Odd that he couldn’t remember the man’s name.

He took the book down from the shelf and turned the pages—even now they affected him uncomfortably. Yes, here it was, William . . . William . . . he would have to look back to find the surname. William Stainsforth.

His own initials.

Walter did not think the coincidence meant anything but it coloured his mind and weakened its resistance to his obsession. So uneasy was he that when the next postcard came it came as a relief.

‘I am quite close now,’ he read, and involuntarily he turned the postcard over. The glorious central tower of Gloucester Cathedral met his eye. He stared at it as if it could tell him something, then with an effort went on reading. ‘My movements, as you may have guessed, are not quite under my control, but all being well I look forward to seeing you some time this week-end. Then we can really come to grips. I wonder if you’ll recognize me! It won’t be the first time you have given me hospitality. My hand feels a bit cold to-night, but my handshake will be just as hearty. As always, W.S.’

‘P.S. Does Gloucester remind you of anything? Gloucester gaol?’

Walter took the postcard straight to the police station, and asked if he could have police protection over the week-end. The officer in charge smiled at him and said he was quite sure it was a hoax; but he would tell someone to keep an eye on the premises.

‘You still have no idea who it could be?’ he asked.

Walter shook his head.

It was Tuesday; Walter Streeter had plenty of time to think about the week-end. At first he felt he would not be able to live through the interval, but strange to say his confidence increased instead of waning. He set himself to work as though he could work, and presently he found he could—differently from before, and, he thought, better. It was as though the nervous strain he had been living under had, like an acid, dissolved a layer of non-conductive thought that came between him and his subject: he was nearer to it now, and his characters, instead of obeying woodenly his stage directions, responded wholeheartedly and with all their beings to the tests he put them to. So passed the days, and the dawn of Friday seemed like any other day until something jerked him out of his self-induced trance and suddenly he asked himself, ‘When does a week-end begin?’

A long week-end begins on Friday. At that his panic returned. He went to the street door and looked out. It was a suburban, unfrequented street of detached Regency houses like his own. They had tall square gate-posts, some crowned with semi-circular iron brackets holding lanterns. Most of these were out of repair: only two or three were ever lit. A car went slowly down the street; some people crossed it: everything was normal.

Several times that day he went to look and saw nothing unusual, and when Saturday came, bringing no postcard, his panic had almost subsided. He nearly rang up the police station to tell them not to bother to send anyone after all.

They were as good as their word: they did send someone. Between tea and dinner, the time when week-end guests most commonly arrive, Walter went to the door and there, between two unlit gate-posts, he saw a policeman standing—the first policeman he had ever seen in Charlotte Street. At the sight, and at the relief it brought him, he realized how anxious he had been. Now he felt safer than he had ever felt in his life, and also a little ashamed at having given extra trouble to a hard-worked body of men. Should he go and speak to his unknown guardian, offer him a cup of tea or a drink? It would be nice to hear him laugh at Walter’s fancies. But no—somehow he felt his security the greater when its source was impersonal and anonymous. ‘P.C. Smith’ was somehow less impressive than ‘police protection’.

Several times from an upper window (he didn’t like to open the door and stare) he made sure that his guardian was still there; and once, for added proof, he asked his housekeeper to verify the strange phenomenon. Disappointingly, she came back saying she had seen no policeman; but she was not very good at seeing things, and when Walter went a few minutes later he saw him plain enough. The man must walk about, of course, perhaps he had been taking a stroll when Mrs. Kendal looked.

It was contrary to his routine to work after dinner but to-night he did, he felt so much in the vein. Indeed, a sort of exaltation possessed him; the words ran off his pen; it would be foolish to check the creative impulse for the sake of a little extra sleep. On, on. They were right who said the small hours were the time to work. When his housekeeper came in to say good night he scarcely raised his eyes.

In the warm, snug little room the silence purred around him like a kettle. He did not even hear the door bell till it had been ringing for some time.

A visitor at this hour?

His knees trembling, he went to the door, scarcely knowing what he expected to find; so what was his relief on opening it, to see the doorway filled by the tall figure of a policeman. Without waiting for the man to speak—

‘Come in, come in, my dear fellow,’ he exclaimed. He held his hand out, but the policeman did not take it. ‘You must have been very cold standing out there. I didn’t know that it was snowing, though,’ he added, seeing the snowflakes on the policeman’s cape and helmet. ‘Come in and warm yourself.’

‘Thanks,’ said the policeman. ‘I don’t mind if I do.’

Walter knew enough of the phrases used by men of the policeman’s stamp not to take this for a grudging acceptance. ‘This way,’ he prattled on. ‘I was writing in my study. By Jove, it is cold, I’ll turn the gas on more. Now won’t you take your traps off, and make yourself at home?’

‘I can’t stay long,’ the policeman said, ‘I’ve got a job to do, as you know.’

‘Oh yes,’ said Walter, ‘such a silly job, a sinecure.’ He stopped, wondering if the policeman would know what a sinecure was. ‘I suppose you know what it’s about—the postcards?’

The policeman nodded.

‘But nothing can happen to me as long as you are here,’ said Walter. ‘I shall be as safe . . . as safe as houses. Stay as long as you can, and have a drink.’

‘I never drink on duty,’ said the policeman. Still in his cape and helmet, he looked round. ‘So this is where you work,’ he said.

‘Yes, I was writing when you rang.’

‘Some poor devil’s for it, I expect,’ the policeman said.

‘Oh, why?’ Walter was hurt by his unfriendly tone, and noticed how hard his gooseberry eyes were.

‘I’ll tell you in a minute,’ said the policeman, and then the telephone bell rang. Walter excused himself and hurried from the room.

‘This is the police station,’ said a voice. ‘Is that Mr. Streeter?’

Walter said it was.

‘Well, Mr. Streeter, how is everything at your place? All right, I hope? I’ll tell you why I ask. I’m sorry to say we quite forgot about that little job we were going to do for you. Bad co-ordination, I’m afraid.’

‘But,’ said Walter, ‘you did send someone.’

‘No, Mr. Streeter, I’m afraid we didn’t.’

‘But there’s a policeman here, here in this very house.’

There was a pause, then his interlocutor said, in a less casual voice:

‘He can’t be one of our chaps. Did you see his number by any chance?’

‘No.’

A longer pause and then the voice said:

‘Would you like us to send somebody now?’

‘Yes, p . . . please.’

‘All right then, we’ll be with you in a jiffy.’

Walter put back the receiver. What now? he asked himself. Should he barricade the door? Should he run out into the street? Should he try to rouse his housekeeper? A policeman of any sort was a formidable proposition, but a rogue policeman! How long would it take the real police to come? A jiffy, they had said. What was a jiffy in terms of minutes? While he was debating the door opened and his guest came in.