"I thought I recognised the mark," the other replied. "A most outrageous mistake! I am very glad that it came under my notice. You are absolutely free from the censor, Sir Alfred.""I thought so myself," Sir Alfred remarked. "However, I suppose an occasional mistake can scarcely be wondered at. Don't worry them about it, please. My Dutch letters are simply records of the balances at my different banks, mere financial details.""All the same," Mr. Gordon Jones insisted, "there has been gross neglect somewhere. I will see that it is inquired into to-morrow morning.""Very kind of you," Sir Alfred declared. "As you know, I have been able to give you fragments of information now and then which would cease at once, of course, if my correspondence as a whole were subject to censorship. An occasional mistake like this is nothing."There was another interruption. This time a message had come from the house--Ministers would be required within the next twenty minutes. The little party--it was a men's dinner-party only--broke up. Very soon Sir Alfred and his nephew were left alone. Sir Alfred's fingers shook for a moment as he tore open the seal of his letter. He glanced through the few lines it contained and breathed a sigh of relief.
"Come this way, Ronnie," he invited.
They left the dining-room and, eschewing the inviting luxuries of the billiard room and library, passed into a small room behind, plainly furnished as a business man's study. Granet seized his uncle by the arm.
"It's coded, I suppose?"
Sir Alfred nodded.
"It's coded, Ronnie, and between you and me I don't believe they'll be able to read it, but whose doing is that?" he added, pointing with his finger to the envelope.
"It must have been a mistake," Granet muttered.
Sir Alfred glanced toward the closed door. Without a doubt they were alone.
"I don't know," he said. "Mistakes of this sort don't often occur. As ILooked around to-night, Ronnie, I thought--I couldn't help thinking that our position was somewhat wonderful. Does it mean that this is the first breath of suspicion, I wonder? Was it really only my fancy, or did I hear to-night the first mutterings of the storm?""No one can possibly suspect," Granet declared, "no one who could have influence enough to override your immunity from censorship. It must have been an accident.""I wonder!" Sir Alfred muttered.
"Can't you decode it?" Granet asked eagerly. "There may be news."Sir Alfred re-entered the larger library and was absent for several minutes.
When he returned, the message was written out in lead pencil:--Leave London June 4th. Have flares midnight Buckingham Palace, St. Paul's steps, gardens in front of Savoy. Your last report received.
Granet glanced eagerly back at the original message. It consisted of a few perfectly harmless sentences concerning various rates of exchange. He gave it to his uncle with a smile.
"I shouldn't worry about that, sir," he advised.
"It isn't the thing itself I worry about," Sir Alfred said thoughtfully,--"they'll never decode that message. It's the something that lies behind it. It's the pointing finger, Ronnie. I thought we'd last it out, at any rate. Things look different now. You're serious, I suppose? You don't want to go to America?""I don't," Granet replied grimly. "That's all finished, for the present. You know very well what it is I do want."Sir Alfred frowned.
"There are plenty of wild enterprises afoot," he admitted, "but I don't know, after all, that I wish you particularly to be mixed up in them.""I can't hang about here much longer," his nephew grumbled. "I get the fever in my blood to be doing something. I had a try this morning."His uncle looked at him for a moment.
"This morning," he repeated. "Well?"
Granet thrust his hands into his trousers pockets. There was a frown upon his fine forehead.
"It's that man I told you about," he said bitterly,--"the man I hate. He's nobody of any account but he always seems to be mixed up in any little trouble I find myself in. I got out of that affair down at Market Burnham without the least trouble, and then, as you know, the War Office sent him down, of all the people on earth, to hold an inquiry. Sometimes I think that he suspects me.
I met him at a critical moment on the battlefield near Niemen. I always believed that he heard me speaking German--it was just after I had come back across the lines. The other day--well, I told you about that. Isabel Worth saved me or I don't know where I should have been. I think I shall kill that man!""What did you say his name was?" Sir Alfred asked, with sudden eagerness.
"Thomson."
There was a moment's silence. Sir Alfred's expression was curiously tense. He leaned across the table towards his nephew.
"Thomson?" he repeated. "My God! I knew there was something I meant to tell you. Don't you know, Ronnie?--but of course you don't. You're sure it's Thomson--Surgeon-Major Thomson?""That's the man."
"He is the man with the new post," Sir Alfred declared hoarsely. "He is the head of the whole Military Intelligence Department! They've set him up at the War Office. They've practically given him unlimited powers.""Why, I thought he was inspector of Field Hospitals!" Granet gasped.
"A blind!" his uncle groaned. "He is nothing of the sort. He's Kitchener's own man, and this," he added, looking at the letter, "must be his work!"
