"Strange," murmured Lord Beamdale, "very strange," and the others knew that he was referring not to the text, or to the unhappy girl-- but to Malcolm Sage.

"We are always surprised when we find Saul among the prophets,"

remarked Mr. Llewellyn John, and he made a mental note of the phrase.

It might do for the "Wee Frees."

CHAPTER VIII GLADYS NORMAN DINES WITH THOMPSON

I

"Tommy," remarked Miss Gladys Norman one day as Thompson entered her room through the gla.s.s-panelled door, "have you ever thought what I shall do fifty years hence?"

"Darn my socks," replied the practical Thompson.

"I mean," she proceeded with withering deliberation, "what will happen when I can't do the hundred in ten seconds?"

Thompson looked at her with a puzzled expression.

"My cousin Will says that if you can't do the hundred yards in ten seconds you haven't an earthly," she explained. "It's been worrying me. What am I to do when I'm old and rheumaticky and the Chief does three on the buzzer? He's bound to notice it and he'll _look_."

Malcolm Sage's "look" was a slight widening of the eyes as he gazed at a delinquent. It was his method of conveying rebuke. That "look"

would cause Thompson to swear earnestly under his breath for the rest of the day, whilst on Gladys Norman it had several distinct effects, the biting of her lower lips, the snubbing of Thompson, the merciless banging of her typewriter, and a self-administered rebuke of "Gladys Norman, you're a silly little a.s.s," being the most noticeable.

For a moment Thompson thought deeply, then with sudden inspiration he said, "Why not move your table nearer his door?"

"What a brain!" she cried, regarding him with mock admiration. "You must have been waving it with Hindes' curlers. Yes," she added, "you may take me out to dinner to-night, Tommy."

Thompson was in the act of waving his hat wildly over his head when Malcolm Sage came out of his room. For the fraction of a second he paused and regarded his subordinates.

"It's not another war, I hope," he remarked, and, without waiting for a reply, he turned, re-entered his room and closed the door.

Gladys Norman collapsed over her typewriter, where with heaving shoulders she strove to mute her mirth with a ridiculous dab of pink cambric.

Thompson looked crestfallen. He had turned just in time to see Malcolm Sage re-enter his room.

Three sharp bursts on the buzzer brought Gladys Norman to her feet.

There was a flurry of skirt, the flash of a pair of shapely ankles, and she disappeared into Malcolm Sage's room.

II

"It's a funny old world," remarked Gladys Norman that evening, as she and Thompson sat at a sheltered table in a little Soho restaurant.

"It's a jolly nice old world," remarked Thompson, looking up from his plate, "and this chicken is It."

"Chicken first; Gladys Norman also ran," she remarked scathingly.

Thompson grinned and returned to his plate.

"Why do you like the Chief, Tommy?" she demanded.

Thompson paused in his eating, resting his hands, still holding knife and fork, upon the edge of the table. The suddenness of the question had startled him.

"If you must sit like that, at least close your mouth," she said severely.

Thompson replaced his knife and fork upon the plate.

"Well, why _do_ you?" she queried.

"Why do I what?" he asked.

She made a movement of impatience. "Like the Chief, of course." Then as he did not reply she continued: "Why does Tims like him, and the Innocent, and Sir James, and Sir John Dene, and the whole blessed lot of us? Why is it, Tommy, why?"

Thompson merely gaped, as if she had propounded some unanswerable riddle.

"Why is it?" she repeated. Then as he still remained silent she added, "There's no hurry, Tommy dear; just go on listening with your mouth. I quite realise the compliment."

"I'm blessed if I know," he burst out at last. "I suppose it's because he's 'M.S.,'" and he returned to his plate.

"Yes, but _why_ is it?" she persisted, as she continued mechanically to crumble her bread. "That's what _I_ want to know; why is it?"

Thompson looked at her a little anxiously. By nature he was inclined to take things for granted, things outside his profession that is.

"It's a funny old world, Tommikins," she repeated at length, picking up her knife and fork, "funnier for some than for others."

Thompson looked up with a puzzled expression on his face. There were times when he found Gladys Norman difficult to understand.

"For a girl, I mean," she added, as if that explained it.

Thompson still stared. The remark did not strike him as illuminating.

"It may be," she continued meditatively, "that I like doing things for the Chief because he was my haven of refuge from a wicked world; but that doesn't explain why you and Tims----"

"Your haven of refuge!" repeated Thompson, making a gulp of a mouthful, and once more laying down his knife and fork, as he looked across at her curiously.

"Before I went to the Ministry I had one or two rather beastly experiences." She paused as if mentally reviewing some unpleasant incident.

"Tell me, Gladys." Thompson was now all attention.

"Well, I once went to see a man in Shaftesbury Avenue who had advertised for a secretary. He was a funny old bean," she added reminiscently, "all eyes and no waist, and more curious as to whether I lived alone, or with my people, than about my speeds. So I told him my brother was a prize-fighter, and----"