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Ireland. There seemed but one possible solution to the riddle. I.C.E. must be able to cast metal almost wholly free of the multitude of tiny flaws that greatly weaken the strength of ordinary metals.
    I mention this technicality because it greatly fortified my resolve to dig through to the bottom of the I.C.E. business. At about the same time my morale received a fillip in a rather strange way. My rooms were searched.
    There was nothing very obvious about it. Probably under normal conditions I wouldn’t have noticed the very slight changes in the disposition of my clothes. Over a before-bed cup of tea, I pondered on the situation. Surely it would be incredibly stupid to search my things if I were under any really serious suspicion. All such a search would be likely to achieve would be to put me sharply on my guard. But suppose I was being taken for a slightly overzealous student. Then it might be quite sensible to look me over rather closely, even at the risk of my spotting what was happening. The most sensible conclusion was that Irish Security had some interest in me, but only mildly, at a low level.
    Enormously encouraged by these arguments, I resolved there and then to give them a devil of a time. Starting the following morning I tramped assiduously from museum to picture gallery to museum again. Memory is a little dim, but I recollect places in Kildare Street and Merrion Street. Then I thought up a most satisfactory form of torture for anyone who might be deputed to follow me around. I visited the homes and haunts of old Dublin characters. There were the obvious literary men: Shaw, Joyce, Wilde, Le Fanu, Synge. But I cut a far wider swath than this. My inquiries enfolded such diverse individuals as Sam Lover and the famous Buck Whaley. My high spot was William Conyngham Plunket at No. 18, St. Stephen’s Green. This crazy business gave me much quiet satisfaction.
    By now the first week was over, and I duly reported without incident to the police. My departure for the mountains to the south was delayed however by the Trinity lads, who press-ganged me into a game of cricket played against a team that fared quite happily under the name of the Dun Laoghaire Wanderers. We won our game with quite a flourish, not let it be said due to my efforts. I had scored a confident 5 when my wicket was totally disintegrated by a beefy individual. The same fellow cracked a tremendous drive at me later in the afternoon, to which I was ill-advised enough to put a hand.
    In spite of this inauspicious preparation, the evening turned out exceedingly well. We dined with our opponents, then drank beer and sang such songs as cricketers will. Our team returned by car to Dublin at close to midnight—the match had been “away.” The car in which I happened to be traveling stopped at the northern corner of Merrion Square. Two of our chaps got out, and so on impulse did I, assuring the driver that it was no distance at all to Trinity.
    I don’t know whether it was the beer, or the fluke catch I had held—my hand still seemed red hot—but suddenly it appeared obvious that the time and hour for Marrowbone Lane had arrived at last. When would I be more likely to catch Seamus Colquhoun at home than at midnight on the Sabbath?
    The wave of new building had advanced only as far as the area around St. Patrick’s. So perforce I had to quit the broad, bright avenues when I reached the old High Street. From now on I walked through the rabbit warren of the Old City.
    Very soon, I thought, all this will be gone. Soon Marrowbone Lane will be gone. And what will Seamus Colquhoun do then, poor thing? Soon he and all his kind will be smoked out into the open. Will they run their affairs from an office in one of the bright new buildings? Will they cease selling birdseed or whatever it is they pretend to do at present?
    I had already reconnoitered Marrowbone Lane during my tours of the town, so I knew exactly where to find my man, in, a little alleyway set