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CHAPTER I
THE PONY-SKIN COAT
IT came smash on to my hat, slipped off the brim on to my shoulder, then fell to the pavement. I did not know what had happened. I took off my black felt hat and looked at it. There was a great dent in the crown; if it had not been for my hat something would have happened to my head. And my shoulder hurt. Then I looked at the pavement. At my feet was what seemed to be some sort of canvas bag. I picked it up. It was made of coarse brown canvas, perhaps five inches square, and was stuffed full of what felt to be some sort of metal. It was heavy, weighing perhaps a pound. No wonder it had dented my hat made my shoulder smart. Where could the thing have come from?
As I was wondering I became conscious that a man was moving towards me from the other side of the road moving rapidly. I had been vaguely aware as I came striding along that there was someone on the other side of the road. Now he was positively rushing at me was within a foot before I realised that he was making for me. He said something in some guttural foreign tongue I supposed it to be a foreign tongue, although, so far as I knew, I had never heard it spoken before and made a grab at the bag which had struck me. I put it behind my back in my left hand; my right I placed against his chest and pushed.
"What are you up to?" I inquired.
The inquiry was foolish; it was pretty plain what he was up to he was after that bag. The effect on him was curious. He was so slight and apparently weak that though I had used scarcely any force at all he staggered backwards across the pavement into the road. When I looked at him he raised his arms above his head as if to ward off a blow. He struck me as a man who might be recovering from a severe illness. His hairless face was white and drawn, thin to the verge of emaciation. He wore an old, soft black felt hat which was certainly not English. The whole man was un-English
