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Waterloo. Your London and South Western road."

Waterloo?" frowned Tuppence.

Why, yes. Didn't he tell you?"

I haven't seen him either," replied Tuppence impatiently. "Go on about Waterloo.

What were you doing there?"

"He gave me a call. Over the phone. Told me to get a move on, and hustle. Said he

was trailing two crooks."

Oh!" said Tuppence, her eyes opening. "I see. Go on."

I hurried along right away. Beresford was there. He pointed out the crooks. The

big one was mine, the guy you bluffed. Tommy shoved a ticket into my hand and

told me to get aboard the cars. He was going to sleuth the other crook." Julius

paused. "I thought for sure you'd know all this."

"Julius," said Tuppence firmly, "stop walking up and down. It makes me giddy.

Sit down in that armchair, and tell me the whole story with as few fancy turns of

speech as possible."

Mr. Hersheimmer obeyed.

Sure," he said. "Where shall I begin?"

Where you left off. At Waterloo."

Well," began Julius, "I got into one of your dear old-fashioned first-class British

compartments. The train was just off. First thing I knew a guard came along and

informed me mighty politely that I wasn't in a smoking-carriage. I handed him

out half a dollar, and that settled that. I did a bit of prospecting along the corridor

to the next coach. Whittington was there right enough. When I saw the skunk,

with his big sleek fat face, and thought of poor little Jane in his clutches, I felt

real mad that I hadn't got a gun with me. I'd have tickled him up some.

We got to Bournemouth all right. Whittington took a cab and gave the name of

an hotel. I did likewise, and we drove up within three minutes of each other. He

hired a room, and I hired one too. So far it was all plain sailing. He hadn't the

remotest notion that anyone was on to him. Well, he just sat around in the hotel

lounge, reading the papers and so on, till it was time for dinner. He didn't hurry

The Secret Adversary