“He was a man rather above medium height.  I should say about my own build; dark, going gray.  He had a neat moustache and a short beard, and the look of a man who had travelled a lot.  His skin was very tanned, almost as deeply as yours, Mr. Harley.  Not at all the sort of chap that goes in there as a rule.  After a while he made an extraordinary proposal.  At first I thought he was joking, then when I grasped the idea that he was serious I concluded he was mad.  He asked me how much a year I earned, and I told him Peters and Peters paid me 150 pounds.  He said:  ’I’ll give you a year’s salary to knock a man’s hat off!’”

As Bampton spoke the words he glanced at us with twinkling eyes, but although for my own part I was merely amused, Harley’s expression had grown very stern.

“Of course, I laughed,” continued Bampton, “but when the man drew out a fat wallet and counted ten five-pound notes on the table I began to think seriously about his proposal.  Even supposing he was cracked, it was absolutely money for nothing.

“‘Of course,’ he said, ’you’ll lose your job and you may be arrested, but you’ll say that you had been out with a few friends and were a little excited, also that you never could stand white hats.  Stick to that story and the balance of a hundred pounds will reach you on the following morning.’

“I asked him for further particulars, and I asked him why he had picked me for the job.  He replied that he had been looking for some time for the right man; a man who was strong enough physically to accomplish the thing, and someone”—­Bampton’s eyes twinkled again—­“with a dash of the devil in him, but at the same time a man who could be relied upon to stick to his guns and not to give the game away.

“You asked me to be brief, and I’ll try to be.  The man in the white hat was described to me, and the exact time and place of the meeting.  I just had to grab his white hat, smash it, and face the music.  I agreed.  I don’t deny that I had a couple of stiff drinks before I set out, but the memory of that fifty pounds locked up here in my room and the further hundred promised, bucked me up wonderfully.  It was impossible to mistake my man; I could see him coming toward me as I waited just outside a sort of little restaurant called the Cafe Dame.  As arranged, I bumped into him, grabbed his hat and jumped on it.”

He paused, raising his hand to his head reminiscently.

“My man was a bit of a scrapper,” he continued, “and he played hell.  I’ve never heard such language in my life, and the way he laid about me with his cane is something I am not likely to forget in a hurry.  A crowd gathered, naturally, and (also naturally) I was ‘pinched.’  That didn’t matter much.  I got off lightly; and although I’ve been dismissed by Peters and Peters, twenty crisp fivers are locked in my trunk there, with the ten which I received in the City.”

Harley checked him, and: