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 Emba.s.sy 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 a.s.sented 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 a.s.sented.

"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 a.s.sented, 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, pa.s.sing it over. "Your att.i.tude, however, seems to render that course useless."

Mr. Tyritt adjusted his eyegla.s.ses and glanced benevolently at the doc.u.ment. A sharp e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n broke from his lips. As his eyes wandered downwards, his first expression of incredulity gave way to one of suppressed amus.e.m.e.nt.

"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 pa.s.sing 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

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 a.s.sumed.

"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 a.s.sented. "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?"