“That game won’t work here,” one of the detectives said, “you should keep your eyes shut when there’s dust about, or else not have such protruding ones.”

Hamar threatened to report him to the Home Secretary for brutal conduct, but the detective only laughed, and Hamar had to submit to the mortification of being searched.

“What are these?” a detective said, fingering the seaweed pills gingerly.

“Stomachic pills!” Hamar said bitterly, “they are taken as a digestive after meals.  You look dyspeptic—­have one.”

“Now, none of your sauce!” the detective said, “you come along with me,”—­and Hamar was hauled before the inspector.

“Can I go out on bail?” Hamar asked.

“Certainly not,” the inspector replied.

“Then I shan’t give you my name and address,” Hamar said.  “I shan’t tell you anything.”

The inspector merely shrugged his shoulders, and after the charge sheet was read over, Hamar was conducted to a cell.

“This is awful,” he said, “what the deuce am I to do!  To send for Curtis and Kelson will be fatal, and it will be equally fatal to leave them in ignorance of what has happened to me.  I am, indeed, in the horns of a dilemma.  I must get at those pills.”

Up and down the floor of the tiny cell he paced, his mind tortured with a thousand conflicting emotions.  And then, an idea struck him.  He would ask to be allowed to see his lawyer.

“Cotton’s the man,” he said to himself, “he will get the pills for me!”

The inspector, after satisfying himself that Cotton was on the register, rang him up, and after an hour of terrible suspense to Hamar, the lawyer briskly entered his cell.

They conferred together for some minutes, and having arranged the method of defence, Cotton was preparing to depart, when Hamar whispered to him—­

“I want you to do me a particular favour.  In the top right hand drawer of the chest of drawers in my bedroom, in Cockspur Street, I have left a red pill-box.  These pills are for indigestion.  I simply can’t do without them.  Will you get them for me?”

“What, to-night?” the lawyer asked dubiously.

“Yes, to-night,” Hamar pleaded.  “I’ll make it a matter of business between us—­get me the pills before eight o’clock, and you have L1000 down.  My cheque book is in the same drawer.”

The lawyer said nothing, but gave Hamar a look that meant much!

Again there was a dreadful wait, and Hamar had abandoned himself to the deepest despair when Cotton reappeared.  He shook hands with his client, slipping the pills into the latter’s palm.  Whilst the lawyer was pocketing his cheque, Hamar gleefully swallowed a pill, and crying out “Bakra—­naka—­takso—­mana,”—­vanished!

“Heaven preserve us!  What’s become of you?” Cotton exclaimed, putting his hand to his forehead and leaning against the wall for support.  “Am I ill or dreaming?”