round and see what the little man
wants this time. Last month he had secret wireless installations on
the brain."

Dawson found the First Lord striding up and down his big room. All
round the walls were set great maps bristling with pins to which were
attached numbered labels. Each pin represented a ship, and each ship
was obedient to an order flashed from the big aerials overhead. Here
was the Holy of Holies, the nerve ganglion of the English Navy, and
here, striding up and down, the man who could jab the nerve-centre
with his finger whenever he pleased. He often pleased. Then he would
gloat over the pins as they skipped about the maps.

Chief Inspector Dawson was announced, and stood to attention.

"Ha!" cried the First Lord, "so you are Dawson, the Master of Spies.
We need you, Dawson; the country needs you; I need you. You have a
great chance this day to show your quality, Dawson. Those of whom I
approve, I advance. They become great men. Am I to approve of you?"

Dawson observed that he could not well say until he learned what was
wanted of him.

"Ha!" cried the First Lord again, "you are a man of few words. I like
those with me who do not talk. When there is talking to be done--well,
I can do a little in that line myself. Among my instruments I demand
silence."

Dawson said nothing. The First Lord struck a bell; a servant in blue
uniform appeared. "Will you please tell his lordship that Chief
Inspector Dawson is here, and that I await his presence."

The man retired and presently returned. "His lordship is in his room
making out the orders for the Fleet. He bids me say that he is quite
at your service."

The First Lord flushed, and glanced hurriedly at Dawson, who stood at
attention, stolid, silent, immovable. It would seem that he read
nothing in the message.

"The Mountain is old and stiff in his joints," remarked the First Lord
playfully. "When he settles into his chair, it would take a bomb to
lift him out. We are young and active; we must consider the
infirmities of age. Mahomet will go to the Mountain, and you will
please to follow."

Mahomet, swinging his long coat-tails, strode out of the room and down
a passage, whence they emerged into another room also set about with
pin-studded maps.

"Ha!" said the First Lord, "as you would not come to us, we have
unbent our dignity and come to you. This is Chief Inspector Dawson."

"So I supposed," growled the grizzled old man, who sat at a big desk