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I WAS standing upon the steps of the Milan foyer gazing down at the gay crowd below and asking myself the inevitable question whether or no it was worth while reviving old associations, when a cloak-room attendant, grey-headed now and heavier with the years, answered my thought.

“GIad to see you back again, Major Forester. It does one good to see some of the old faces sometimes.”

He relieved me of my hat and stick, and retreated with them. After that I hesitated no longer. I took my place amongst the diners at a small table as far removed from the orchestra as possible, ordered a simple dinner, and looked around me without any of that intuitive thrill which is sometimes the precursor of adventure. Yet adventure was to come even before I had finished my melon,

I had lighted a cigarette—one of my bad habits, to smoke during meals— whilst waiting for my sole Colbert, and poured out a glass of Chablis, when a young man, who seemed to appear from nowhere, stopped before my table with a slight bow of greeting. He appeared to know me, but so far as I was aware I had never seen him before in my life. He was quietly but well dressed, and would have been good-looking but for some slight pit marks in his face, and a scar on his left temple. Nevertheless, he was personable enough, and his smile was evidently meant to be ingratiating.

“When did you reach England, sir?” he inquired. I was a little taken aback, but I answered him truthfully.

“This afternoon. You will forgive me, but I don’t seem to recognise you.”

He smiled.

“We have never actually met before,” he admitted, “but I have been expecting you for some time. Perhaps it would excite less comment if I sat down at your table.”

“Why on earth should you?” I asked, a little coldly. “It is not my custom to dine with strangers.”

“Capital!” he murmured. “Still I think you are unnecessarily careful. This place was once the happy hunting ground of espionage. Those days have passed. I doubt whether there is a soul in this room who would recognise either of us.”

I did my best to conceal my irritation.

“Look here,” I said, “I think that you are making some mistake. My name is Forester. To the best of my belief, I have never seen you before.”

He was in no way discomposed. He even leaned a little nearer and lowered his voice to a whisper.

“Marlingham comes back to-night,” he confided. “Somewhere about eleven o’clock. I have an appointment with him for later on.”

“Then for heaven’s sake go and keep it,” I enjoined, a little testily. “I don’t know you; I never heard of Marlingham, and I should be glad to be allowed to go on with my dinner in peace.”

The waiter had arrived with my fish. I took up my knife and fork and ignored this persistent young man. He hesitated for a moment, and then shrugged his shoulders.

“A trifle overdone,” he declared reproachfully. “Still, you are within your rights not to anticipate.”

He strolled away and as soon as I was sure that I was rid of him, I watched his movements curiously. He made his way to a table at which several men and women were already seated—an ordinary-looking crowd, so far as I could see, of well-bred, pleasant people, undistinguishable save for one woman whom I had noticed upon my entrance, a woman who was strikingly dressed in a yellow chiffon dancing gown, which went strangely with her chestnut-coloured hair and brown eyes. She alone seemed to take any notice of the young man’s return. He leaned towards her, and talked for several moments, apparently in a low tone. Afterwards they proceeded with their dinner and I with mine.

I was halfway through my partridge, when a smiling maître d’hôtel laid a twisted slip of paper upon the table in front of me. Before I could ask him what it meant, he had passed on, I opened it—just a half-sheet of the hotel note paper without any envelope—and read a few lines written very precisely in a bold upright handwriting in pencil:

You were quite right. Maintain your present attitude. X.

I summoned the maître d’hôtel.

“Who gave you this note?” I demanded.

“It was passed on to me by another waiter, sir,” he replied.

“Which one? Where is he?”

The man shrugged his shoulders.

“I am very sorry, sir,” he regretted. “I was busy at the time and I didn’t notice.”

If I had been a woman, and carried a mirror, I should certainly have looked at myself to ascertain whether my appearance was in any way unusual. As I did not possess such a luxury, however, I continued my dinner, a little intrigued by this time as to what might happen next. I looked around at my fellow diners with a new interest, and was forced to admit that they were not a crowd with any particularly inspiring characteristics. We were on the whole a sedate and almost a commonplace assembly. The young man who had first addressed me had never since glanced in my direction, nor was there any other of my neighbours who seemed to be unduly interested in me, or whom I could possibly identify with the sender of that little note. I finished my dinner, ordered my coffee and fin, and laid my cigarette case upon the table.

Soon the orchestra which had been playing through dinner time was replaced by something in the nature of a jazz band, and dancing began. I watched the couples without any real interest. For some time the young lady in the yellow gown retained her seat. Presently, however, she was led on to the floor by an elderly man, to all appearance a typical English lawyer or barrister. She did not once glance towards my table, or show the slightest consciousness of my presence. She danced beautifully, and I saw that she was younger than I had imagined. Afterwards she waltzed with the young man who had approached me, and this time I saw them both glance furtively in my direction. When the music had stopped, the woman paused on the border of the dancing circle to speak with an acquaintance. The young man, after a moment’s hesitation, approached me.

“Amabel is in one of her moods to-night,” he said in a low tone. “She says there is no reason why you should not dance with her.”

Almost as he spoke, she came towards us, I rose to my feet.

“The only reason I can suggest,” I rejoined, “is that I have not the pleasure of knowing the lady.”

The young man smiled cryptically. He had the irritating air now of one humouring the whim of an eccentric person.

“Permit me to present you, then,” he begged. “What name shall I say?”

“My name is Forester—Major Forester,” I told him stiffly.

“Amabel,” he said, turning towards her, “may I present Major Forester—Miss- -”

“Brown will do excellently,” the young lady interrupted, with the faintest of smiles. “Come and dance with me, please, Major Forester.”

We danced—in silence for some time, for, although I am not a wonderful performer, I am able to appreciate a perfect partner. The waltz changed to a fox trot, and with its less seductive movements I found opportunity for speech.

“Do you know,” I confided, “I think your friend is under some misapprehension as regards me.”

“What misapprehension could he be under?” she asked.

And from the first I liked her voice. She spoke so precisely and in such a liquid tone that one listened for that trace of a foreign accent which seemed somehow suggested.

“He appears to think,” I explained, “that we are acquaintances. I am quite sure that I never saw him before in my life.”

She nodded a little vaguely.

“Your school is becoming played out,” she remonstrated. “It is the vogue now to flirt with danger. I suppose, though, you are right. There is always the thousandth chance. Why did you dance with me?”

“Because I admired you, and because you dance beautifully,” I ventured.

Her hand suddenly held mine tightly. I returned the little squeeze.

“I find your pastime amusing,” she whispered softly.

“Let us continue it,” I begged, as the music stopped. “Must we go back to the table?” She made a little grimace.

“You see who is with us,” she pointed out. “Later perhaps.”

I returned to my place, lit a cigarette, and ordered myself another brandy. Decidedly this home of past adventures, though much of its glamour had departed, still held possibilities!

The music called, but my late partner seemed to have become deaf to its invitation. For some reason or other, the conversation at her table had become much more serious. The man with whom she had danced was leaning forward, drumming upon the table with his fingers, as though to give added effect to what he was saying.

I glanced across at the table twice as the orchestra started afresh, but my late partner gave no sign. People were beginning now to leave. I decided that the mistake as to my identity had been discovered, and called for my bill. When it was brought, there was another twisted up note, which I immediately opened. It contained a few lines in the same upright calligraphy :

I withdraw my congratulations. You are a fool. I shall visit you in your room in a quarter of an hour.

I paid my bill, stuffed the note into my pocket, tried in vain to obtain a parting salute from my late dancing partner, crossed the floor, and, after having bought an evening paper, made my way to the lift. At least, I thought, there was a possibility that if my unknown correspondent kept his word I might learn something of the truth.

One of my few extravagances in life has always been a profound dislike of the bed and bathroom provided by the ordinary hotel. At the Milan, I had discovered a pleasant suite upon the fourth floor of the Court, and in my easy- chair, with whisky and soda by my side, I slowly filled a pipe and awaited developments. They were not long in coming. I had barely been there five minutes when my telephone bell rang. I took up the receiver and uttered the conventional “Hallo!”

“Are you alone?” a voice asked quickly.

“Certainly,” I replied.

“Leave your door open. I shall be with you in two minutes.”

I replaced the receiver, opened my door, lit my pipe, and again awaited impending events. I had scarcely settled down when I heard the sound of swift and stealthy footsteps outside, the pushing open and closing of my door. My late dancing partner made her breathless entrance. I rose at once to my feet. She seemed to be listening. Outside in the corridor there was blank silence, no sound except the clang of the descending lift. She closed the door.

There was nothing in her manner to indicate whether her visit was one of adventure, or a part of the maze into which I seemed to have drifted.

“Tell me,” she begged, coming a little farther into the room, “has any one else approached you this evening? You must tell me this quickly, please. We are all the same—uneasy of something, and yet we don’t know of what.”

She paused breathlessly. I was tired of answering questions. There were a few things I wanted to know myself.

“Sit down, please,” I insisted. “Now that you are here, and we are alone, for heaven’s sake clear up this mystery for me. Who is the young man with the scarred face who came and spoke to me? Why did you dance with me? Why did he imagine that I ought to have recognised him, or known who he was?”

She assumed the air of a patient woman determined to humour an unruly child.

“His name,” she told me, “is Maurice James Philpot.”

I produced the second of the hasty notes I had received during dinner.

“It is something,” I admitted, “to have penetrated the identity of Mr. Maurice James Philpot. Perhaps you can also tell me whose handwriting that is.”

She gave one glance at the note, and if ever I have seen horror chase the natural expression out of a face I saw it then. Twice she tried to rise from her chair. The third time I held out my hand and steadied her.

“I was a fool to come,” she exclaimed, “but you were so difficult!”

She moved towards the door, but even at that moment there was a quiet though imperative knock. She turned towards me, and the pallor of her face was such that her becarmined lips seemed like vivid wounds. Her eyes asked me a dumb, passionate question. I took her by the arm, passed through the sitting room to the entrance beyond, softly opened the door of my bedroom, and pointed to the independent exit on to the corridor.

“I will shut you in,” I whispered. “As soon as I have opened the outside door you can slip away.”

I left her uncertain myself whether or no she fully understood, but I carried out my part of the programme. I closed the bedroom door softly, and went hack on tiptoe to the sitting room. Arrived there, I paused for a moment, then, crossing the room, turned the handle of the outside door.

My impression of the man who stood waiting there filled me at first with something of that same apprehension which my late visitor had shown when confronted with that upright handwriting. He was of medium height, wearing a black cape over his evening clothes, and carrying a silk hat in his hand. His beard was black and carefully trimmed; his hair, parted in the middle, was of the same colour. It was his complexion, his eyes, and the extraordinary stillness of the man which terrified. His eyes were uncannily brilliant, set deep back, and his complexion was more than pallid—it was waxen. Apart from that, he was standing perfectly still, without the slightest sign of impatience, without a vestige of movement.

I looked at him, and I had no breath for any obvious inquiry. It is a ridiculous thing to confess, but it was an absolute relief to me when he spoke, and gave actual evidence of being a creature of flesh and blood. He spoke pleasantly but in a voice entirely nondescript as regards inflexion or accent.

“May I come in?” he inquired quietly. “I should be glad of a few minutes’ conversation.”

I became at once more or less myself. I opened the door wider, closed it with unnecessary force, and purposely raised my voice as I answered him.

“Of course you can,” I acquiesced. “If you are the person who wrote me those notes, I am very curious indeed to know what they meant. Come in, please. Won’t you take that easy-chair. Can I offer you a whisky and soda?”

He listened to all I had to say without direct reply. Then he subsided into the chair which I had indicated, and sat there for several moments, subjecting me to the most incomprehensible scrutiny.

“In the first place,” he began, at last, “may I inquire whether I am in time?”

“In time for what?” I asked.

“Your question is a satisfactory response,” my visitor declared, withdrawing a morocco case from the inside pocket of his dinner coat. “I am here to tell you that we have decided to accept your terms.”

I addressed myself once more to the business of obtaining some explanation as to this mysterious intrigue which was going on around me. I drew my chair up a little and leaned forward.

“Look here, sir,” I said, “I don’t know who you are, I don’t know whom you came from, I don’t know why you wrote me those extraordinary notes at dinner time, and I haven’t the faintest idea what you mean when you say that you have decided to accept my terms. There can be only one explanation of all this confusion. You and several others must be mistaking me for some one else.”

My visitor smiled patiently, but did not cease the task which he had commenced. I gave a little gasp of surprise. He was counting out bank notes from one hand to the other—not five-pound notes, or tens, or fifties, but five hundreds! I stared at them in blank amazement.

“Pretty things, those!” I murmured idiotically.

“They represent an absolutely rational consideration in life,” was the calm reply. “Their present use is that they seal the bargain which wc have just concluded.”

I recognised the futility of mere words, and decided to wait upon events. My visitor counted twenty of those wonderful notes, smoothed then) out Upon his knee, folded them up, and passed them over to me.

“Ten thousand pounds,” he announced, replacing the case in his pocket. “I will now take the liberty of helping myself to one of your cigarettes—you smoke a reasonable brand, I see, and wishing you good night.”

I held the notes in my hand.

“What do I do with these?” I demanded.

My visitor buttoned up his cape and took up his hat—the glossiest I had ever seen, and bearing the name of a well-known maker.

“From what one knows of you, Major Forester,” he remarked, “you are very well in the position to answer your own question. Mind,” he added, as he moved towards the door, “what has been done tonight has been done against my advice. I believe in other measures. I have been overruled. Good night !”

“Look here—” I began.

He glanced at me over his shoulder, and the words dried up on my lips. My instincts towards the convention of speeding the parting guest seemed paralysed. I allowed him to open the door for himself and take his leave. I stood there, listening to his retreating footsteps with ten thousand pounds’ worth of bank notes clutched in my fingers.

I presently poured myself out a stiff whisky and soda, re-lit my pipe, and, determined to deal with the situation in a common-sense fashion, carefully went back through the incidents of the day. I had arrived late in the afternoon from abroad, having wired for such accommodation as I had found reserved for me. I had been received pleasantly by the manager, who was evidently new, and who had seemed a little uncomprehending when I had spoken of the old days I had spent in the Court. I had registered in my correct name. I had telephoned to no friends, nor had I left the hotel since my arrival. Such things as had happened to me had happened in the sequence recorded, and the longer I thought about them the more completely I failed to find in my mind any possible explanation. In the end, I knocked out my pipe, put the notes into an envelope, inscribed it with the date and hour, and wrote as follows:

Handed to me by an unknown man for an unknown reason, hour and date as above.

Then I went to bed.

The first gleam of enlightenment came to me when in one of the principal columns of my morning newspaper I read that Major Forester, an ex-King’s Messenger, but now retired, had been one of the victims of a crash in the afternoon service of aeroplanes from Paris to Croydon. There was only a brief record of the officer in question, who was no connection of mine, and whose career seemed to have been in a way undistinguished,

I had intended to visit several of my tradespeople in the morning, but the conviction that under the circumstances I should have callers was so strong that I remained in my rooms until almost one o’clock. No one came near me, however, nor did my telephone bell once ring. At five minutes past one, I left a note in the office that I should be back during the afternoon and made my way towards Piccadilly. Just as I was passing the St. James’s Club, a taxicab drove up, and, with a little start, I recognised in its solitary occupant my visitor of the night before. I patted the breast pocket of my coat to make sure that the notes were still there, and waited whilst he paid the driver. He turned round to find me by his side.

“Good morning,” I said.

He looked at me doubtfully.

“Good morning,” he answered coldly, and would have passed on, but I still blocked the way.

“Perhaps you can understand, now,” I continued, “my astonishment of last night. You were evidently taking me for the poor fellow of the same name who was killed.”

Again the man impressed me with that sense of extraordinary stillness. He was leaning slightly upon the gold top of his malacca cane, so perfectly dressed that I found myself wondering at the set of his collar and cravat and the rich purple of his tie.

“I fear, sir,” he said, “that you are making some mistake. I have not the honour of your acquaintance.”

I swallowed hard. Just as I had imagined myself stepping back into the world of commonplace things, the mists of Arabia were once more rolling up.

“Look here,” I expostulated, “you came to my rooms last night at the Milan Court, and you handed me ten thousand pounds, which I have in my pocket here for you. You had better take them. I don’t want to inquire into your business, but they were evidently meant for the Forester who was killed.”

Again the shadow of that irritatingly patient smile.

“My dear fellow,” he protested, “I don’t know who you are, and I am not a poor man, but I can assure you that I am not in the habit of going about distributing ten thousand pounds to perfect strangers. You will excuse me. I am a little late for luncheon here.”

I stood in the middle of the pavement with the pedestrians streaming by on each side, and I began to wonder whether I were in the throes of some sudden streak of lunacy.

“Sir,” I insisted firmly, “I repeat that you wrote me two notes at dinner time at the Milan last night. You visited my rooms afterwards. You told me that you had accepted my terms, and you handed me twenty five-hundred-pound notes. I have them in my pocket at the present moment.”

He lifted his silk hat to a lady passing—the same hat, and the same maker’s name inside. Then he turned back to me.

“My friend,” he inquired, “have you lived in the East at all?”

“Some part of my life,” I admitted.

“A touch of the sun,” he said meaningly. “Be careful! These little weaknesses will crop up sometimes. Last night I was dining at Claridge’s, I have never seen a five-hundred-pound note in my life—or you. Good morning!”

I watched him disappear within the portals of the club. He whispered a word to the commissionaire who looked at me suspiciously. Nevertheless, I stepped forward and addressed him.

“Can you tell me the name of that gentleman?” I asked.

The man scrutinised me sternly.

“You should know better than to ask such a question, sir,” he replied. “Move on, please.”

So I moved on to luncheon, with the ten thousand pounds still in my pocket.

I met a few friends at the club, and spent a pleasant hour or so, during which I recovered a certain amount of confidence in my own sanity. Shortly before the closing hour, I presented myself at my bank, and asked to see the chief cashier. I produced my notes.

“Can you tell me,” I asked, first of all, “if these are genuine?”

The man examined them gingerly, produced a magnifying glass, shook them, and nodded.

“There is not the slightest doubt about that, sir,” he informed me.

I produced the packet, the contents of which rather astonished him.

“Will you put these to a deposit account in my name?” I instructed. “I wish them cleared through the Bank of England as soon as possible, but I am not proposing to draw against them at first. I will come in and see you again in a few days, but in the meantime I should be glad if you would drop me a line to the Milan Court if by any chance payment of the notes should be stopped.”

I was an old client, but he looked at me doubtfully.

“I understand that you are not wishing to draw any of this money, sir?” he asked.

“Not a penny,” I assured him.

I played a rubber or two of bridge that afternoon at another club to which I belong, but the game ended early, and I found myself back at the Milan by six. The sounds of music in the foyer attracted me, and I strolled down to witness the last stages of a thé dansant. As I stood upon the steps I recognised, with a little start of satisfaction, the young lady with the chestnut hair who had spent a portion of the preceding evening in my bedroom. I crossed towards her with a smile of welcome. She was accompanied by the elderly lady with whom she had been dining.

“I wonder whether I might have a dance?” I ventured.

She looked at me, not unpleasantly, but with a slight air of surprise. Her companion raised her lorgnette. Even then I could not realise what was about to happen.

“I am sorry,” the young lady said, rather stiffly, “but I do not dance with strangers.”

I had become hardened to surprises, so I recovered myself more quickly than might otherwise have been the case.

“But I am not a stranger,” I told her. “I was presented to you last night. We danced together, and—”

I broke off there. What I was on the point of adding might possibly have been indiscreet. The young lady’s brown eyes, which I had admired very much the night before, were fixed upon me coldly. Her eyebrows were drawn slightly together.

“I am sure that you are making a mistake,” she said, “or you would not need me to tell you twice that I have not the pleasure of your acquaintance. Who did you say presented you to me?”

“The young man who was with you,” I replied. “He did not tell me his name, but I think you told me that it was Philpot—Maurice Philpot.”

She turned her shoulder towards me.

“You are entirely mistaken,” she insisted.

I backed away, feeling more or less of a fool, but at the top of the steps I came face to face with the young man who had first approached me on the previous evening. He showed no signs of recognition, but I buttonholed him firmly.

“Look here,” I said, “I want you to come with me and remind the young lady to whom you presented me last night of my existence.”

He looked me sternly in the eyes.

“You must be making some mistake,” he said. “I haven’t the slightest idea who you are.”

Although I suppose I ought to have been prepared for it, this final shock was at the moment the most unrealisable of them all. I stared at him blankly. Then I pointed down the room.

“I sat at that table there at dinner last night,” I told him. “You came up to me and said a few words—obviously taking me for some one else. Anyhow, later on you presented me to the young lady with whom you had been dancing. You’re not going to deny that, of course?”

He shook hie head gently, and began to move away.

“I hope you won’t mind my saying so,” he declared, “but I think you must have dined somewhere exceedingly well last night. I can only repeat that I neither saw you, spoke to you, nor introduced you to anybody.”

Then I lost my temper.

“Be damned to the whole lot of you!” I exclaimed, and made my way up to my rooms.

I dined at my favourite club that night, and in the course of the evening I found myself one of a small group who were discussing the tragic death of my namesake. When the majority had drifted away, to bridge or billiards, and there were only three of us left, an old friend of mine—Angus Haynes—who was in a Government office, spoke for the first time.

“It was a terrible end for any one, of course,” he said, glancing around to be sure that we were alone; “but, on the other hand, I am not sure that it was not for the best.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“No relation of yours, was he?”

“Not the slightest.”

“Well, I am afraid, if the truth were known, Forester was a pretty bad lot. He lost his job as King’s Messenger during the War, and neither of the recognised branches of the Intelligence Department would employ him at all. Since then there have been some very unpleasant rumours. In fact, I don’t think I should be betraying any confidence if I told you that this last time, from the moment of leaving Paris, he was shadowed. He would have been met at Croydon, and although the evidence at present was insufficient to go to the full length of arresting him, I fancy that even that would have happened during the next few weeks.”

“Arresting him for what?” I asked, a little breathlessly.

“As a spy.”

“The word seems to have a sort of pre-War flavour about it,” the third of our little party observed.

Angus Haynes shrugged his shoulders.

“There is still a great deal of information,” he said, “especially in the part of the world from which Forester was just returning, which several countries besides our own are very anxious to get hold of. One of these countries, as I happen to know, has two agents who were waiting in London for the express purpose of meeting Forester.”

“Would it be a great advantage to your department,” I asked, “to have these people pointed out?”

Angus Haynes smiled as he rose to bis feet.

“Not the slightest,” he assured me. “They take the most meticulous care to remain unsuspected, but we know them all perfectly well—and what we didn’t know,” he added, dropping his voice a little as he passed out, “we found by going through Forester’s papers.”

This was all the explanation I ever received of the extraordinary behaviour of the girl in the yellow dancing dress with the chestnut hair, the man with the scarred face, and the waxen-complexioned foreigner who had visited me in my rooms. Not one of the three showed up again at the Milan, or came anywhere near me. I was able to piece the story together a little more completely after a conversation with the reception clerk and headwaiter, both of whom had been begged to point me out to them, and the only problem that remains is, after all, rather an intriguing one.

What am I to do with that ten thousand pounds?