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discreetly back from the lane itself. It may be imagined how I made the best reasonable pace I could, first along Thomas Street, then through the court of the same name, past a block of flats, and so to my destination.
    Now what? Here was a slight problem. Should I knock discreetly on the door? I might not be heard, so then I should be obliged to knock discreetly again, and perhaps again, and again. Would this be more likely to attract attention than one single furious cannonade?
    I was silently debating this difficult point when a voice from behind said quietly in a Cork accent, “Not a sound, mister, if you value your life!”
    Something was pressed into my kidneys.
    “Won’t that gun make quite a noise if it goes off?”
    “Close yer flamin’ beak!” remarked a second voice.
    Someone moved in front of me to unlock the door. The gun prodded in my back.
    “Quick, inside with you.”
    “But that’s exactly why I came here, because I wanted to go inside!”
    Violent hands seized me from the front and heaved me across the threshold, with far more noise than was really necessary. Three of us were crammed into a narrow entrance hall. A door opened and a faint light showed up a staircase immediately to the right.
    “What is it, boys?” asked a third voice from above.
    “We found a feller on the doorstep.”
    “Bring him up.”
    The room into which I was forced seemed somewhat less depressing than might have been expected in the circumstances. Quite incongruously, it was decorated with rather well-done, sporting prints. A grandfather clock ticked away in a corner, a fire burned brightly in the grate and a half-filled glass of whiskey stood on a small table.
    “Stand over there,” said the third voice.
    I turned to face them. My captors were both young. The one with the gun was well dressed, almost dapper, like a civil servant; the other, the muscle man who had dragged me inside, looked rather like a character in an Irish play of fifty years ago: cloth cap, heavy rough trousers and shirt without collar. The third man, whom I took to be Colquhoun himself, was middle-aged, dark, bright-eyed, rather full in build, of medium height
    “Mr. Seamus Colquhoun?”
    “What’s that to you?”
    “During winter storms the waves beat heavily on the western strands.”
    “This is the right moment to buy vegetables on the London market.”
    “Or fish for that matter, if you have a taste for it.”
    Colquhoun showed obvious relief.
    “You can put it away, Liam,” said he, indicating the gun. “This is one of the fellers we’ve been waiting for.”
    For the first time since Parsonage gave me the passwords, I really appreciated their effect; no impostor could have chanced on so improbable a sequence.
    “You’d best take a look outside, lads.”
    When the two rough customers had gone down the stairs again, Colquhoun turned on me in a rage.
    “What a divil of a time to come here. Are you out of your wits?”
    “You didn’t expect me?”
    “No, nor I didn’t anticipate a visit from the Folies-Bergeres either. Were you trying to bring the guards down on us? Or have you been at the brewery, drinking the Guinness family into bankruptcy?”
    “If you weren’t expecting me to come, this is obviously the best possible time; the police won’t be expecting you to have visitors either.”
    “That wouldn’t stop you from being seen. You must have been as conspicuous walking the streets as the Nelson Column itself.”
    “Of course I was conspicuous. I’m not silly enough to slouch about the place. If I’m stopped for any reason, then I’m an innocent who happens to have lost his way. What of it?”
    Colquhoun was obviously badly frightened. I realized that he would go on and on unless I took a brusque line. Every minute lost on this rubbish was increasing the danger of the return to Trinity.
    “This is a well-nigh perfect illustration of what Shakespeare meant by the term ‘unprofitable chat.’ I came here to get money