Let me begin by explaining that I have set myself the task of telling this story for two sufficient reasons. The first, because I consider that it presents as good a warning to a young fellow as he could anywhere find, against allowing himself to be deluded by a false hatred into committing a sin that at any other time he would consider in every way contemptible and cowardly; and the second because i think it just possible that it may serve to set others on their guard, against one of the most unscrupulous men, if man he is -- of which I begin to have my doubts -- who ever wore shoe leather.

Author Biography

Guy Newell Boothby (1867 - 1905) was a prolific Australian novelist and writer, noted for sensational fiction in variety magazines around the end of the nineteenth century. He lived mainly in England. He is best known for such works as the Dr Nikola series, about an occultist criminal mastermind who is a Victorian forerunner to Fu Manchu, and Pharos, the Egyptian, a tale of Gothic Egypt, mummies' curses and supernatural revenge. Rudyard Kipling was his friend and mentor and his books were remembered with affection by George Orwell.