Roy turned to Ken as the key clicked in the lock behind them.

‘This is a rum go,’ he said in great astonishment.  ’What’s it mean?  Who is the Johnny with the fat tummy and the bloodshot eyes?  Why was he so quiet with you?  What—?’

‘Steady, old man!’ cut in Ken.  ’One question at a time.  Didn’t you hear his name?’

‘What—­Henkel?  Yes.’

He broke off with a gasp.

’You don’t mean to say he is the sweep that tried to swindle your father out of his coal mine?’

’You’ve hit it, Roy—­hit it in once.  That’s the very same chap, though I never knew before that he was a colonel.  He recognised me as soon as I spotted him.’

‘But what’s his game?’ demanded Roy.  ’I should have thought he would have been only too pleased to get you shot out of hand.  If your father is dead, you’re next heir to the coal.’

‘I’m not very clear what he is after,’ Ken answered in a puzzled voice.  ’But it’s something to do with our property, you may be sure of that.  This much I do know—­that Henkel was awfully in debt when I last saw him.  And I know this, too—­that our friend, old Othman Pacha, who is Bey in that part of the country, would refuse to let the property pass without proper title deeds.’

‘Then it’s clear as mud,’ said Roy quickly.  ’Henkel wants to get the deeds out of you.’

‘That may be it.  But anyhow I’m not of age.  I couldn’t sign anything.’

‘Don’t, anyhow,’ said Roy.  ‘He can’t do worse than shoot us.’

But Ken looked very grave.  Inwardly, he was thinking that, if Henkel did actually mean to make terms, he had no right to sacrifice Roy’s life as well as his own.

At this moment the corporal came in with a platter of food and a pitcher of water.  He planked them down without a word, and went out again.

‘No use starving ourselves,’ said Roy with his usual cheeriness.  ’It’s a case of “let us eat and drink for to-morrow we die."’

His pluck was wonderful, and they set to as well as their manacled hands permitted, on the coarse barley-meal bread and goats’ milk cheese.  They had had nothing since their ‘emergency’ breakfast and they finished the food to the last crumb.

‘That’s better,’ said Roy.  ‘Now I’m ready for anything.’  As he spoke the key turned in the lock, the door opened, and in stumped Henkel.  He closed the door behind him, and stood facing the two young fellows.

‘So we meet again, Kenneth Carrington,’ he said.  Like most German officers, he spoke excellent English, though with a thick, unpleasant accent.

Ken did not answer.  It did not seem worth while.  He stood facing the other, watching him with a slightly contemptuous expression in his clear blue eyes.

‘We meet under different conditions from the last time,’ continued Henkel.  ‘There is now no Othman Pacha to protect you from your just fate.’

Ken shrugged his shoulders.