'
'Well,' said I, 'I hope it is not so unsavoury as the last.' But to
this the old man made no response.
There was silence in the carriage as we drove back to my flat.
Sanderson had taken the precaution of pulling down the blinds of the
carriage, which he need not have troubled to do, for, as I have said,
it would have been the simplest matter in the world for me to have
discovered who his employer was, if I had desired to know. As a matter
of fact, I do not know to this day whom he represented.
Once more in my room with the electric light turned on, I was shocked
and astonished to see the expression on Sanderson's face. It was the
face of a man who would grimly commit murder and hang for it. If ever
the thirst for vengeance was portrayed on a human countenance, it was
on his that night. He spoke very quietly, laying down the packet
before him on the table.
'I think you will agree with me,' he said, 'that no punishment on
earth is too severe for that creature calling himself Major Renn.'
'I'm willing to shoot him dead in the streets of London tomorrow,'
said the convict, 'if you give the word.'
Sanderson went on implacably: 'He not only murdered the son, but for
five years has kept the father in an agony of sorrow and apprehension,
bleeding him of money all the time, which was the least of his crimes.
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