Aside from these there were a moon-faced Bengali babu, a dark Italian with flashing eyes and teeth, and a stout person of bovine Teutonic cast—­the type that is sage, shrewd, easy-going when unopposed, but capable under provocation of exhibiting the most conscienceless brutality.

From this last Thirteen got his warmest welcome.

“You are late, mine friend.”

“In good time, however,” Thirteen responded with a nod toward the vacant chair.  “More than that, the summons was handed me only twenty minutes ago.”

“How was that?” the babu asked.  “It was sent at six o’clock.”

“I was at work in the laboratory and had left orders I was not to be disturbed.  But for one thing”—­the petulance of Thirteen’s habitual expression was lightened by a flash of self-gratulation, and his voice shook a little with excitement—­“I might not have received the summons before morning.”

“And that one thing?”

“Success, comrades!  At last—­after months of experimentation—­I have been successful!”

“’Ow?” dryly demanded the man in the checked suit.

“I have discovered a great secret—­discovered, perfected, adapted it to common means at our command.  Comrades, I tell you, to-night we hold all England in the hollow of our hands!”

With an incoherent exclamation and eyes afire the Russian sat forward.  Unconsciously the others imitated his action.  Only the man in evening dress made a show of remaining unimpressed.

“It’s fine, fat words you’re after using,” he commented. “’All England in the hollow of our hands!’ If they mean anything at all, comrade, they mean—­”

“Everything!” Thirteen cut in with arrogant assertiveness; “all we’ve been waiting for, hoping for, praying for—­the end of the ruling classes, extinction of the accursed aristocrats, subjugation of the thrice-damned bourgeois, the triumph of the proletariat, all at a single stroke, swift, subtle, and sure!  Freedom for Ireland, freedom for India, freedom for England, the speedy spreading of that red dawn which lights the Russian skies to-day, till all the wide world basks in its warm radiance and acclaims us, comrades, its redeemers!”

“Lieber Gott!” the German breathed.  “Colossal!”

“’Ear, ’ear!” the Englishman applauded, perfunctory and skeptical.  “Bli’me if you didn’t mike me forget where I was—­’ad me thinking I was in ’Yde Park, you did, listening to a bloody horator on a box.”

“You may laugh,” Thirteen replied with a sour glance; “but when you have heard, you will not laugh.  I am not boasting—­I am telling you.”

“Not a great deal,” the Irishman suggested.  “Your mouth is full of sounds and fury, but till you tell us more you’ll have told us nothing.”

The face of Thirteen grew darker still, and for a moment he seemed to meditate an angry retort; but he thought better of it, contenting himself with an impatient movement and a mutter:  “All in good time; Number One is not here yet.”