to enter--I had a look round before coming in to-day--and on Wednesday
night (that is to-morrow) there will be a scientific burglary here and
your Notes will be stolen."

"Oh no they won't," cried Cary. "I will take them down this afternoon
to my office and lock them up in the big safe. It will put me to a lot
of bother, for I shall also have to lock up there the chapters of my
book."

"You newspaper men ought all to be locked up yourselves. You are a
cursed nuisance to honest, hard-worked Scotland Yard men like me. But
you mistake the object of my visit. I want this flat to be entered
to-morrow night, and I want your Naval Papers to be stolen."

For a moment the wild thought came to Cary that this man Dawson--the
chosen of the Yard--was himself a German Secret Service agent, and
must have shown in his eyes some signs of the suspicion, for Dawson
laughed loudly. "No, Mr. Cary, I am not in the Kaiser's pay, nor are
you, though the case against you might be painted pretty black. This
man Hagan is on our string in London, and we want him very badly
indeed. Not to arrest--at least not just yet--but to keep running
round showing us his pals and all their little games. He is an
Irish-American, a very unbenevolent neutral, to whom we want to give a
nice, easy, happy time, so that he can mix himself up thoroughly with
the spy business and wrap a rope many times round his neck. We will
pull on to the end when we have finished with him, but not a minute
too soon. He is too precious to be frightened. Did you ever come
across such an ass"--Dawson contemptuously indicated the pile of
sealed envelopes; "he must have soaked himself in American dime novels
and cinema crime films. He will be of more use to us than a dozen of