should work out as I told you."

"Of course," Furley observed, "ciphers can lead you--"

He stopped short. Julian, who had been leaning over towards the
cigarette bog, glanced around at his friend. There was a frown on
Furley's forehead. He withdrew his pipe from between his teeth.

"What did you say you made of it?" he demanded.

"`Thirty-eight steeple on barn.'"

"Thirty-eight! That's queer!"

"Why is it queer?"

There was a moment's silence. Furley glanced at the little clock
upon the mantelpiece. It was five and twenty minutes past nine.

"I don't know whether you have ever heard, Julian," he said, "that
our enemies on the other side of the North Sea are supposed to
have divided the whole of the eastern coast of Great Britain into
small, rectangular districts, each about a couple of miles square.
One of our secret service chaps got hold of a map some time ago."

"No, I never heard this," Julian acknowledged. "Well?"

"It's only a coincidence, of course," Furley went on, "but number
thirty-eight happens to be the two-mile block of seacoast of which
this cottage is just about the centre. It stretches to Cley on