And during one such discussion, members of Parliament receive a letter from the Four Just Men, urging compliance, and a display of their ability to threaten, by the placement nearby of a device that would be “enough to wreck the House.” Sir Philip believes it “imperative that neither England nor any other country should harbour propagandists who, from the security of these, or other shores, should set Europe ablaze.” The bill was created due to the insecurity of the Spanish succession.Īn indiscretion of the Foreign Secretary in revealing particulars of the case leads to a report detailing sixteen counts of murder, from London to Paris to New York and elsewhere, attributed to the “Four Just Men.” These details soon become the talk of London. Plot to arrest the passage of the aliens extradition bill-”Ī reward is offered for information leading to the “apprehension and conviction of the author of these anonymous letters” to Sir Philip Ramon, the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. Some time later, in the first chapter, London journalists are agog about one particular news item that leads to this revelation: “Cabinet minister in danger. Together, it appears, they plot the demise of an English minister who proposes to introduce a parliamentary bill that would threaten the life of Manuel Garcia, leader of a movement that-presumably-brings hope to the people of the country where they reside. We learn they “kill for justice, which lifts us out of the ruck of professional slayers.” When they “see and unjust man oppressing his fellows…and know that by the laws of man this evildoer may escape punishment-we punish.”
These four men discuss the recent death of “a governor of one of the Southern Provinces”, killed in a bombing, and how explosives are an inexact method to kill. “Leon Gonsalez was one, Poiccart was another, George Manfred was a notable third, and one, Thery, or Saimont, was the fourth.” Of these the narrator notes that Thery “requires no introduction to the student of contemporary history” or “to all students of criminology and physiognomy, Thery must need no introduction.” A most unusual crime novel begins at the Cafe of the Nations on the High Street of Cadiz, where four men sat about one table and talked business.
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