Turnbull leapt up again in a living fury and cried: "What have I
got to do with MacIan? I believe all I ever believed, and
disbelieve all I ever disbelieved. What does all this mean, and
what do you want with me here?"

Then for the first time the other lifted himself from the edge of
the car and faced him.

"I have brought you here," he answered, "to take part in the last
war of the world."

"The last war!" repeated Turnbull, even in his dazed state a
little touchy about such a dogma; "how do you know it will be the
last?"

The man laid himself back in his reposeful attitude, and said:

"It is the last war, because if it does not cure the world for
ever, it will destroy it."

"What do you mean?"

"I only mean what you mean," answered the unknown in a temperate
voice. "What was it that you always meant on those million and
one nights when you walked outside your Ludgate Hill shop and
shook your hand in the air?"

"Still I do not see," said Turnbull, stubbornly.