Norgate made no reply. He felt that his companion was watching him.
“It is something,” he remarked, “to find charming young ladies in a strange place to dine with one.”
Selingman smiled broadly.
“If we travelled together often, my young friend,” he said, “you would discover that I have friends everywhere. If I have nothing else to do, I go out and make a friend. Then, when I revisit that place, it loses its coldness. There is some one there to welcome me, some one who is glad to see me again. Look steadily in that direction, a few points to the left of the bows. In two hours’ time you will see the lights of your country. I have friends there, too, who will welcome me. Meantime, I go below to sleep. You have a cabin?”
Norgate shook his head.
“I shall doze on deck for a little time,” he said. “It is too wonderful a night to go below.”
“It is well for me that it is calm,” Selingman acknowledged. “I do not love the sea. Shall we part for a little time? If we meet not at Dover, then in London, my young friend. London is the greatest city in the world, but it is the smallest place in Europe. One cannot move in the places one knows of without meeting one’s friends.”
“Until we meet in London, then,” Norgate observed, as he settled himself down in his chair.
CHAPTER VI
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Norgate spent an utterly fruitless morning on the day after his arrival in London. After a lengthy but entirely unsatisfactory visit to the Foreign Office, he presented himself soon after midday at Scotland Yard.
“I should like,” he announced, “to see the Chief Commissioner of the Police.”
The official to whom he addressed his enquiry eyed him tolerantly.
“Have you, by any chance, an appointment?” he asked.
“None,” Norgate admitted. “I only arrived from the Continent this morning.”
The policeman shook his head slowly.
“It is quite impossible, sir,” he said, “to see Sir Philip without an appointment. Your best course would be to write and state your business, and his secretary will then fix a time for you to call.”
“Very much obliged to you, I’m sure,” Norgate replied. “However, my business is urgent, and if I can’t see Sir Philip Morse, I will see some one else in authority.”
Norgate was regaled with a copy of The Times and a seat in a barely-furnished waiting-room. In about twenty minutes he was told that a Mr. Tyritt would see him, and was promptly shown into the presence of that gentleman. Mr. Tyritt was a burly and black-bearded person of something more than middle-age. He glanced down at Norgate’s card in a somewhat puzzled manner and motioned him to a seat.
“What can I do for you, sir?” he enquired. “Sir Philip is very much engaged for the next few days, but perhaps you can tell me your business?”
“I have just arrived from Berlin,” Norgate explained. “Would you care to possess a complete list of German spies in this country?”
Mr. Tyritt’s face was not one capable of showing the most profound emotion. Nevertheless, he seemed a little taken aback.
“A list of German spies?” he repeated. “Dear me, that sounds very interesting!”
He took up Norgate’s card and glanced at it. The action was, in its way, significant.
“You probably don’t know who I am,” Norgate continued. “I have been in the Diplomatic Service for eight years. Until a few days ago, I was attached to the Embassy in Berlin.”
Mr. Tyritt was somewhat impressed by the statement.
“Have you any objection to telling me how you became possessed of this information?”
“None whatever,” was the prompt reply. “You shall hear the whole story.”
Norgate told him, as briefly as possible, of his meeting with Selingman, their conversation, and the subsequent happenings, including the interview which he had overheard on the golf links at Knocke. When he had finished, there was a brief silence.
“Sounds rather like a page out of a novel, doesn’t it, Mr. Norgate?” the police official remarked at last.
“It may,” Norgate assented drily. “I can’t help what it sounds like. It happens to be the exact truth.”
“I do not for a moment doubt it,” the other declared politely. “I believe, indeed, that there are a large number of Germans working in this country who are continually collecting and forwarding to Berlin commercial and political reports. Speaking on behalf of my department, however, Mr. Norgate,” he went on, “this is briefly our position. In the neighbourhood of our naval bases, our dockyards, our military aeroplane sheds, and in other directions which I need not specify, we keep the most scrupulous and exacting watch. We even, as of course you are aware, employ decoy spies ourselves, who work in conjunction with our friends at Whitehall. Our system is a rigorous one and our supervision of it unceasing. But—and this is a big ‘but’, Mr. Norgate—in other directions—so far as regards the country generally, that is to say—we do not take the subject of German spies seriously. I may almost say that we have no anxiety concerning their capacity for mischief.”
“Those are the views of your department?” Norgate asked.
“So far as I may be said to represent it, they are,” Mr. Tyritt assented. “I will venture to say that there are many thousands of letters a year which leave this country, addressed to Germany, purporting to contain information of the most important nature, which might just as well be published in the newspapers. We ought to know, because at different times we have opened a good many of them.”
“Forgive me if I press this point,” Norgate begged. “Do you consider that because a vast amount of useless information is naturally sent, that fact lessens the danger as a whole? If only one letter in a thousand contains vital information, isn’t that sufficient to raise the subject to a more serious level?”
Mr. Tyritt crossed his legs. His tone still indicated the slight tolerance of the man convinced beforehand of the soundness of his position.
“For the last twelve years,” he announced,—“ever since I came into office, in fact,—this bogey of German spies has been costing the nation something like fifty thousand a year. It is only lately that we have come to take that broader view of the situation which I am endeavouring to—to—may I say enunciate? Germans over in this country, especially those in comparatively menial positions, such as barbers and waiters, are necessary to us industrially. So long as they earn their living reputably, conform to our laws, and pay our taxes, they are welcome here. We do not wish to unnecessarily disturb them. We wish instead to offer them the full protection of the country in which they have chosen to do productive work.”
“Very interesting,” Norgate remarked. “I have heard this point of view before. Once I thought it common sense. To-day I think it academic piffle. If we leave the Germans engaged in the inland towns alone for a moment, do you realise, I wonder, that there isn’t any seaport in England that hasn’t its sprinkling of Germans engaged in the occupations of which you speak?”
“And in a general way,” Mr. Tyritt assented, smiling, “they are perfectly welcome to write home to their friends and relations each week and tell them everything they see happening about them, everything they know about us.”
Norgate rose reluctantly to his feet.
“I won’t trouble you any longer,” he decided. “I presume that if I make a few investigations on my own account, and bring you absolute proof that any one of these people whose names are upon my list are in traitorous communication with Germany, you will view the matter differently?”
“Without a doubt,” Mr. Tyritt promised. “Is that your list? Will you allow me to glance through it?”
“I brought it here to leave in your hands,” Norgate replied, passing it over. “Your attitude, however, seems to render that course useless.”
Mr. Tyritt adjusted his eyeglasses and glanced benevolently at the document. A sharp ejaculation broke from his lips. As his eyes wandered downwards, his first expressi
on of incredulity gave way to one of suppressed amusement.
“Why, Mr. Norgate,” he exclaimed, as he laid it down, “do you mean to seriously accuse these people of being engaged in any sort of league against us?”
“Most certainly I do,” Norgate insisted.
“But the thing is ridiculous!” Mr. Tyritt declared. “There are names here of princes, of bankers, of society women, many of them wholly and entirely English, some of them household names. You expect me to believe that these people are all linked together in what amounts to a conspiracy to further the cause of Germany at the expense of the country in which they live, to which they belong?”
Norgate picked up his hat.
“I expect you to believe nothing, Mr. Tyritt,” he said drily. “Sorry I troubled you.”
“Not at all,” Mr. Tyritt protested, the slight irritation passing from his manner. “Such a visit as yours is an agreeable break in my routine work. I feel as though I might be a character in a great modern romance. The names of your amateur criminals are still tingling in my memory.”
Norgate turned back from the door.
“Remember them, if you can, Mr. Tyritt,” he advised, “You may have cause to, some day.”
CHAPTER VII
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Norgate sat, the following afternoon, upon the leather- stuffed fender of a fashionable mixed bridge club in the neighbourhood of Berkeley Square, exchanging greetings with such of the members as were disposed to find time for social amenities. A smartly-dressed woman of dark complexion and slightly foreign appearance, who had just cut out of a rubber, came over and seated herself by his side. She took a cigarette from her case and accepted a match from Norgate.
“So you are really back again!” she murmured. “It scarcely seems possible.”
“I am just beginning to realise it myself,” he replied. “You haven’t altered, Bertha.”
“My dear man,” she protested, “you did not expect me to age in a month, did you? It can scarcely be more than that since you left for Berlin. Are you not back again sooner than you expected?”
Norgate nodded.
“Very much sooner,” he admitted. “I came in for some unexpected leave, which I haven’t the slightest intention of spending abroad, so here I am.”
“Not, apparently, in love with Berlin,” the lady, whose name was Mrs. Paston Benedek, remarked.
Norgate’s air of complete candour was very well assumed.
“I shall never be a success as a diplomatist,” he confessed. “When I dislike a place or a person, every one knows it. I hated Berlin. I hate the thought of going back again.”
The woman by his side smiled enigmatically.
“Perhaps,” she murmured, “you may get an exchange.”
“Perhaps,” Norgate assented. “Meanwhile, even a month away from London seems to have brought a fresh set of people here. Who is the tall, thin young man with the sunburnt face? He seems familiar, somehow, but I can’t place him.”
“He is a sailor,” she told him. “Captain Baring his name is.”
“Friend of yours?”
She looked at him sidewise.
“Why do you ask?”
“Jealousy,” Norgate sighed, “makes one observant. You were lunching with him in the Carlton Grill. You came in with him to the club this afternoon.”
“Sherlock Holmes!” she murmured. “There are other men in the club with whom I lunch—even dine.”
Norgate glanced across the room. Baring was playing bridge at a table close at hand, but his attention seemed to be abstracted. He looked often towards where Mrs. Benedek sat. There was a restlessness about his manner scarcely in keeping with the rest of his appearance.
“One misses a great deal,” Norgate regretted, “through being only an occasional visitor here.”
“As, for instance?”
“The privilege of being one of those fortunate few.”
She laughed at him. Her eyes were full of challenge. She leaned a little closer and whispered in his ear: “There is still a vacant place.”
“For to-night or to-morrow?” he asked eagerly.
“For to-morrow,” she replied. “You may telephone—3702 Mayfair—at ten o’clock.”
He scribbled down the number. Then he put his pocket-book away with a sigh.
“I’m afraid you are treating that poor sailor-man badly,” he declared.
“Sometimes,” she confided, “he bores me. He is so very much in earnest. Tell me about Berlin and your work there?”
“I didn’t take to Germany,” Norgate confessed, “and Germany didn’t take to me. Between ourselves—I shouldn’t like another soul in the club to know it—I think it is very doubtful if I go back there.”
“That little contretemps with the Prince,” she murmured under her breath.
He stiffened at once.
“But how do you know of it?”
She bit her lip. For a moment a frown of annoyance clouded her face. She had said more than she intended.
“I have correspondents in Berlin,” she explained. “They tell me of everything. I have a friend, in fact, who was in the restaurant that night.”
“What a coincidence!” he exclaimed.
She nodded and selected a fresh cigarette.
“Isn’t it! But that table is up. I promised to cut in there. Captain Baring likes me to play at the same table, and he is here for such a short time that one tries to be kind. It is indeed kindness,” she added, taking up her gold purse and belongings, “for he plays so badly.”
She moved towards the table. It happened to be Baring who cut out, and he and Norgate drifted together. They exchanged a few remarks.
“I met you at Marseilles once,” Norgate reminded him. “You were with the Mediterranean Squadron, commanding the Leicester, I believe.”
“Thought I’d seen you somewhere before,” was the prompt acknowledgment. “You’re in the Diplomatic Service, aren’t you?”
Norgate admitted the fact and suggested a drink. The two men settled down to exchange confidences over a whisky and soda. Baring looked around him with some disapprobation.
“I can’t really stick this place,” he asserted. “If it weren’t for—for some of the people here, I’d never come inside the doors. It’s a rotten way of spending one’s time. You play, I suppose?”
“Oh, yes, I play,” Norgate admitted, “but I rather agree with you. How wonderfully well Mrs. Benedek is looking, isn’t she!”
Baring withdrew his admiring eyes from her vicinity.
“Prettiest and smartest woman in London,” he declared.
“By-the-by, is she English?” Norgate asked.
“A mixture of French, Italian, and German, I believe,” Baring replied. “Her husband is Benedek the painter, you know.”
“I’ve heard of him,” Norgate assented. “What are you doing now?”
“I’ve had a job up in town for a week or so, at the Admiralty,” Baring explained. “We are examining the plans of a new—but you wouldn’t be interested in that.”
“I’m interested in anything naval,” Norgate assured him.
“In any case, it isn’t my job to talk about it,” Baring continued apologetically. “We’ve just got a lot of fresh regulations out. Any one would think we were going to war to-morrow.”
“I suppose war isn’t such an impossible event,” Norgate remarked. “They all say that the Germans are dying to have a go at you fellows.”
Baring grinned.
“They wouldn’t have a dog’s chance,” he declared. “That’s the only drawback of having so strong a navy. We don’t stand any chance of getting a fight.”
“You’ll have all you can do to keep up, judging by the way they talk in Germany,” Norgate observed.
“Are you just home from there?”
Norgate nodded. “I am at the Embassy in Berlin, or rather I have been,” he replied. “I am just home on six months’ leave.”
“And that’s your real impre
ssion?” Baring enquired eagerly. “You really think that they mean to have a go at us?”
“I think there’ll be a war soon,” Norgate confessed. “It probably won’t commence at sea, but you’ll have to do your little lot, without a doubt.”
Baring gazed across the room. There was a hard light in his eyes.
“Sounds beastly, I suppose,” he muttered, “but I wish to God it would come! A war would give us all a shaking up—put us in our right places. We all seem to go on drifting any way now. The Services are all right when there’s a bit of a scrap going sometimes, but there’s a nasty sort of feeling of dry rot about them, when year after year all your preparations end in the smoke of a sham fight. Now I am on this beastly land job—but there, I mustn’t bother you with my grumblings.”
“I am interested,” Norgate assured him. “Did you say you were considering something new?”
Baring nodded.
“Plans of a new submarine,” he confided. “There’s no harm in telling you as much as that.”
Mrs. Benedek, who was dummy for the moment, strolled over to them.
“I am not sure,” she murmured, “whether I like the expression you have brought back from Germany with you, Mr. Norgate.”
Norgate smiled. “Have I really acquired the correct diplomatic air?” he asked. “I can assure you that it is an accident—or perhaps I am imitative.”
“You have acquired,” she complained, “an air of unnatural reserve. You seem as though you had found some problem in life so weighty that you could not lose sight of it even for a moment. Ah!”
The glass-topped door had been flung wide open with an unusual flourish. A barely perceptible start escaped Norgate. It was indeed an unexpected appearance, this! Dressed with a perfect regard to the latest London fashion, with his hair smoothly brushed and a pearl pin in his black satin tie, Herr Selingman stood upon the threshold, beaming upon them.
CHAPTER VIII
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Selingman had the air of a man who returns after a long absence to some familiar spot where he expects to find friends and where his welcome is assured. Mrs. Paston Benedek slipped from her place upon the cushioned fender and held out both her hands.
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