I sat up in bed.  “Under the circumstances,” I said, “you’ll excuse my being a little inquisitive.”

“Oh, there is no secret about it.  Any surgeon could do it.  I have only to alter the shape of your nose a trifle, and make your forehead rather higher and wider.  A stain of some sort will do the rest.”

“Yes,” I said; “but what about the first part of the programme?”

He shrugged his shoulders.  “Child’s play,” he answered.  “Merely a question of paraffin injections and the X-rays.”

He spoke with such careless confidence that for once it was impossible to doubt his sincerity.

I lay back again and drew in a large exulting lungful of cigarette smoke.  I had suddenly realized that if McMurtrie’s offer was genuine, and he could really do what he promised, there were no longer any difficulties in the way of my getting at George.  The idea of meeting him, and perhaps even speaking to him, without his being able to recognize me filled me with a wicked satisfaction that no words can do justice to.

I don’t think I betrayed my emotion, however, for McMurtrie’s keen eyes were on me, and I was not in the least anxious to take him into my confidence.  I blew out the smoke in a grey cloud, and then, raising myself on my elbow carefully flicked the ash off my cigarette.

“How am I to know that you will keep your promise?” I asked.

Savaroff made an angry movement, but before he could speak, McMurtrie had broken in.

“You forget what an embarrassing position we shall be putting ourselves in, Mr. Lyndon,” he said with perfect good temper.  “Shielding a runaway convict is an indictable offence—­to say nothing of altering his appearance.  As for the money”—­he made a little gesture of contempt—­“well, do you think it would pay us to cheat you?  There is always the chance that a gentleman who can invent things like this explosive and the Lyndon-Marwood torpedo may have other equally satisfactory notions.”

“Very well,” I said quietly.  “I will accept the offer on one condition—­that I can have a week in London before beginning work.”

With an oath Savaroff started up from the window-sill.

“Gott in Himmel! and who are you to make terms?” he exclaimed roughly.  “Why, we have only to send you back to the prison and you will be flogged like a dog!”

“In which distressing event,” I observed, “you would not get your explosive.”

“My dear Savaroff,” interrupted McMurtrie, soothingly, “there is no need to threaten Mr. Lyndon.  I am sure that he appreciates the situation.”  Then he turned to me.  “I suppose you have some reason for making this condition?”

Silently in my heart I invoked the shade of Ananias.

“If you had been in Dartmoor three years,” I said, with a rather well-forced laugh, “you would find several excellent reasons for wanting a week in London.”

My acting must have been good, for I could have sworn I saw a faint expression of relieved contempt flicker across McMurtrie’s face.