"Not exactly that. My own work accumulated so."

"Briefs coming along, eh?"

"I'm a sort of hack journalist as well, as you reminded me just
now," Julian explained a little evasively.

"I wonder you stuck at the censoring so long. Isn't it terribly
tedious?"

"Sometimes. Now and then we come across interesting things,
though. For instance, I discovered a most original cipher the
other day."

"Did it lead to anything?" Furley asked curiously.

"Not at present. I discovered it, studying a telegram from
Norway. It was addressed to a perfectly respectable firm of
English timber merchants who have an office in the city. This was
the original: `Fir planks too narrow by half.' Sounds harmless
enough, doesn't it?"

"Absolutely. What's the hidden meaning?"

"There I am still at a loss," Julian confessed, "but treated with
the cipher it comes out as `Thirty-eight steeple on barn.'"

Furley stared for a moment, then he lit his pipe.

"Well, of the two," he declared, "I should prefer the first