knocked it out of my
hand. He smashed the teapot."

"Smashed the teapot!" cried several girls in chorus.

"Oh! Wessie," wailed the little brunette, "I shall die."

"Why did you let him do it?" asked a fair girl with white eyelashes and
glasses.

"I didn't," said Dorothy; "he just barged into me and knocked the
teapot out of my hand, and then made an assignation for eleven o'clock
to-morrow in the First Lord's room."

"An assignation! The First Lord's room!" cried Miss Cunliffe, who by
virtue of a flat chest, a pair of round glasses, and an uncompromising
manner made an ideal supervisor. She was known as "Old Goggles."
"What do you mean, Miss West?"

"Exactly what I say, Miss Cunliffe. He asked me if I was a
stenographer, and then said that I was to see him at eleven o'clock
to-morrow morning in the First Lord's room. What do you think I had
better do?"

"Who is he? What is he? Do tell us, Wessie, dear," cried Marjorie
Rogers excitedly.

"Well, I should think he's either a madman or else he's bought the
Admiralty," said Dorothy West, her head on one side as if weighing her
words before uttering them. "He's the man I saw this morning with Sir
Lyster Grayne and Admiral Heyworth, going to call on the Prime
Minister--at least, I suppose they were; they went up the steps into
Downing Street. But ought I to go at eleven o'clock, Miss Cunliffe?"
she queried.

"I'll make enquiries," said Miss Cunliffe. "I'll see Mr. Blair.
Perhaps he's mad."

"But what are we going to do about our tea?" wailed Marjorie. "I'd
sooner lose my character than my tea."

"Miss Rogers!" said Miss Cunliffe, whose conception of supervisorship
was that she should oversee the decorum as well as the work of the
other occupants of the room.

"I believe she did it on purpose," said she of the white eyelashes
spitefully to a girl in a velvet blouse.

"You had better brew to-morrow's tea to-day, Miss West," said Miss
Cunliffe.

"Yes, do, there's a darling," cried Marjorie. "I simply can't wait
another five minutes. Why, I couldn't lick a stamp to save my life.
Borrow No. 13's pot when they've finished with it, and pinch some of
their tea, if you can," she added.

And Dorothy West went out to interview the guardian of No. 13's teapot.

CHAPTER III

DEPARTMENT Z.

I

"Mr. Sage there? Very well, ask him to step in and see me as soon as
he returns."

Colonel Walton replaced the telephone-receiver and continued to