r, which we deciphered, the plan of the
Ridges Waterworks, and our allegations concerning his generous friend,
he began to reflect.

"Has he ever asked you about the new gun now being made at Elswick?" I
asked.

"Well"--he hesitated--"now I recall the fact, he has on several
occasions."

"Ah!" I said. "He intended to either ruin you, Rosser, or compel you to
become a traitor."

"He'd never do that!" declared the stout-hearted Briton. "By God! If
what you tell me is true," he cried fiercely, "I'll wring the
blackguard's neck."

"No," I said, "don't do that. He's paid the purchase money for a new
house for you, hasn't he?"

"Yes."

"Then leave him to us. We'll compel him to hand back the mortgage, and
your revenge shall be a new house at the expense of the German
Government," whereat both Ray and he laughed heartily.

Next night we faced the spy at his own rooms, and on pain of exposure
and the police compelled him to hand over the new little villa to his
intended victim unconditionally, a fact which caused him the most
intense chagrin, and induced him to utter the most fearful threats of
vengeance against us.

But we had already had many such threats. So we only laughed at them.

We had, however, the satisfaction of exposing the spy to the firm which
employed him, and we were present on the platform of the Central Station
when, two days later, having given up his rooms and packed his
belongings, he left the Tyne-side for London, evidently to consult his
travelling-inspector, "Henry Lewis."

Several months passed. The attempt to obtain details of our new gun had
passed completely from my mind.

An inquiry which Ray and I had been actively prosecuting into an attempt
to learn the secrets of the "transmitting-room" of our new
_Dreadnoughts_ had led me to the south of Germany. I had had a rather
exciting experience in Dresden and was now on my way back to London.

"Ah! Your London is such a strange place. So dull, so _triste_--so very
damp and foggy," remarked the girl seated in the train before me.

"Not always, mademoiselle," I replied. "You have been there in winter.
You should go in June. In the season it is as pleasant as anywhere else
in the world."

"I have no desire to return. And yet----"

"Well?"

"And yet I have decided to go straight on from the Gare du Nord."

"The midday service! I shall cross by that also. We shall be
fellow-travellers," I said.

We were together in the night _rapide