The Quest of Julian Day Read Online Free

one which enabled me to walk down Bond Street without the slightest chance of recognition.
    I took a place next to O’Kieff at the counter and overheard him making arrangements to sail in the S.S. ‘Hampshire’ from Marseilles to Egypt. My thoughts were chaotic. Killing him was one thing and, at that time, I was still not quite prepared to risk my own neck by such a desperate measure, but it did seem that this was a heaven-sent chance to keep him under observation for a spell without arousing his supicions and, perhaps, to find out enough about his activities to get him a long term of imprisonment. It did not matter in the least to me if I went to Egypt or Peru, and before he had finished fixing up his cabin I too had decided to book a passage in the S.S. ‘Hampshire’.
    Directly he had gone I made inquiries and learnt that the ship was sailing from Liverpool two days later. I am a good sailor and like the sea, even in rough weather, so I thought it would be a good idea to sail in her from England. I should then be well dug-in on board before O’Kieff joined her seven days later at Marseilles. The cabins on either side of his were already booked but I managed to get one two doors aft of his, on the promenade deck. Next night I was on the train to Liverpool feeling a changed man already now that after allthose dreary months I had once again some sort of motive for existing.
    There was a blanket of mist when we nosed our way out of the Mersey the following afternoon and nearly everybody went straight down to their cabins after dinner that first night out. But the following day clear, winter sunshine and only a moderate sea brought the passengers out on deck with their rugs for the run down the Irish Channel.
    Those passengers were few enough, as people returning East from leave, who form the bulk of the travellers on such liners, naturally prefer to pay the extra cost of the overland journey to Marseilles in order to get the few extra days in England. It is easy enough to lose oneself on a crowd but the very fact of our small numbers made it difficult for me to avoid the others and, as it happened, my deck-chair was put next to that of an, elderly, grey-bearded man who soon displayed a lively interest in the book I was reading.
    He shuffled for a little with a couple of weighty tomes that were lying in his own lap and then leant over. ‘Excuse me, but isn’t that “The Thousand and One Nights”?’ he asked.
    â€˜Yes,’ I replied. ‘I find the original version most entertaining.’
    â€˜Of course,’ he chuckled. ‘It’s a grand book. But I commented on it because I see you’re reading it in Arabic—rather an unusual accomplishment for a young man. Perhaps you’re in one of the Services?’
    â€˜No. I was in Egypt for some months last winter and amused myself part of the time by learning Arabic; as I’m on my way back there now I thought a little amusing reading was the pleasantest way to polish it up again.’
    â€˜Were you engaged at one of the “digs”, by any chance?’
    â€˜No. I’m afraid I’m an idle dog,’ I confessed. ‘I don’t do any job at all.’
    â€˜I see,’ he said with a rather disapproving look. ‘Well, let me introduce myself. My name is Walter Shane. If you’re interested in ancient civilisations you may perhaps have heard of me.’
    â€˜Of course.’ I looked up with quick interest. ‘Who hasn’t heard of Sir Walter Shane, the famous Egyptologist? It’s a great pleasure to meet you, sir.’
    â€˜That’s nice of you,’ he smiled benignly at me over his thick spectacles. ‘And what may your name be?’
    â€˜Julian Day,’ I told him; and, incidentally, the one concession the Foreign Office had made on my leaving the Service was to grant me a passport in the pseudonym I had taken, to save me unnecessary complications on my