make me temporarily a captain
in command, and I will engage to cut off the snake's head. You can
have my own head if I fail."

The Great War Minister rose, walked over to Dawson, and shook his
embarrassed hand. "It is a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Dawson," said he.
The First Lord, now fully awake, sat up and stared earnestly at the
detective. Those two, the chiefs of the Navy and the Army, had grasped
the startling fact that for once they were in the presence of a Man.
The others saw only a rather ill-dressed, intrusive, vulgar police
officer.

"I have rarely met a man with so economical a mind," went on the War
Minister, who resumed his seat. "If you had asked me for eight
thousand, I should not have been surprised." He turned to the Prime
Minister. "If our resolute friend here can stop a revolution with
eighty Red Marines, let him have them in God's name."

"Oh, he can have the Marines," growled the Prime Minister--"if the
First Lord agrees. They are in his department. And if it pleases him
to dress up as a temporary captain, that is nothing to me; but I draw
a firm line at any proclamation of martial law."

"Well," asked the War Minister of Dawson, "what say you?"

"I must have the proclamation, my lord," replied Dawson. "Not to put
up in the streets, but to show to the shop stewards. They won't
believe that the Cabinet has any spunk until they see the proclamation
signed by you. They know that what you say you do."

["Great Heavens," I said to Dawson, when he recounted to me the
details of his surprising interview with the War Committee, "tact is
hardly your strong suit. You could not have asked more plainly to be
kicked out. The flabbier a Cabinet is, the more convinced are its
members of adamantine resolution."

"If I had to go down and out," replied Dawson, "I had determined to go
fighting. I was there to speak my mind, not to flatter anybody."]

The silence which followed this awful speech could be felt. The Prime
Minister gasped, flushed to the eyes, and half rose to dismiss Dawson
from the room. He himself thought for a moment that all was lost, when
through the tense atmosphere ran a ripple of gay laughter. It was the
First Lord who, with instant decision, had taken the only means to
save his new friend Dawson. He has a delightfully infectious silvery
laugh, and the effect was electrical. The War Minister opened his
great mouth, and bellowed Ha! Ha! Ha! The Minister of Munitions put
his head down on