Apart from that altogether, there is something
far more important which I have to say to you."

Hebblethwaite knitted his brows. He was clearly puzzled.

"Still personal, eh?" he enquired.

Norgate shook his head.

"It is something of vastly more importance," he said, "than any question
affecting my welfare. I am almost afraid to begin for fear I shall miss
any chance, for fear I may not seem convincing enough."

"We'll have the champagne opened at once, then," Mr. Hebblethwaite
declared. "Perhaps that will loosen your tongue. I can see that this is
going to be a busy meal. Charles, if that bottle of Pommery 1904 is iced
just to the degree I like it, let it be served, if you please, in the
large sized glasses. Now, Norgate."

"What I am going to relate to you," Norgate began, leaning across the
table and speaking very earnestly, "is a little incident which happened
to me on my way back from Berlin. I had as a fellow passenger a person
whom I am convinced is high up in the German Secret Service Intelligence
Department."

"All that!" Mr. Hebblethwaite murmured. "Go ahead, Norgate. I like the
commencement of your story. I almost feel that I am moving through the
pages of a diplomatic romance. All that I am praying is that your fellow
passenger was a foreign lady--a princess, if possible--with wonderful
eyes, fascinating manners, and of a generous disposition."

"Then I am afraid you will be disappointed," Norgate continued drily.
"The personage in question was a man whose name was Selingman. He told me
that he was a manufacturer of crockery and that he came often to England
to see his customers. He called himself a peace-loving German, and he
professed the utmost good-will towards our country and our national
policy. At the commencement of our conversation, I managed to impress him
with the idea that I spoke no German. At one of the stations on the line
he was joined by a Belgian, his agent, as he told me, in Brussels for the
sale of his crockery. I overheard this agent, whose name was Meyer,
recount to his principal his recent operations. He offered him an exact
plan of the forts of Liege. I heard him instructed to procure a list of
the wealthy inhabitants of Ghent and the rateable value of the city, and
I heard him commissioned to purchase land in the neighbourhood of Antwerp
for a secret purpose."

Mr. Hebblethwaite's eyebrows became slowly upraised. The twinkle in his
eyes remained, however.

"My!" he excla