibles. Why? I asked in amazement, principally because I received a letter from Scudder. I knew something of the man, and he did several jobs for me. He was half-crank, half-genius, but he was wholly honest. The trouble about him was his partiality for playing a lone hand. That made him pretty well useless in any secret service, a pity, for he had uncommon gifts. I think he was the bravest man in the world, for he was always shivering with fright, and yet nothing would choke him off. I had a letter from him on the 31st of May. But he had been dead a week by then. The letter was written and posted on the 23rd. He evidently did not anticipate his immediate decease. His communications usually took a week to reach me, for they were sent undercover to Spain and then to Newcastle. He had a mania, you know, for concealing his tracks. What did he say? I stammered. Nothing. Merely that he was in danger, but had found shelter with a good friend, and I would hear from him before the 15th of June. He gave me no address, but he said he was living near Portland Place. I think his object was clear to you if anything happened. When I got it, I went to Scotland Yard, went over the details of the inquest, and concluded that you were the friend. We made inquiries about you, Mr. Hanay, and found you were respectable. I thought I knew the motives for your disappearance, not only the police, the other one, too, and when I got Harry's scrawl, I guessed at the rest. I've been expecting you any time this past week. You can imagine what a load this took off my mind. I felt a free man once more, for I was now up against my country's enemies only, and not my country's law. Now let us have the little notebook, said Sir Walter. It took us a good hour to work through it. I explained the cipher, and he was jolly quick at picking it up. He amended my reading of it on several points, but I had been fairly correct on the whole. His face was very grave before he had finished, and he sat silent for a while. I don't know what to make of it, he said at last. He is right about one thing, what is going to happen the day after tomorrow. How the devil can it have got known? That is ugly enough in itself, but all this about war and the black stone. It reads like some wild melodrama. If only I had more confidence in Scudder's judgment. The trouble about him was that he was too romantic. He had the artistic temperament and wanted a story to be better than God meant it to be. He had a lot of odd biases too. Jews, for example, made him see red. Jews and the high finance. The black stone, he repeated. Der Schwartzstein. It's like a pinny novelette, and all this stuff about corollades. That is the weak part of the tale, for I happen to know that the virtuous corollades is likely to outlast us both. There is no state in Europe that wants him gone, besides he has just been playing up to Berlin and Vienna and giving my chief some uneasy moments. No. Scudder has gone off the track there. Frankly, Hene, I don't believe that part of the story. There's some nasty business afoot, and he found out too much and lost his life over it, but I am ready to take my oath that it is ordinary spy work. A certain great European power makes a hobby of her spy system, and her methods are not too particular. Since she pays by piecework, her blaggards are not likely to stick at a murder or two. They want our naval dispositions for their collection at the Marine Ampt, but they will be pigeonholed nothing more. Just then the butler entered the room. There's a trunk call from London, so alter. It's Mr. Wreath, and he wants to speak to you personally. My host went off to the telephone. He returned in five minutes with a whitish face. I apologised to the shade of Scudder. He said, Corollades was shot dead this evening at a few minutes after seven. End of Section 7 Chapter 8 of the 39 Steps by John Buckin This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Read by Tom Hare Chapter 8 The Coming of the Black Stone I came down to breakfast the next morning, after eight hours of blessed, dreamless sleep, to find Sir Walter decoding a telegram in the midst of muffins and marmalade. His fresh rosiness of yesterday seemed a thought tarnished. I had a busy hour on the telephone after you went to bed, he said. I got my chief to speak to the First Lord and the Secretary of War, and they are bringing Royer over a day sooner. This wire clenches it. He will be in London at five. Odd that the code word for a sous-chef did our Major General should be Paul Kerr. He directed me to the hot dishes and went on. Not that I think it will do much good. If your friends were clever enough to find out the first arrangement, they are clever enough to discover the change. I would give my head to know where the leak is. We believed there were only five men in England who knew about Royer's visit, and you may be certain there were fewer in France, for they managed these things better there. While I ate, he continued to talk, making me to my surprise a present of his full confidence. Can the dispositions not be changed, I asked. They could, he said. But we want to avoid that, if possible. They are the result of a mince thought, and no alteration would be as good. Besides, on one or two points change is simply impossible. Still, something could be done, I suppose, if it were absolutely necessary. Would you see the difficulty, Hanny? Our enemies are not going to be such fools as to pick Royer's pocket or any childish game like that. They know that would mean a row and put us on our guard. Their aim is to get the details without any one of us knowing, so that Royer will go back to Paris in the belief that the whole business is still deadly secret. If they can't do that, they fail, for, once we suspect, they know that the whole thing must be altered. Then we must stick by the Frenchman's side till he is home again, I said. If they thought they could get the information in Paris, they would try there. It means they have some deep scheme on foot in London, which they reckon is going to win out. Royer dines with my chief and then comes to my house, where four people will see him, which occur from the Admiralty. Myself, Sir Arthur drew in General Winstonly. The First Lord is ill and has gone to Shermingham. At my house he will get a certain document from Whitaker and after that he will be moted to Portsmouth, where a destroyer will take him to Avre. His journey is too important for the ordinary boat train. He will never be left unattended for a moment till he is safe on French soil. The same with Whitaker till he meets Royer. That is the best we can do and it's hard to see how there can be any miscarriage. But I don't mind admitting that I'm horribly nervous. This murder of corollaries will play the deuce in the chancellories of Europe. After breakfast he asked me if I could drive a car. Well, you'll be my chauffeur today and wear Hudson's rig. You ought about his size. You have a hand in this business and we are taking no risks. There are desperate men against us who will not respect the country retreat of an overworked official. When I first came to London I bought a car and amused myself with running about the south of England, so I knew something of the geography. I took Sir Walter to town by the bath-road and made good going. It was a soft, breathless June morning with a promise of sultriness later, but it was delicious enough swinging through the little towns with their freshly watered streets and past the summer gardens of the Thames Valley. I landed Sir Walter at his house in Queen Anne's Gate punctually by half past eleven. The butler was coming up by train with the luggage. The first thing he did was to take me round to Scotland Yard. There we saw a prim gentleman with a clean shaven lawyer's face. I've brought you the Portland Place murderer, was Sir Walter's introduction. The reply was a wry smile. It would have been a welcome present, relevant. This, I presume, is Mr. Richard Hane, who for some days greatly interested my department. Mr. Hane will interest it again. Here's much to tell you, but not today. For certain grave reasons his tale must wait for four hours. Then, I can promise you, you will be entertained and possibly edified. I want you to assure Mr. Hane that he will suffer no further inconvenience. This assurance was promptly given. You can take up your life where you left off, I was told. Your flat, which probably you no longer wish to occupy, is waiting for you, and your man is still there. As you were never publicly accused, we considered that there was no need of a public exculpation, but on that, of course, you must please yourself. We may want your assistance later on, McAllivray. Sir Walter said as we left. Then he turned me loose. Come and see me tomorrow, Hane. I didn't tell you to keep deadly quiet.  You'd better lie low, for if one of your black stone friends saw you, there might be trouble. I felt curiously at a loose end. At first it was very pleasant to be a free man able to go where I wanted without fearing anything. I'd only been a month under the ban of the law, and it was quite enough for me. I went to the Savoy and ordered very carefully a very good luncheon, and then smoked the best cigar the house could provide. But I was still feeling nervous. When I saw anybody looking at me in the lounge, I grew shy and wondered if they were thinking about the murder. After that I took a taxi and drove miles away up into North London. I walked back through fields and lines of villas and terraces and then slums and mean streets, and it took me pretty nearly two hours. All the while my restlessness was growing worse. I felt that great things, tremendous things were happening or about to happen, and I, who was the cogwheel of the whole business, was out of it. Royer would be landing a dover, Sir Walter would be making plans with the few people in England who were in the secret, and somewhere in the darkness the black stone would be working. I felt the sense of danger and impending calamity, and I had the curious feeling, too, that I alone could avert it, alone could grapple with it. But I was out of the game now. How could it be otherwise? It was not likely that cabinet ministers and admiralty lords and generals would admit me to their councils. I actually began to wish that I could run up against one of my three enemies. That would lead to developments. I felt that I wanted enormously to have a vulgar scrap with those gentry, where I could hit out and flatten something. I was rapidly getting into a very bad temper. I didn't feel like going back to my flat. That had to be faced some time, but as I still had sufficient money I thought I would put it off till next morning and go to a hotel for the night. My irritation lasted through dinner, which I had at a restaurant in German Street. I was no longer hungry and let several courses pass untasted. I drank the best part of a bottle of burgundy, but it did nothing to cheer me. An abominable restlessness had taken possession of me. Here was I, a very ordinary fellow, with no particular brains, and yet I was convinced that somehow I was needed to help this business through. That without me it would all go to blazes. I told myself it was sheer, silly conceit that four or five of the cleverest people living, with all the might of the British Empire at their back, had the job in hand. Yet I couldn't be convinced. It seemed as if a voice kept speaking in my ear, telling me to be up and doing, or I would never sleep again. The upshot was that about half past nine I made up my mind to go to Queen Anne's Gate. Very likely I would not be admitted, but it would ease my conscience to try. I walked down German Street and at the corner of Duke Street passed a group of young men. They were in evening-dress, had been dining somewhere, and were going on to a music hall. One of them was Mr. Marmaduke Jopley. He saw me and stopped short. By God! The murderer! he cried. Here, you fellows, hold him! That's Henne, the man who did the Portland Place murder! He gripped me by the arm and the others crowded round.  A policeman came up, and I should have told him the truth, and, if he didn't believe it, demanded to be taken to Scotland Yard, or for that matter to the nearest police station. But a delay at that moment seemed to me unendurable, and the sight of Marmy's imbecile face was more than I could bear. I let out with my left, and had the satisfaction of seeing him measure his length in the gutter. Then began an unholy row. They were all on me at once, and the policeman took me in the rear. I got in one or two good blows, for, I think, with fair play I could have licked a lot of them, but the policeman pinned me behind, and one of them got his fingers on my throat. Through a black cloud of rage I heard the officer of the law asking what was the matter, and Marmy, between his broken teeth, declaring that I was Henne the murderer.  I cried.  I advise you to leave me alone, Constable. Scotland Yard knows all about me, and you'll get a proper wigging if you interfere with me. You've got to come along with me, young man, said the policeman. I saw you strike that gentleman crew-lord. You began it, too, for he wasn't doing nothing. I seen you. Let's go quietly, or I'll have to fix you up. Exasperation and an overwhelming sense that at no cost must I delay gave me the strength of a bull-elephant. I fairly wrenched the Constable off his feet, floored the man who was gripping my collar, and set off at my best pace down Duke Street. I heard a whistle being blown, and the rush of men behind me. I have a very fair turn of speed, and that night I had wings. In a jiffy I was in Paul Mall, and had turned down towards St. James Park. I dodged the policeman at the Palace Gates, dived through a press of carriages at the entrance to the mall, and was making for the bridge before my pursuers had crossed the roadway. In the open ways of the park I put on a spurt. Happily there were a few people about, and no one tried to stop me. I was staking all on getting to Queen Anne's Gate. When I entered that quiet thoroughfare it seemed deserted. Sir Walter's house was in the narrow part, and outside it three or four motor cars were drawn up. I slackened speed some yards off and walked briskly up to the door. If the butler refused me admission, or if he even delayed to open the door, I was done. He didn't delay. I had scarcely rung before the door opened. I must see Sir Walter, I panted. My business is desperately important. That butler was a great man.  Sir Walter is engaged, sir, and I have orders to admit no one. Perhaps you will wait. The house was of the old-fashioned kind, with a wide hall and rooms on both sides of it. At the far end was an alcove with a telephone and a couple of chairs, and there the butler offered me a seat. See here, I whispered. There's trouble about and I'm in it, but Sir Walter knows, and I'm working for him. If anyone comes and asks if I'm here, tell him a lie. He nodded, and presently there was a noise of voices in the street and a furious ringing at the bell. I never admired a man more than that butler. He opened the door and with a face like a graven image waited to be questioned. Then he gave them it. He told them whose house it was and what his orders were, and simply froze them off the doorstep. I could see it all from my alcove, and it was better than any play. I hadn't waited long till there came another ring at the bell. The butler made no bones about admitting this new visitor. While he was taking off his coat I saw who it was.  I recognized the first sea-lord, the man they say, that made the new British navy. He passed my alcove and was ushered into a room at the back of the hall. As the door opened I could hear the sound of low voices. It shut, and I was left alone again. For twenty minutes I sat there wondering what I was to do next. I was still perfectly convinced that I was wanted, but when or how I had no notion. I kept looking at my watch, and as the time crept on to half-past ten I began to think that the conference must soon end. In a quarter of an hour Royer should be speeding along the road to Portsmouth. Then I heard a bell ring, and the butler appeared. The door of the back room opened, and the first sea-lord came out. He walked past me, and in passing he glanced in my direction. And for a second we looked each other in the face. Only for a second, but it was enough to make my heart jump. I had never seen the great man before, and he had never seen me, but in that fraction of time something sprang into his eyes, and that something was recognition. You can't mistake it. It is a flicker, a spark of light, a minute shade of difference, which means one thing and one thing only. It came involuntarily. For in a moment it died, and he passed on. In a maze of wild fancies I heard the street door close behind him. I picked up the telephone book and looked up the number of his house. We were connected at once, and I heard a servant's voice. It's his lordship at home, I asked. His lordship returned half an hour ago, said the voice, and has gone to bed. He is not very well tonight. We leave a message, sir. I rang off and almost tumbled into a chair. My part in this business was not yet ended. It had been a close shave, but I had been in time. Not a moment could be lost, so I marched boldly to the door of that back room and entered without knocking. Five surprised faces looked up from a round table. There was Sir Walter and Drew, the war minister, whom I knew from his photographs. There was a slim elderly man who was probably Whitaker, the Admiralty official, and there was General Winstonley, conspicuous from the long scar on his forehead. Lastly there was a short stout man with an iron gray moustache and bushy eyebrows, who had been arrested in the middle of a sentence. Sir Walter's face showed surprise and annoyance. This is Mr. Hane, of whom I have spoken to you, he said apologetically to the company. I am afraid, Mr. Hane, this visit is ill-timed. I was getting back my coolness. That remains to be seen, sir, I said, but I think it may be in the nick of time. For God's sake, gentlemen, tell me who went out a minute ago. Lord Alloa, Sir Walter said, reddening with anger. It was not, I cried. It was his living image, but it was not Lord Alloa. It was someone who recognized me, someone I have seen in the last month.  Who? Who? Someone stammered. The black stone, I cried. And I sat down in the chair so recently vacated and looked round at five badly scared gentlemen. End of Section 8, Chapter 9 of the 39 Steps by John Buckin. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 9. The 39 Steps. Nonsense, said the official from the Admiralty. Sir Walter got up and left the room while we looked blankly at the table. He came back in ten minutes with a long face. I have spoken to Alloa, he said. Had him out of bed, very grumpy. He went straight home after Mollros's dinner. But its madness broke in general winstingly. Do you mean to tell me that that man came here and sat beside me for the best part of half an hour and that I didn't detect the imposture? Alloa must be out of his mind. Don't you see the cleverness of it? I said. You were too interested in other things to have any eyes. You took Lord Alloa for granted. If it had been anybody else you might have looked more closely, but it was natural for him to be here and that put you all to sleep. Then the Frenchman spoke, very slowly and in good English. The young man is right. His psychology is good. Our enemies have not been foolish. He bent his wise brows on the assembly. I will tell you a tale, he said. It happened many years ago in Senegal. I was quartered in a remote station and the past the time used to go fishing for big barbel in the river. A little Arab mare used to carry my luncheon basket, one of the salted done breed you got at Timbuktu in the old days. Well, one morning I had good sport and the mare was unaccountably restless. I could hear her whinnying and squealing and stamping her feet and I kept soothing her with my voice while my mind was intent on fish. I could see her all the time as I thought, out of a corner of my eye, tethered to a tree twenty yards away. After a couple of hours I began to think of food. I collected my fish in a tarpolin bag and moved down the stream towards the mare, twirling my line. When I got up to her, I flung the tarpolin on her back. He paused and looked around. It was the smell that gave me warning. I turned my head and found myself looking at a lion three feet off, an old man-eater that was the terror of the village. What was left of the mare, a mass of blood and bones and hide, was behind him. What happened, I asked. I was enough of a hunter to know a true yarn when I heard it. I stuffed my fishing rod into his jaws and I had a pistol. Also my servants came presently with rifles, but he left his mark on me. He held up a hand which lacked three fingers. Consider, he said, the mare had been dead more than an hour, and the brute had been patiently watching me ever since. I never saw the kill, for I was accustomed to the mare's fretting, and I never marked her absence, for my consciousness of her was only of something tawny, and the lion filled that part. If I could blunder thus, gentlemen, in land where men senses are keen, why should we be busy preoccupied urban folk, not air also? Sir Walter nodded. No one was ready to gain say him. But I don't see, went on winstingly. That object was to get these dispositions without our knowing it. Now it only required one of us to mention to Alloa our meeting tonight, for the whole fraud to be exposed. Sir Walter laughed dryly. The selection of Alloa shows their acumen. Which of us was likely to speak to him about tonight, or was he likely to open the subject? I remembered the First Sea Lord's reputation for taciturnity and shortness of temper. The one thing that puzzles me, said the general, is what good his visit here would do that spy, fellow. He could not carry away several pages of figures and strange names in his head. That is not difficult, the Frenchman replied. A good spy is trained to have a photographic memory, like your own Macaulay. You noticed he said nothing, but went through these papers again and again. I think we may assume that he has every detail stamped on his mind. When I was younger I could do the same trick. Well, I suppose there is nothing for it but to change the plans, said Sir Walter roofily. Whitaker was looking very glum. Did you tell Lord Alloa what has happened? he asked. Now? Well, I can't speak with absolute assurance, but I'm nearly certain we can't make any serious change unless we alter the geography of England. Another thing must be said. It was Royer who spoke. I talked freely when that man was here. I told something of the military plans of my government. I was permitted to say so much. But that information would be worth many millions to our enemies. No, my friends, I see no other way. The man who came here and his confederates must be taken and taken at once. Could God, I cried. And we have not a rag of a clue. Besides, said Sir Whitaker, there is a post. By this time the news will be on its way. No, said the Frenchman. You do not understand the habits of the spy. He receives personally his reward, and he delivers personally his intelligence. We in France know something of the breed. There is still a chance, mes amis. These men must cross the sea, and there are ships to be searched and ports to be watched. Believe me, the need is desperate for both France and Britain. Royer's grave good sense seemed to pull us together. He was the man of action among fumblers. But I saw no hope in his face, and I felt none. Where among the fifty millions of these islands and within a dozen hours were we to lay hands on the three cleverest rogues in Europe. Then I suddenly had an inspiration. Where is Scudder's book? I cried to Sir Walter. Quick man, I remember something in it. He unlocked the door of a bureau and gave it to me. I found the place. Thirteen nine steps I read. And again, thirteen nine steps I counted them. I tied ten seventeen p.m. The Admiralty man was looking at me as if he thought I had gone mad. Don't you see it's a clue? I shouted. Scudder knew where these fellows layered. He knew where they were going to leave the country, though he kept the name to himself. Tomorrow was the day, and it was some place where high tide was at ten seventeen. They may have gone to-night, someone said. Not they. They have their own snug secret way, and they won't be hurried. I know Germans and they are mad about working to a plan. Where the devil can I get a book of tide tables? Whitaker brightened up. It's a chance, he said. Let's go over to the Admiralty. We got into two of the waiting-motor-cars, all but Sir Walter, who went off to Scotland Yard to mobilise megalovre. So he said, We marched through empty corridors and big chambers where the Charve women were busy, till we reached a little room lined with books and maps. A resident Clark was unearthed, who presently fetched from the library the Admiralty tide tables. I sat at the desk and the others stood round, for somehow or other I had got charge of this expedition. It was no good. There were hundreds of entries, and so far as I could see, ten seventeen might cover fifty places. We had to find some way of narrowing the possibilities. I took my head in my hands and thought, There must be some way of reading this riddle. What did Scudder mean by steps? I thought of Doc's steps, but if he had meant that, I didn't think he would have mentioned the number. It must be some place where there were several staircases, and one marked out from the others by having thirteen-nine steps. Then I had a sudden thought, and hunted up all the steamer sailings. There was no boat which left for the continent at ten seventeen p.m. Why was high tide so important? If it was a harbour it must be some little place where the tide mattered, or else it was a heavy draft boat. But there was no regular steamer sailing at that hour, and somehow I didn't think they would travel by a big boat from a regular harbour, so it must be some little harbour where the tide was important, or perhaps no harbour at all. But if it was a little port I couldn't see what the steps signified. There were no sets of staircases on any harbour that I had ever seen. It must be some place which a particular staircase identified and where the tide was full at ten seventeen. On the whole it seemed to me that the place must be a bit of open coast, but the staircases kept puzzling me. Then I went back to wider considerations. Whereabouts would a man be likely to leave for Germany, a man in a hurry, who wanted a speedy and secret passage? Not from any of the big harbours, and not from the Channel, or the West Coast, or Scotland, for remember he was starting from London. I measured the distance on the map, and tried to put myself in the enemy's shoes. I should try for Austin or Antwerp or Rotterdam, and I should sail from somewhere on the east coast between Cromer and Dover. All of this was very loose guessing, and I don't pretend it was ingenious or scientific. I wasn't any kind of Sherlock Holmes. But I have always fancied I had a kind of instinct about questions like this. I don't know if I can explain myself, but I used to use my brains as far as they went, and after they came to a blank wall I guessed, and I usually found my guesses pretty right. So I set out all my conclusions on a bit of Admiralty paper. They ran like this. Fairly certain, one, placed where there are several sets of stairs, one that matters distinguished by having thirty-nine steps. Two, full tide at ten-seventeen PM, leaving shore only possible at full tide. Three, steps not dock steps, and so place probably not harbor. Four, no regular night steamer at ten-seventeen, means of transport must be tramp, unlikely, yacht or fishing boat. There my reasoning stopped. I made another list which I headed guest, but I was just as sure of the one as the other. Guest, one, place not harbor, but open coast. Two, boat small, trawler, yacht or launch. Three, place somewhere on the east coast between Cromer and Dover. It struck me as odd I should be sitting at that desk with a cabinet minister, a field marshal, two high government officials, and a French general watching me, while from the scribble of a dead man I was trying to drag a secret which meant life or death for us. Sir Walter had joined us and presently McGallivary arrived. It sent out instructions to watch the ports and railway stations for the three men whom I had described to Sir Walter. Not that he or anybody else thought that that would do much good. Here's the most I can make of it, I said. We've got to find a place where there are several staircases down to the beach, one of which has thirty-nine steps. I think it's a piece of open coast with big-ish cliffs somewhere between the wash and the channel. Also it's a place where full tide is at ten-seventeen tomorrow night. Then an idea struck me. Is there no inspector of coastguards or some fellow like that who knows the east coast? Whitaker said there was and that he lived in Clapham.  I lit a pipe and went over the whole thing again till my brain grew weary. About one in the morning the Coast Guard man arrived. He was a fine old fellow with the look of a naval officer and was desperately respectful to the company. I left the war minister to cross examine him, for I felt he would think a cheek in me to talk. We want you to tell us the places you know on the east coast where there are cliffs and where several sets of steps run down to the beach. He thought for a bit. What kind of steps do you mean, sir? There are plenty of places with roads cut down through the cliffs, and most roads have a step or two in them? Or do you mean regular staircases? All steps, so to speak. Sir Arthur looked towards me. We mean regular staircases, I said. He reflected a minute or two. I don't know that I can think of any. Wait a second. There's a place in Norfolk, Brattlesham, beside a golf course, where there are a couple of staircases to let the gentleman get a loose ball. That's not it, I said. Then there are plenty of marine parades, if that's what you mean. Every seaside resort has them. I shook my head. It's got to be more retired than that, I said. Well, gentlemen, I can't think of anywhere else. Of course, there's the rough. What's that? I asked. The big chalk headland in Kent, close to Bradgate. It's got a lot of villas on the top and some of the houses have staircases down to a private beach. It's a very high-toned sort of place and the residents there like to keep by themselves. I tore open the tide tables and found Bradgate. High tide there was at 10.27 p.m. on the 15th of June. We're on the scent at last. I cried excitedly. How can I find out what is the tide at the rough? I can tell you that, sir, said the Coast Guard man. I was once lent a house there in this very month and I used to go out at night to the deep-sea fishing, the tide's 10 minutes before Bradgate. I closed the book and looked round at the company. If one of those staircases has thirty-nine steps, we have solved the mystery, gentlemen. I said, I want the loan of your car, Sir Walter, and a map of the roads. If Mr. McAllivry will spare me ten minutes, I think we can prepare something for tomorrow. It was ridiculous in me to take charge of the business like this, but they didn't seem to mind. And after all, I had been in the show from the start. Besides I was used to rough jobs, and these eminent gentlemen were too clever not to see it. It was General Royer who gave me my commission. I, for one, he said, am content to leave the matter in Mr. Anne's hands. By half past three I was tearing past the moonlit hedgerows of Kent, with McAllivry's best man on the seat beside me. End of Section 9 Chapter 10 Various Parties Converging on the Sea A pink and blue June morning found me at Bradgate, looking from the Gryphon Hotel over a smooth sea to the light ship on the cocksands which seemed the size of a bell buoy. A couple of miles farther south and much nearer the shore, a small destroyer was anchored. Skafe, McAllivry's man who had been in the navy, knew the boat and told me her name and her commanders, so I sent off a wire to Sir Walter. After breakfast Skafe got from a house agent a key for the gates of the staircases on the rough. I walked with him along the sands, and sat down in a nook of the cliffs while he investigated the half dozen of them. I didn't want to be seen, but the place at this hour was quite deserted, and all the time I was on that beach I saw nothing but the seagulls. It took him more than an hour to do the job, and when I saw him coming towards me conning a bit of paper, I can tell you my heart was in my mouth. Everything depended, you see, on my guess-proving right. He read aloud the number of steps in the different stares, thirty-four, thirty-five, thirty-nine, forty-two, forty-seven, and twenty-one, where the cliffs grew lower. I almost got up and shouted. We hurried back to the town and sent a wire to McAllivry. I wanted half a dozen men, and I directed them to divide themselves among different specified hotels. Then Skafe set out to prospect the house at the head of the thirty-nine steps. He came back with news that both puzzled and reassured me. The house was called Trafalgar Lodge, and belonged to an old gentleman called Appleton, a retired stockbroker, the house agent said. Mr. Appleton was there a good deal in the summertime and was in residence now, had been for the better part of a week. Skafe could pick up very little information about him, except that he was a decent old fellow who paid his bills regularly and was always good for a fiver for local charity. Then Skafe seemed to have penetrated to the back door of the house, pretending he was an agent for sewing machines. Only three servants were kept, a cook, a parlor maid, and a housemaid, and they were just the sort that you find in a respectable middle-class household. The cook was not the gossiping kind, and had pretty soon shut the door in his face. But Skafe said he was positive she knew nothing. Next door there was a new house building which would give a good cover for observation, and the villa on the other side was to let, and its garden was rough and shrubby. I borrowed Skafe's telescope, and before lunch went for a walk along the rough. I kept well behind the rows of villas and found a good observation point on the edge of the golf course. There I had a view of the line of turf along the cliff-top, with seats placed at intervals, and the little square plots railed in and planted with bushes, once the staircases descended to the beach. I saw Trafalgar Lodge very plainly, a red brick villa with a veranda, a tennis lawn behind, and in front the ordinary seaside flower garden, full of margarites and scraggie geraniums. There was a flagstaff, from which an enormous Union jack hung limply in the still air. Presently I observed someone leave the house and saunter along the cliff. When I got my glasses on him I saw it was an old man wearing white flannel trousers, a blue-surge jacket and a straw hat. He carried field glasses and a newspaper and sat down on one of the iron seats and began to read. Sometimes he would lay down the paper and turn his glasses on the sea. He looked for a long time at the destroyer. I watched him for half an hour till he got up and went back to the house for his luncheon when I returned to the hotel for mine. I wasn't feeling very confident. This decent common-place dwelling was not what I had expected. The man might be the bald archaeologist of that horrible Moorland farm, or he might not. He was exactly the kind of satisfied old bird you will find in every suburb, in every holiday place. If you wanted a type of the perfectly harmless person you would probably pitch on that. But after lunch, as I sat in the hotel porch I perked up, for I saw the thing I had hoped for and dreaded to miss. A yacht came up from the south and dropped anchor pretty well opposite the ruff. She seemed about a hundred and fifty tons, and I saw she belonged to the squadron from the White Incin. So Scaife and I went down to the harbour and hired a boatman for an afternoon's fishing. I spent a warm and peaceful afternoon. We caught between us about twenty pounds of cod and lithe, and out in the dancing blue sea I took a cheerier view of things. Above the white cliffs of the ruff I saw the green and red of the villas, and especially the great flagstaff of Trafalgar Lodge. About four o'clock when we had fished enough I made the boatman row us round the yacht, which lay like a delicate white bird, ready at a moment to flee. Scaife said she must be a fast boat for her build in that she was pretty heavily injured. Her name was the Ariadne, as I discovered from the cap of one of the men who was polishing brass work. I spoke to him and got an answer in the soft dialect of Essex. Another hand that came along passed me the time of day in an unmistakable English tongue. Our boatman had an argument with one of them about the weather, and for a few minutes we lay on our oars close to the starboard bow. Then the men suddenly disregarded us and bent their heads to their work as an officer came along the deck. He was a pleasant, clean-looking young fellow, and he put a question to us about our fishing in very good English. But there could be no doubt about him. His close cropped head in the cut of his collar and tie never came out of England. That did something to reassure me. But as we rode back to Bradgate, my obstinate doubts would not be dismissed. The thing that worried me was the reflection that my enemies knew that I had got my knowledge from Scudder, and it was Scudder who had given me the clue to this place. If they knew that Scudder had this clue, would they not be certain to change their plans? Too much depended on their success for them to take any risks. The whole question was how much they understood about Scudder's knowledge.  But if they had any suspicions that I was on their track they would be fools not to cover it. I wondered if the man last night had seen that I recognized him. Somehow I did not think that he had, and to that I had clung. But the whole business had never seemed so difficult as that afternoon, when by all calculations I should have been rejoicing in assured success. In the hotel I met the commander of the destroyer, to whom Scaife introduced me, and with whom I had a few words. Then I thought I would put an hour or two watching Trafalgar Lodge. I found a place farther up the hill in the garden of an empty house, from there I had a full view of the court, on which two figures were having a game of tennis. One was the old man whom I had already seen, the other was a younger fellow, wearing some club colors and the scarf round his middle. They played with tremendous zest, like two city gents who wanted hard exercise to open their pores. You couldn't conceive a more innocent spectacle. They shouted and laughed and stopped for drinks when a maid brought out two tankards on a salver. I rubbed my eyes and asked myself if I was not the most immortal fool on earth. Mystery and darkness had hung about the men who hunted me over the scotch moor in an aeroplane and a motor-car, and notably about that infernal antiquarian. It was easy enough to connect those folk with the knife that pinned Scudder to the floor and with fell designs on the world's peace, but here were two guileless citizens taking their innocuous exercise and soon about to go indoors to a humdrum dinner, where they would talk of market prices and the last cricket scores, and the gossip of their native Surbitan. I had been making a net to catch vultures and falcons, and lo and behold, two plump thrushes had blundered into it. Presently a third figure arrived, a young man on a bicycle, with a bag of golf clubs slung on his back. He strolled round to the tennis-lawn and was welcomed riotously by the players. Evidently they were chaffing him and their chaff sounded horribly English. Then the plump man, mopping his brow with a silk handkerchief, announced that he must have a tub. I heard his very words. I've gotten to a proper lather, he said. This will bring down my weight and my handicap, Bob. I'll take you on to-morrow and give you a stroke a whole. You couldn't find anything much more English than that.  I had been barking up the wrong tree this time. These men might be acting, but if they were, where was their home? They didn't know I was sitting thirty yards off in a rhododendron. It was simply impossible to believe that these three hearty fellows were anything but what they seemed. Three ordinary, game-playing, suburban Englishmen, wearysome, if you like, but swordedly innocent. And yet there were three of them, and one was old, and one was plump, and one was lean and dark. And their house chimed in with Scudder's notes, and half a mile off was lying a steam-yacht with at least one German officer. I thought of cruel that he is lying dead in all Europe trembling on the edge of earthquake, and the men I had left behind me in London, who were waiting anxiously for the events of the next hours.  The black stone had won, and if it survived this June night would bank its winnings. There seemed only one thing to do, go forward as if I had no doubts, and if I was going to make a fool of myself to do it handsomely. Never in my life have I faced a job with courage, and I have no doubt in my life that I will be able to live my life have I faced a job with greater disinclination. I would rather in my then mind have walked into a den of anarchists, each with his browning handy, or faced a charging lion with a pop-gun, than enter that happy home of three cheerful Englishmen and tell them that their game was up. How they would laugh at me! But suddenly I remembered a thing I once heard in Rhodesia from old Peter PNR. I have quoted Peter already in this narrative. He was the best scout I ever knew, and before he had turned respectable he had been pretty often on the windy side of the law, when he had been wanted badly by the authorities. Peter once discussed with me the question of disguises, and he had a theory which struck me at the time. He said, barring absolute certainties like fingerprints, mere physical traits were very little use for identification if the fugitive really knew his business. He laughed at things like dyed hair and false beards and such childish follies. The only thing that mattered was what Peter called atmosphere. If a man could get into perfectly different surroundings from those in which he had been first observed, and this is the important part, really play up to these surroundings and behave as if he had never been out of them, he would puzzle the cleverest detectives on earth, and he used to tell a story of how he once borrowed a black coat and went to church and shared the same hymn-book of the man that was looking for him. If that man had seen him in decent company before he would have recognized him, but he had only seen him snuffing the lights in the public house with a revolver. The recollection of Peter's talk gave me the first-wheel comfort that I had had that day. Peter had been a wise old bird, and these fellows I was after were about the pick of the aviary. What if they were playing Peter's game? A fool tries to look different, a clever man looks the same, and is different. Again there was that other maxim of Peter's which had helped me when I had been a roadman. If you are playing a part, you will never keep it up unless you convince yourself that you are it. That would explain the game of tennis. Those chaps didn't need to act. They just turned a handle and passed into another life which came as naturally to them as the first. It sounds a platitude, but Peter used to say that it was the big secret of all the famous criminals. It was now getting on for eight o'clock, and I went back and saw Scaife to give him his instructions. I arranged with him how to place his men, and then went for a walk, for I didn't feel up to any dinner. I went round the deserted golf course, and then to a point on the cliffs, farther north beyond the line of the villas. On the little trim newly made roads I met people in flannels coming back from tennis and the beach, and a coast guard from the wireless station, and donkeys and pirats patting homewards. Out at sea in the blue dusk I saw lights appear on the Ariadne, and on the destroyer away to the south, and beyond the cocksands the bigger lights of steamers making for the Thames. The whole scene was so peaceful and ordinary that I got more dashed in spirits every second. It took all my resolution to stroll towards Trafalgar Lodge about half past nine. On the way I got a piece of solid comfort from the sight of a grey hound that was swinging along at a nursemaid's heels. He reminded me of a dog I used to have in Rhodesia, and of the time when I took him hunting with me in the Pally Hills. We were after Raybock, the Dunkind, and I recollected how we had followed one beast, and both he and I had clean lost it. A grey hound works by sight, and my eyes are good enough, but that buck simply leaked out of the landscape. Afterwards I found out how he managed it. Against the grey rock of the copes it showed no more than a crow against a thunder-cloud. It didn't need to run away. All it had to do was to stand still and melt into the background. Suddenly as these memories chased across my brain I thought of my present case and applied the moral. The black stone didn't need to bolt. They were quietly absorbed into the landscape. I was on the right track, and I had jammed that down in my mind and vowed never to forget it. The last word was with Peter P. and R. Scaife's men would be posted now, but there was no sign of a soul. The house stood as open as a marketplace for anybody to observe. A three-foot railing separated it from the cliff road. The windows on the ground floor were all open, and shaded lights on the low sound of voices revealed where the occupants were finishing dinner. Everything was as public and above-board as a charity bazaar. Feeling the greatest fool on earth, I opened the gate and rang the bell. A man of my sort who has travelled about the world in rough places gets on perfectly well with two classes, what you may call the upper and the lower. He understands them, and they understand him. I was at home with herds and tramps and roadmen, and I was sufficiently at my ease with people like Sir Walter and the men I had met the night before. I can't explain why, but it is a fact. But what fellows like me don't understand is the great comfortable, satisfied middle-class world, the folk that live in villas and suburbs. He doesn't know how they look at things, he doesn't understand their conventions, and he is as shy of them as of a black mamba. When a trim parlor made open the door, I could hardly find my voice. I asked for Mr. Appleton and was ushered in. My plan had been to walk straight into the dining-room, and by a sudden appearance waken the men that start of recognition which would confirm my theory. But when I found myself in that neat hall the place mastered me. There were the golf clubs and tennis-rackets, the straw hats and caps, the rows of gloves, the sheaf of walking sticks which you will find in ten thousand British homes. A stack of neatly folded coats and waterproofs covered the top of an old oak chest. There was a grandfather-clock ticking and some polished brass warming pans on the walls and a barometer and a print of chiltern winning the St. Ledger. The place was as orthodox as an Anglican church. When the maid asked me for my name I gave it automatically and was shown into the smoking room on the right side of the hall. That room was even worse. I hadn't time to examine it, but I could see some framed group photographs above the mantelpiece and I could have sworn they were English public school or college. I had only one glance for I managed to pull myself together and go after the maid. But I was too late. She had already entered the dining room and given my name to her master and I had missed the chance of seeing how the three took it. When I walked into the room the old man at the head of the table had risen and turned round to meet me. He was in evening dress, a short coat in black tie, as was the other, whom I called in my mind the plump one. The third, the dark fellow, wore a blue-sherge suit and a soft white collar and the colors of some club or school. The old man's manner was perfect. Miss Mr. Hane, he said hesitatingly, did you wish to see me? One moment, you fellows, and I'll rejoin you. We had better go to the smoking room. Though I hadn't an ounce of confidence in me, I forced myself to play the game. I pulled up a chair and sat down on it. I think we have met before, I said, and I guess you know my business. The light in the room was dim, but so far as I could see their faces, they played the part of mystification very well. May be, may be, said the old man. I haven't a very good memory, but I'm afraid you must tell me your errand, sir, for I really don't know it. Well then, I said, and all the time I seemed to myself to be talking pure foolishness, I have come to tell you that the game's up. I have a warrant for the arrest of you three gentlemen. Arrest! said the old man, and he looked really shocked. Arrest! Good God! What for? For the murder of Franklin Scudder in London on the 23rd day of last month. Ah, I've never heard that name before, said the old man in a dazed voice. One of the others spoke up. That was the Portland Place murder. I read about it. Good heavens, you must be mad, sir. Where do you come from? Scotland Yard, I said. After that, for a minute, there was utter silence. The old man was staring at his plate and fumbling with a nut, the very model of innocent bewilderment. Then the plump one spoke up. He stammered a little, like a man picking his words. Don't get flustered, uncle, he said. It is all a ridiculous mistake, but these things happen sometimes, and we can easily set it right. It won't be hard to prove our innocence. I can show that I was out of the country on the 23rd of May, and Barb was in a nursing home. You were in London, but you can explain what you were doing. Right, Percy. Of course, that's easy enough. The 23rd, that was the day after Agatha's wedding. Let me see. What was I doing? I came up in the morning from woking and lunched at the club with Charlie Simmons. Then, oh yes, I dined with the fishmongers. I remember, for the punch didn't agree with me, and I was seedy next morning. Hang it all, there's the cigar-box I bought back from the dinner. He pointed to an object on the table and laughed nervously. I think, sir, said the young man, addressing me respectfully. You will see you are mistaken. We want to assist the law like all Englishmen, and we don't want Scotland Yard to be making fools of themselves. That's so uncle. Certainly, Barb. The old fellow seemed to be recovering his voice. Certainly, we'll do anything in our power to assist the authorities. But, but this is a bit too much. I can't get over it. How Nelly will chuckle, said the plump man. She always said that you would die of boredom because nothing ever happened to you. And now you've got it thick and strong. And he began to laugh very pleasantly. By Jove, yes. Just think of it. What a story to tell at the club. Really, Mr. Hane, I suppose I should be angry to show my innocence, but it's too funny. I almost forgive you the fright you gave me. You looked so glum. I thought I might have been walking in my sleep and killing people. It couldn't be acting. It was too confoundedly genuine. My heart went into my boots. My first impulse was to apologize and clear out. But I told myself I must see it through, even though I was to be the laughing stock of Britain. The light from the dinner-table candlesticks was not very good. And to cover my confusion, I got up, walked to the door, and switched on the electric light. The sudden glare made them blink, and I stood scanning the three faces. Well, I made nothing of it. One was old and bald, one was stout, one was dark and thin. There was nothing in their appearance to prevent them being the three who had hunted me in Scotland, but there was nothing to identify them. I simply can't explain why I, who, as a roadman, had looked into two pairs of eyes and as Ned Ainsley into another pair. Why I, who have a good memory and reasonable powers of observation, could find no satisfaction. They seemed exactly what they professed to be, and I could not have sworn to one of them. There in that pleasant dining-room, with edgings on the walls and a picture of an old lady in a bib above the mantelpiece, I could see nothing to connect them with the moreland desperados. There was a silver cigarette-box beside me, and I saw that it had been one by Percival Appleton Esquire of the St. Bede's Club in a golf tournament. I had to keep a firm hold of Peter Pienard to prevent myself bolting out of that house. Well, said the old man politely, are you reassured by your scrutiny, sir? I couldn't find a word. I hope you'll find it consistent with your duty to drop this ridiculous business. I make no complaint, but you'll see how annoying it must be to respect people. I shook my head. Oh, Lord! said the young man, this is a bit too thick. Do you propose to march us off to the police station? asked the plump one. That might be the best way out of it, but I suppose you won't be content with the local branch. I have the right to ask to see your warrant, but I don't wish to cast any aspersions upon you. You are only doing your duty. But you'll admit it's horribly awkward. What do you propose to do? There was nothing to do except to call in my men and have them arrested, or to confess my blunder and clear out. I felt mesmerized by the whole place, by the air of obvious innocence. Not innocence merely, but frank, honest bewilderment and concern in the three faces. Oh, Peter Pienard, I groaned inwardly, and for a moment I was very near damning myself for a fool and asking their pardon. Meantime I vote we have a game of bridge, said the plump one. It will give Mr. Hanay time to think over things, and you know we have been wanting a fourth player. Do you play, sir? I accepted as if it had been an ordinary invitation at the club. The whole business had mesmerized me. We went into the smoking room where a card table was set out and I was offered things to smoke and drink. I took my place at the table in a kind of dream. The window was open and the moon was flooding the cliffs and sea with a great tide of yellow light. There was moonshine, too, in my head. The three had recovered their composure and were talking easily, just the kind of snaggy talk you will hear in any golf club house.  My partner was the young, dark one. I play a fair hand at bridge, but I must have been rank bad that night. They saw that they had got me puzzled, and that put them more than ever at their ease. I kept looking at their faces, but they conveyed nothing to me. It was not that they looked different, they were different. I clung desperately to the words of Peter P. N. R. Then something awoke me. The old man laid down his hand to light his cigar. He didn't pick it up at once, but sat back for a moment in his chair with his fingers tapping on his knees. It was the movement I remembered when I had stood before him in the Moorland farm with the pistols of his servants behind me. A little thing lasting only a second, and the odds were a thousand to one that I might have had my eyes on my cards at the time and missed it, but I didn't. And in a flash the air seemed to clear. Some shadow lifted from my brain, and I was looking at the three men with full and absolute recognition. The clock on the mantelpiece struck ten o'clock. Three faces seemed to change before my eyes and reveal their secrets. The young one was the murderer. Now I saw cruelty and ruthlessness, where before I had only seen good humor. His knife, I made certain, had skewered scutter to the floor. His kind had put the bullet in corollities. The plump man's features seemed to dislimp and form again as I looked them. He hadn't a face, only a hundred masks that he could assume when he pleased. That chap must have been a superb actor. Perhaps he had been Lord Loa of the night before. Perhaps not. It didn't matter. I wondered if he was the fellow who had first tracked scutter and left his card on him. Scutter had said he lisped, and I could imagine how the adoption of a lisp might add terror. But the old man was the pick of the lot. He was sheer brain, icy, cool, calculating, as ruthless as a steam hammer. Now that my eyes were opened I wondered where I had seen the benevolence. His jaw was like chilled steel, and his eyes had the inhuman luminosity of a bird's. I went on playing, and every second a greater hate welled up in my heart. It almost choked me, and I couldn't answer when my partner spoke. Only a little longer could I endure their company. Phew! Bob, look at the time, said the old man. You'd better think about catching your train. Bob's got to go to town to-night. He added, turning to me. The voice rang now as false as hell. I looked at the clock, and it was nearly half past ten. I'm afraid he must put off his journey, I said. Oh, damn! said the young man. I thought you had dropped that rot. I've simply got to go. You can have my address, and I'll give any security like. No, I said. You must stay. At that I think they must have realized that the game was desperate. Their only chance had been to convince me that I was playing the fool, and that had failed. But the old man spoke once again. I'll go bail for my nephew that ought to content you, Mr. Hane. Was it fancy, or did I detect some halt in the smoothness of that voice? There must have been, for as I glanced at him, his eyelids fell in that hawk like hood which fear had stamped on my memory. I blew my whistle. In an instant the lights were out. A pair of strong arms gripped me round the waist, covering the pockets in which a man might be expected to carry a pistol. Schnellfranz cried a voice, Das Boot, Das Boot! As it spoke I saw two of my fellows emerge on the moonlit lawn. The young dark man leapt for the window was through it, and over the low fence before a hand could touch him. I grappled the old chap, and the room seemed to fill with figures. I saw the plump one collared, but my eyes were all for the out-of-doors, where fronds sped on over the road towards the railed entrance to the beach stairs. One man followed him, but he had no chance. The gate of the stairs locked behind the fugitive, and I stood staring with my hands on the old boy's throat for such a time as a man might take to descend those steps to the sea. Suddenly my prisoner broke from me and flung himself on the wall. There was a click as if a lever had been pulled, then came a low rumbling far, far below the ground, and through the window I saw a cloud of chalky dust pouring out of the shaft of the stairway. Someone switched on the light. The old man was looking at me with blazing eyes. He is safe! he cried. You cannot follow in time. He is gone. He has triumphed. Der Schwatstein ist in der Siegeskrone. There was more in those eyes than any common triumph. They had been hooded like a bird of prey, and now they flamed with a hawk's pride. A white fanatic heat burned in them, and I realised for the first time the terrible thing I had been up against. This man was more than a spy. In his foul way he had been a patriot. As the handcuffs clinked on his wrists I said my last word to him. I hope Franz will bear his triumph well. I ought to tell you that the Ariadne for the last hour has been in our hands. Seven weeks later as all the world knows we went to war. I joined the new army the first week and owing to my metabolic experience got a captain's commission straight off. But I had done my best service, I think, before I put on the khaki. End of the 39 Steps by John Buckin


Hey friends and welcome to my channel, I'm Yoshida and this is Norris Cove. You guys today, I'm going to show you how I weekly plan in my business planner. Last week I showed you how I did weekly plan in my personal, which is my mode term. And I just wanted to show you how I planned in my business planner. And I just realized that, um, I'm missing, uh oh, well at any rate. So the first thing I do is I go to my monthly and here I have kind of pre planned out some things that I need to film. Basically this is my kind of filming schedule here and I made these tabs after had wrote some in that these represent filming. So I'll just take one of these with that same color on it and then I'll write in what I'm filming that day. If it's budget related, it'll be this, like this one says my debt history that is down for Tuesday, which is today, but we're filming something else. And what I like to move this, what I like about this system is that I can move this since I'm not doing my debt history today, I can move this to another day. So business planner is down here on Thursday. So let's just switch those around. So I'm filming my business planner today. So next I'm just thinking, do I even got a weekly answer here in ideas? So let's get to the week. So last week I wanted to like decorate with you guys, but I was a little impatient and I had kind of waited to the last minute. So let's do some decorating. Okay, so I'm going into my happy planner journaling stickers and I think that came in silver, but I'm going to use them anyway. So I'm a little behind because I did want to play with you guys. So I'm just going to lay these dates on here. Okay, so now I'm going to be using a lot of functional stickers. These are from my shop. They're new. They're in there. These are from my shop. They're in there. They're little dew drops. All these are transparent and these are from my shop as well. They're transparent. I'll try to remember to leave a link below to pretty much everything that I'm using. So these are a little sampler from Elaine Michelle Studios, which I love and her little bits office person. So I kind of like always use them. These are from Elaine Michelle, Elaine Michelle, Elaine Michelle, Elaine Michelle, Elaine Michelle. Let me stuff them up for me, Elaine Michelle. So I have some new stuff to hold on and I'm going to use, I won't be needing this. And I found this randomly in my stuff. This is like from a summer collection from Joanne's and it was blue and I thought it would go well with this leftover sticker kit from Nikki plus three. So I'm going to kind of use this kit from Nikki plus three. And if I need to like add more deco, I'll probably go into this one here from Joanne's, but I figured it would match perfectly. You know, what I normally do is fill in what's going on. I plan a little different in here opposed to the way I planned before. And the reason I do that is because it's functional. I've learned if I'm going to functional plan, I need to actually put down what it is that needs to be done and then I'll add the deco. And then that's the reason being I don't need a whole lot. So today I'm going to be using this pen. This is the precise B7RT by Pilot. I do like the way this one writes and plus it sits here on my desk to the side. So this is my business planner. So I needed to feel orders. That's the top priority. So what I'm going to do is just kind of fill everything in and then come back and kind of explain that way because I know it's the last time it took me longer to make the video because I kind of wrote down first and kind of explained everything to you guys, whatever. So I'll just do this first and then I'll come back. Okay, you guys. So this is what I have is take a little while because I'm trying to work on my lettering. So I'm just going to add computer screens. I love these stickers because it's a little simpler than like looking for something in color. I have to like, you know, have something with color, I guess you could say I'm filming or we're happy. So I'll put one there and then I need to go into this here, this Nikky plus three. Love the deco. Also, you guys, I'm looking for a nice shot that sells deco. This is crooked. See you all. I can't even lay the sticker. That's the date sticker. I can't even lay the date sticker. Well, it's still a little crooked, but whatever. Thanks for writing. So I try to write letter a little bit each day. I know it's not perfect and I'm fine with that because I'm just trying to get better at it. And the only way to get better at it is to do it each day. And I tried last year, but I just didn't really stick with it, you know, so I'm going to do a little bit here and there. I'm going to use this work sticker because I worked yesterday. It's Tuesday, by the way, you guys. So I do have an appointment here. I'm just going to put that right up under there. Before I could never really, it's funny how you find the function of stuff later. I could never understand these little, I'm not going to say to understand them. I just think I needed them, but now look how cute that is. And I'm going to find something to add to this one here on Sunday because it's so pretty. I'm going to use a today sticker and I'm definitely just doing minimal stickers in here. This something very, very, very, very simple.  Here's a little backpack for Tuesday because I feel like I need to just pack all my stuff up, go to the Panera bread or to the coffee shop and just get some stuff done. So I still have some left of this kit. Let me tell you, this kit is coming through. So now I'm not going to use these. I'm going to save these for another time. So now I'll go into these little things, seeing if I need them. This is what I like to use are these push pins on important stuff. So I needed to add printables, which I just did. Let's see. I guess I should do it this way. And I'm thinking about making these into like a list form of having to like the bow headers or whatever. Maybe I'll do it in this form since these are priorities. So even though it looks simple, but with the lettering for me, it takes me a while to do. So that's what makes it so long. And that's why I kind of like doing it at night, but I wanted to show you guys what I had going on. And I can show you last week. I don't think I did much last week. And then this is gray. So I'm going to use, since this is gray, I'm going to use that because it looks almost similar to the color of what I'm using. My little bit and I like this one here. I've ordered some more because I already knew that I was going to use a lot of these. So I just ordered more. See where we can put this bit. This bit can go here. I think this is good and it's not too much a deco. Like I said, I like for my business planner, I like to keep as simple as possible. That is it for now. So that concludes my plan with me and my business planner. I'm going to put these back. Again, you guys, thank you so much for watching. I hope you enjoyed today's video. If you have any questions, please leave them in the comment section. I love getting feedback from you guys. I love talking to you in my comment section because a lot of times you all let me see some things, you know, that I didn't even realize that I've done or was doing and that it may make sense to me, but it may not make sense to someone else. So anytime you have any questions about my layout or the way that, you know, I do things, do things, please, you know, leave me some feedback in the comment section. I love to interact with you guys. You guys so far have been the best and I really appreciate you. So if you're new here and this is your first time seeing any videos of mine, you enjoy today's content and you would love to see more or you just left me. I'd love to have you stay a while and hit that subscribe button and also hit that notification bell. And I'll see you in my next video. Bye.


What's up everyone? It's your girl Kenzie here from Layton Sports Cards and I'm ripping a personal for Muhammad A. We've got a 2022 Panini World Cup soccer breakaway box. All right. Good luck, Muhammad. Thanks so much for hopping in. Let's see what we can get ya. What is the mosaic no huddle pack box opening number two? Um, is that a break that you're in crime? Empty break schedule looks like there's any no huddle. I'm assuming that's what you're talking about. Um, box opening number two. There's no huddle tonight. Number nine and number 10. Those break at 840 and 905. Collections, Paul and Paredes. Christian Erickson. I'm sorry and Somer. Yep. 840 is number nine and 905 is number 10. You can always find our break schedule at LaytonSportsCards.com under the break schedules tab. We've got Scorus Club of Abu Bakr. We've got, it's nice, a red Felix Torres for Ecuador that is 51 out of 99 on the red pulsar. Pino and Matthew Ryan. I don't know if that's still a command or not white. Thank you. There is the break schedule link right there for ya. Minson. We've got Pulsar of Isen Parisic for Croatia. Not numbered on that one. Savage. Hernandez. Luciala. We've got Silver New Era of Matthias Kunha on the rookie. Irving and Mahi. Now that's Blake. Yes, Eastern Time. Correct. Griezmann. We've got Silver of Jan Vertonghen. Vertonghen. Belgium. Korea team car. Over Declan Rice. Salami. Guardo. Let's see a nice color here. See another numbered. Garu. Busca. New Era Martinez. We've got Blue Pulsar. Pervis. Pina for Ecuador. 46 of 49. Like the pulsars here. Nice looking cards. Felix Sung Lee. We've got Pulsar of Antony Robinson. Not numbered. USA. Davies. Rania. Couple packs left for ya. Mohamed. Ronaldo base. We've got Scores Club. Germany team card. Last pack here Mohamed. Good luck. Sosa. We've got a redemption. Uh oh. Kailman's the fall. Allen. Alright, let's see what our redemption is. Yeah, the near not guaranteed a Nato in this. Alright, good luck Mohamed. A little cup of Qatar. Signature Prisms Breakaway. Card 89 of Unise Simon. Unise Simon. On the prism breakaway. Again, congrats on the hat Mohamed. Again, autographs are not guaranteed in the breakaway boxes. So we will take that for sure. Congrats on that. Thanks as always for hopping in and we will get this right out to ya.


We're at the family's home place here, north of Sturgis, South Dakota, but dad came to this property in 1954. The ranch has basically always been centered around cattle, and dad did some wheat farming and some of that, but probably when Ed and I came in as partners in the ranch in the 70s, we really kind of focused more on the cattle because that's really where our passion was. Our passion wasn't in the farming, so through that time period, well then we've kind of taken some of the farm ground that dad used to summerfowl wheat on and turned that into grasslands and turned into cattle, and so a way we could run more cattle. My dad was always really interested in range management. I'm not real sure where that interest came from, but he really enjoyed going out and finding plants, and at the time when we were in 4-H, I mean we'd spent half the summer out looking for different range plants. He had a real keen interest in anything that had to do with the range. The soil's a real heavy clay. We deal with a lot of native grass. We're working on like a 14-inch annual rainfall a year. You know when I was in high school and it was drought way more than it ever rained, and we've really learned how to deal with droughts better than we can in the last two years that it rains in muddy all the time. I feel a lot of people have to sell cows. We're in a seed stock business, and we've put a lot of time into A.I.ing and some of that, and we can't just get rid of our cows and buy back the same genetics that we have now, so we implement a lot of different strategies. Early weaning's been just a great tool for us. This ranch here is kind of 350 to 450 cows is what it will run depending on the growing condition. We'll have all the heifers here. We'll run those heifers over with the first calf all summer long, and we'll also have some three- and four-year-olds, so we'll A.I., and as they're a cycle back, we'll ship those up to Chad's house, so he gets most of the older cows, and we'll keep the younger cows here, so we'll have the first calf heifers and most of the three-year-olds on this ranch. When they ship to Chad's, they'll stay there basically as long as they're still on the operation. Right now we're on the two-top ranch we call it, which is in Butte County, north of Belfouche, about 35 miles. We bought this ranch in 2014. We drilled a deep well and started putting pipeline in in 2015 with a sage grouse initiative equip contract. We've done quite a little on this ranch in the last four or five years, I guess, and split the pastures into smaller pastures for easy management, easier to move the cows around, and we'll get some better utilization out of them. Chad and I have three kids. I've been learning what conservation means to the entire Blair family. This has kind of been Grandpa Ed's dream for a long time to win the Leopold Award and teaching the kids what it means for Grandpa to receive this award and do it as a family has been pretty cool. We learned to appreciate the value of not overusing grass and making it better for the next generation and for the wildlife and your livestock because the whole goal is to be profitable and maintain your conservation level that you want to have and I think we're reaching it. It's been neat to learn right alongside with my husband. Our ranch is really special and you can't just leave the cows in one pasture forever. You have to move them around. We move the cows because it's good to keep the grass not undergrazed or overgrazed because if grass is overgrazed, it's going to have a hard time getting to grow back up and if you undergraze it, there's going to be too much grass. The Blair Ranch is both Tutop and Butte County and here on the home ranch in Mead County. Grass is abundant and it's not just because we had some adequate rainfall throughout this growing season, it's that way every year. You'll always notice that they seem to have more grass than the conventionally managed or the season long grazed pastures that are just across the fence or just down the road. That's not by accident. They have a lot of ideas and they're willing to listen to any alternatives and they come up with many of their own alternatives and ideas, but really the coolest thing to see is that they are very goal driven. They have their goals and objectives and they know how to see them through. The Blair's are just really good to work with because they have that experience that can only come with a multi-generational type of ranch. They're stewards of the land. They can see things are going in a direction that might not be good and that's when they're coming to talk to us before there's even a problem. They kind of raise the bar for everybody in the area which some producers, that is what's needed and having good innovators and people to look up to like the Blair's, it's not just beneficial for their individual ranches but for community levels and landscapes that are going to see benefits for years to come. What I think is neat about the award is that you're being nominated by your peers. People that have seen what you've been doing out there and appreciated I guess is the big thing for me about it. I've always felt that we've worked really hard at our ranching operation. I mean we've been out there in the wind and the rain and the cold and moving cattle on time when they needed to be moved. And you know it's a pretty elite club. The winners that have been at the Leopold Award, these are people that are doing something and it's nice to be recognized with that group. I think getting a Leopold Award is just kind of a neat deal to kind of make you feel somebody recognized the work and the time and the effort that you put into it.