agreement--treaty--call it what you like. It was drawn up ready for
signature by the various representatives, and drawn up in America--at
that time a neutral country. It was dispatched to England by a special
messenger selected for that purpose, a young fellow called Danvers. It
was hoped that the whole affair had been kept so secret that nothing
would have leaked out. That kind of hope is usually disappointed.
Somebody always talks!

"Danvers sailed for England on the Lusitania. He carried the precious
papers in an oilskin packet which he wore next his skin. It was on that
particular voyage that the Lusitania was torpedoed and sunk. Danvers was
among the list of those missing. Eventually his body was washed ashore,
and identified beyond any possible doubt. But the oilskin packet was
missing!

"The question was, had it been taken from him, or had he himself
passed it on into another's keeping? There were a few incidents that
strengthened the possibility of the latter theory. After the torpedo
struck the ship, in the few moments during the launching of the boats,
Danvers was seen speaking to a young American girl. No one actually
saw him pass anything to her, but he might have done so. It seems to me
quite likely that he entrusted the papers to this girl, believing that
she, as a woman, had a greater chance of bringing them safely to shore.

"But if so, where was the girl, and what had she done with the papers?
By later advice from America it seemed likely that Danvers had been
closely shadowed on the way over. Was this girl in league with his
enemies? Or had she, in her turn, been shadowed and either tricked or
forced into handing over the precious packet?

"We set to work to trace her out. It proved unexpectedly difficult.
Her name was Jane Finn, and it duly appeared among the list of the
survivors, but the girl herself seemed to have vanished completely.
Inquiries into her antecedents did little to help us. She was an orphan,
and had been what we should call over here a pupil teacher in a small
school out West. Her passport had been made out for Paris, where she
was going to join the staff of a hospital. She had offered her services
voluntarily, and after some correspondence they had been accepted.
Having seen her name in the list of the saved from the Lusitania, the
staff of the hospital were naturally very surprised at her not arriving
to take up her billet, and at not hearing from her in any way.

"Well, ever