as
well shout it from the housetops. Therefore I keep my own counsel."

"That is just what I said," cried Froissart triumphantly. "If the
secret of these _grand croiseurs_ is known to one hundred, two
hundred, _le bon Dieu_ knows how many hundreds of dockyard hands, one
might as well print it in these dull English _journaux_. You attempt
the impossible, _mon ami_."

"They are Englishmen," proclaimed Dawson, who felt compelled to uphold
the character of his countrymen in the presence of a foreigner. "They
are patriots. Not a man of them would sell his country."

"I would not bank on their patriotism, my friend, when there is much
Boche gold to be won and much beer to be drunk."

"And who said that I did bank upon it?" cried Dawson testily,
forgetting his noble, words of two minutes earlier. "I wouldn't trust
one of them out of my sight. I have two dozen of my own men working
alongside of those dockyard hands, watching them by night and day. We
know if a man drinks two glasses of beer when he used to drink one,
and takes home to his wife eighteenpence above his ordinary wage. Do
you take me for a fool?"

"You'll be a bigger fool than I take you for if you do not play
straight this time with me, and tell me your plans in detail. I have
to work with you, and I cannot give service blindfold."

"You are not a bad fellow, Froissart," said Dawson thoughtfully--the
name in his mouth became Froy-zart--"and I will tell you here and now
more of my mind than I have yet shown even to the great Chief of us
all. It will take all your brains--for you have some brains--and all
of mine to keep the secret of those battle-cruisers."

* * * * *

In the morning the newspapers published the meagre details of the
disaster in the South Seas, and the Three Towns were shaken to their
foundations. For when naval ships go down, they take with them crews
of whom half have their homes in Devon. The disaster meant that eight
hundred families in the West mourned a son or a father. Ever since the
days of the Great Queen--whose name in the West is not Victoria, but
Elizabeth--Devon has paid in the lives of its best men the price of
Admiralty. The Three Towns mourned with a grief made more bitter by
the realisation that the disaster was one which never should have
happened. Bad slow English ships had been sent against good fast
German ships, and had been sunk with all hands without hurt to the
enemy. The Three Town