Balfour explains how he was betrayed by "the Beggarman" and reveals that this was the nom de guerre of an Edinburgh doctor named "Richard Hannay", an alias of Tom Lowe. Clever writers used the name of the famous lead character of the James Buchan spy novels, the best known of which is "The 39 Steps", the most recent adaptation done by the BBC and starred Rupert Penry-Jones as Hannay.