The Council of Justice | Page 6

country it is permissible to hold opinions and propagate doctrines,
however objectionable they be--I am here to arrest two men who have
broken the laws of this country. Two persons who are part of the
organization known as the Four Just Men.'
All the time he was speaking his eyes searched the faces before him.
He knew that one-half of the audience could not understand him and
that the hum of talk that arose as he finished was his speech in course
of translation.
The faces he sought he could not discern. To be exact, he hoped that his
scrutiny would induce two men, of whose identity he was ignorant, to
betray themselves.
There are little events, unimportant in themselves, which occasionally
lead to tremendous issues. A skidding motor-bus that crashed into a
private car in Piccadilly had led to the discovery that there were three
vociferous foreign gentlemen imprisoned in the overturned vehicle. It
led to the further discovery that the chauffeur had disappeared in the
confusion of the collision. In the darkness, comparing notes, the three
prisoners had arrived at a conclusion--to wit, that their abduction was a
sequel to a mysterious letter each had received, which bore the
signature 'The Four Just Men'.
So in the panic occasioned by the accident, they were sufficiently
indiscreet to curse the Four Just Men by name, and, the Four Just Men
being a sore topic with the police, they were questioned further, and the
end of it was that Superintendent Falmouth motored eastward in great
haste and was met in Middlesex Street by a reserve of police specially
summoned.
He was at the same disadvantage he had always been--the Four Just
Men were to him names only, symbols of a swift remorseless force that

struck surely and to the minute--and nothing more.
Two or three of the leaders of the Red Hundred had singled themselves
out and drew closer to the platform.
'We are not aware,' said Francois, the Frenchman, speaking for his
companions in faultless English, 'we are not aware of the identity of the
men you seek, but on the understanding that they are not brethren of
our Society, and moreover'--he was at a loss for words to put the
fantastic situation--'and moreover since they have threatened
us--threatened us,' he repeated in bewilderment, 'we will afford you
every assistance.'
The detective jumped at the opportunity.
'Good!' he said and formed a rapid plan.
The two men could not have escaped from the hall. There was a little
door near the platform, he had seen that--as the two men he sought had
seen it. Escape seemed possible through there; they had thought so, too.
But Falmouth knew that the outer door leading from the little vestibule
was guarded by two policemen. This was the sum of the discovery
made also by the two men he sought. He spoke rapidly to Francois.
'I want every person in the hall to be vouched for,' he said quickly.
'Somebody must identify every man, and the identifier must himself be
identified.'
The arrangements were made with lightning-like rapidity. From the
platform in French, German and Yiddish, the leaders of the Red
Hundred explained the plan. Then the police formed a line, and one by
one the people came forward, and shyly, suspiciously or
self-consciously, according to their several natures, they passed the
police line.
'That is Simon Czech of Buda-Pest.'
'Who identifies him?'

'I.'--a dozen voices.
'Pass.'
'This is Michael Ranekov of Odessa.'
'Who identifies him?'
'I,' said a burly man, speaking in German.
'And you?'
There was a little titter, for Michael is the best-known man in the Order.
Some there were who, having passed the line, waited to identify their
kinsfolk and fellow-countrymen.
'It seems much simpler than I could have imagined.'
It was the tall man with the trim beard, who spoke in a guttural tone
which was neither German nor Yiddish. He was watching with amused
interest the examination.
'Separating the lambs from the goats with a vengeance,' he said with a
faint smile, and his taciturn companion nodded. Then he asked--
'Do you think any of these people will recognize you as the man who
fired?'
The tall man shook his head decisively.
'Their eyes were on the police--and besides I am too quick a shot.
Nobody saw me unless--'
'The Woman of Gratz?' asked the other, without showing the slightest
concern.
'The Woman of Gratz,' said George Manfred.
They formed part of a struggling line that moved slowly toward the

police barrier.
'I fear,' said Manfred, 'that we shall be forced to make our escape in a
perfectly obvious way--the bull-at-the-gate method is one that I object
to on principle, and it is one that I have never been obliged to employ.'
They were speaking all the time in the