I sat up in bed. "Dr. McMurtrie," I said bluntly, "what does all this
mean? Who are you, and why are you hiding me from the police?"

He looked down on me, with that curious baffling smile of his. "A
natural and healthy curiosity, Mr. Lyndon," he said drily. "I hope
to satisfy it after you have had something to eat. Till then--" he
shrugged his shoulders--"well, I think you will find the _Daily Mail_
excellent company."

He left the room, closing the door behind him, and for a moment I
lay there with an uncomfortable sense of being tangled up in some
exceedingly mysterious adventure. Even such unusual people as Dr.
McMurtrie and his friends do not as a rule take in and shelter escaped
convicts purely out of kindness of heart. There must be a strong
motive for them to run such a risk in my case, but what that motive
could possibly be was a matter which left me utterly puzzled. So far
as I could remember I had never seen any of the three before in my
life.

I glanced round the room. It was a big airy apartment, with ugly
old-fashioned furniture, and two windows, both of which looked out in
the same direction. The pictures on the wall included an oleograph
portrait of the late King Edward in the costume of an Admiral, a large
engraving of Mr. Landseer's inevitable stag, and several coloured and
illuminated texts. One of the latter struck me as being topical if a
little inaccurate. It ran as follows:

THE WICKED
FLEE
WHEN NO MAN