The Thirty-Nine Steps

Sets Out o

bear, and I managed to get a table-cloth and cover it. Then I staggered to a cupboard, found the brandy and swallowed several mouthfuls. I had seen men die violently before; indeed I had k

d all the windows and put the chain on the door. By this time my wits were coming back to me, and I could think again. It took me about an hour

h. The men who knew that he knew what he knew had found him, and had taken the best way to make certain of his silence. Yes; but he had been in my rooms four days, and his en

desperately fishy. If I made a clean breast of it and told the police everything he had told me, they would simply laugh at me. The odds were a thousand to one that I would be charged with the murder, and the circumstantial evidence was strong enough to hang me. Few people knew me

at home, which was what they wanted. Somehow or other the sight of Scudder's dead face had made me a passionate believe

it. I am an ordinary sort of fellow, not braver than other people, but I hate to see a good man

th the Government people and tell them what Scudder had told me. I wished to Heaven he had told me more, and that I had listened more carefully to the little he had told me. I knew nothing but the barest facts. There wa

king for me-Scudder's enemies to put me out of existence, and the police, who would want me for Scudder's murder. It was going to be a giddy hunt, and it was queer how the prospect comforted me. I had been slack so long that alm

was wonderfully calm for a man who had been struck down in a moment. There was nothing in the breast-pocket, and only a few loose coins and a cigar-holder in the waistcoat. The trousers held a little penknife and so

ting-table. Scudder would never have left them in that state, for he was the tidiest o

ds, boxes, even the pockets of the clothes in my wardrobe, and the sideboard in the dining-room. There w

s anywhere as an ordinary Scotsman. I had half an idea at first to be a German tourist, for my father had had German partners, and I had been brought up to speak the tongue pretty fluently, not to mention having put in three years prospecting for copper in German Damaraland. But I calculated

hat was well enough, but a more important matter was how I was to make my way to St Pancras, for I was pretty certain that Scudder's friend

God-forgotten fool. My inclination was to let things slide, and trust to the British police taking a reasonable view of my case. But as I reviewed the situation I could find no arguments to bring agai

iefs, and a tooth-brush. I had drawn a good sum in gold from the bank two days before, in case Scudder should want money, and I took fifty pounds of it in sovereigns in a

ter experience, the milkman turned up with a great clatter of cans, and deposited my share outside my door. I had seen that milkman sometimes when I had gon

s. There I breakfasted off a whisky-and-soda and some biscuits from the cupboard. By this time it was getting on

touched something hard, and I drew ou

amazed at the peace and dignity of the dead face. 'Goodbye, old chap,' I

business, for I was fairly choking to get out of doors. Six-thirty passed, then six-

I opened the front door, and there was my man, singling out my cans from a bunc

. 'I want a word with you.' And

want you to do me a service. Lend me your cap and ove

f the gold, and he grinned bro

for the next ten minutes. All you've got to do is to stay here till I come back. You

ain't the man to spoil a bit of

, banged my door, and went whistling downstairs. The porter at the foo

d a loafer shuffling past on the other side. Some impulse made me raise my eyes to the house opposite, and the

vacant ground. There was no one in the little street, so I dropped the milk-cans inside the hoarding and sent the cap and overall after them. I had only just put on my cloth

the hour. At St Pancras I had no time to take a ticket, let alone that I had not settled upon my destination. A porter told me the platform, and

ome back to my memory, and he conducted me from the first-class compartment where I had ensconced myself to a third-class smoker, occupied by a sailor and a stout woman with a

to pit him in his place. He was complainin' o' this wean no haein' a ticket and h

an atmosphere of protest against authority. I reminded