announced Drishna. "I will do as you wish."
"Very well," said Carrados. "Here is some plain notepaper. You hadbetter write a letter to someone saying that the financialdifficulties in which you are involved make life unbearable."
"But there are no financial difficulties--now."
"That does not matter in the least. It will be put down to anhallucination and taken as showing the state of your mind."
"But what guarantee have we that he will not escape?" whispered Mr.Carlyle.
"He cannot escape," replied Carrados tranquilly. "His identity is tooclear."
"I have no intention of trying to escape," put in Drishna, as hewrote. "You hardly imagine that I have not considered thiseventuality, do you?"
"All the same," murmured the ex-lawyer, "I should like to have a jurybehind me. It is one thing to execute a man morally; it is another todo it almost literally."
"Is that all right?" asked Drishna, passing across the letter he hadwritten.
Carrados smiled at this tribute to his perception.
"Quite excellent," he replied courteously. "There is a train atnine-forty. Will that suit you?"
Drishna nodded and stood up. Mr. Carlyle had a very uneasy feelingthat he ought to do something but could not suggest to himself what.
The next moment he heard his friend heartily thanking the visitor forthe assistance he had been in the matter of the Indo-Scythianinscription, as they walked across the hall together. Then a doorclosed.
"I believe that there is something positively uncanny about Max attimes," murmured the perturbed gentleman to himself.
Four Max Carrados Detective Stories Page 10