“Right you are!” sententiously remarked Verner of the Horse Artillery. “He went a stunning pace for a while, and at last had to get out. Big flirtation--wife of commanding officer! Hawke acted very nicely. Said nothing--sacrificed himself. That’s why the women all like him. Very safe man. But, he’s a shy bird now.” They dissected his past, guessed at his present, but could not read his future! And then and there, the man who knew it all, told of the mysterious governmental quest confided to Major Alan Hawke. “You see, he has a sort of roving commission in mufti, to counteract the ceaseless undermining of the Russian agents in Persia, Afghanistan and in the Pamirs. We always bear the service brand too openly. It gives away our own military agents. Now, Hawke’s a fellow like Alikhanoff, that smart Russian duffer! He can do the Persian, Afghan, or Thibetan to perfection! He has been on to London. Some morning he will clear out. You’ll hear of him next at Kashgar, or in Bhootan, or perhaps he will work down into China and report to the Minister there. He is a Secret Intelligence Department of One, that’s all!” “That’s all very irregular for Her Majesty’s Service,” growled an envious agnostic. “Bah! Secret Service has no rules, you know,” said the man who knew it all, thrusting his lips deeply into a brandy pawnee. And so it was noted that Alan Hawke was a devilish pleasant fellow, a rising man, and one who had certainly dropped into an extremely good thing. The tide of Fortune was setting directly in favor of the man who, pacing the floor upstairs, unavailingly tormented himself with the subject of the missing jewels. “If I could only get a hold on Hugh Johnstone!” mused the adventurer. “Berthe Louison knows nothing of these old matters. She only seeks to approach the child. And she will be here to watch me in a day or so. Ram Lal, the old scoundrel! Does he know? If he did, he would bleed the would-be Baronet on his own account. But he may not know of the golden opportunity, and the old wretch always has many irons himself in the fire. Hugh Fraser was a canny Scot in his youth. Sir Hugh Johnstone is a horse of another color. If old Johnstone has the jewels, why does he not yield them up? Perhaps he wants the Baronetcy first, and then his memory may be strangely refreshed.”