“You see, my dear Inspector,” the Prince said, “I am really a sojourner in your marvellous city not altogether for pleasure.  My stay over here is more in the light of a mission.  I have certain arrangements which I wish to effect for the good of my country.  Amongst them is one concerning which I should like to speak to you.”

“To me, sir?” Inspector Jacks repeated.

The Prince twirled his cane and nodded his head.

“It is a very important matter, Mr. Jacks,” he said.  “It is nothing less than a desire on the part of the city government of Tokio to perfect thoroughly their police system on the model of yours over here.  We are a progressive nation, you know, Mr. Jacks, but we are also a young nation, and though I think that we advance all the time, we are still in many respects a long way behind you.  We have no Scotland Yard in Tokio.  To be frank with you, the necessity for such an institution has become a real thing with us only during the last few years.  Do you read history, Mr. Jacks?”

The Inspector was doubtful.

“I can’t say, sir,” he admitted, “that I have done much reading since I left school, and that was many years ago.”

“Well,” the Prince said, “it is one of the axioms of history, Mr. Jacks, that as a country becomes civilized and consequently more prosperous, there is a corresponding growth in her criminal classes, a corresponding need for a different state of laws by which to judge them, a different machinery for checking their growth.  We have arrived at that position in Japan, and in my latest despatches from home comes to me a request that I send them out a man who shall reorganize our entire police system.  I am a judge of character, Mr. Jacks, and if I can get the man I want, I do not need to ask my friends at Downing Street to help me.  I should like you to accept that post.”

The Inspector was scarcely prepared for this.  He allowed himself to show some surprise.

“I am very much obliged to you, Prince, for the offer,” he said.  “I am afraid, however, that I should not be competent.”

“That,” the Prince reminded him, “is a risk which we are willing to take.”

“I do not think, either,” the detective continued, “that at my time of life I should care to go so far from home to settle down in an altogether strange country.”

“It must be as you will, of course,” the Prince declared.  “Only remember, Mr. Jacks, that a great nation like mine which wants a particular man for a particular purpose is not afraid to pay for him.  Your work out there would certainly take you no more than three years.  For that three years’ work you would receive the sum of thirty thousand pounds.”

The detective gasped.

“It is a great sum,” he said.

The Prince shrugged his shoulders.

“You could hardly call it that,” he said.  “Still, it would enable you to live in comfort for the rest of your life.”