About eleven o'clock on the night of Monday, May 12, 1914, Marshall
Allerdyke, a bachelor of forty, a man of great mental and physical
activity, well known in Bradford as a highly successful manufacturer of
dress goods, alighted at the Central Station in that city from an
express which had just arrived from Manchester, where he had spent the
day on business. He had scarcely set foot on the platform when he was
confronted by his chauffeur, a young man in a neat dark-green livery,
who took his master's travelling rug in one hand, while with the other
he held out an envelope.

"The housekeeper said I was to give you that as soon as you got in, sir,"
he announced. "There's a telegram in it that came at four o'clock this
afternoon--she couldn't send it on, because she didn't know exactly where
it would find you in Manchester."

Allerdyke took the envelope, tore it open, drew out the telegram,
and stepped beneath the nearest lamp. He muttered the wording of
the message--

"_On board SS. Perisco_

"63 _miles N.N.E. Spurn Point_, 2.15 _p.m., May_ 12_th_.

"Expect to reach Hull this evening, and shall stop Station Hotel there
for night on way to London. Will you come on at once and meet me? Want to
see you on most important business--

"JAMES."