"Good Heavens! Yes!" cried Trustram, starting to his feet. "Why, here the information has been sent to Austria for re-transmission to the German submarines--the exact information I gave of transports leaving for the Dardanelles! The _Ellenborough_ and _Desborough_ are not mentioned. That shows the extent of their intimate knowledge of the movements of our ships. But you see," he went on, pointing to the message, "the _Cardigan_, _Leatherhead_ and _Turleigh_ are all mentioned as having left Southampton escorted to Gibraltar, and not beyond, and further, that in future all drafts will embark at Plymouth--just the very information that I gave!" "Yes; I quite see. There must be somewhere a very rapid and secret channel for the transit of information to Germany." "Yes, and we have to find that out, without further delay," Trustram replied. "But," he added, "this has fixed the responsibility undoubtedly. Is Captain Weardale in his room?" "He was, when I came along to you." Trustram thanked him, and, a few moments later, was walking down one of the long corridors in the new building of the Admiralty overlooking St James's Park, bearing the deciphered dispatch from the enemy in his hand. "The artful skunk!" he muttered to himself. "Who would have credited such a thing! But it's that confounded woman, I suppose--the woman of whom poor Jerrold entertained such grave suspicions. What is the secret of it all, I wonder? I'll find out--if it costs me my life! How fortunate that I should have suspected, and been able to test the leakage of information, as I have done!" Just before midnight a rather hollow-eyed, well-dressed young man was seated in Mrs Kirby's pretty little drawing-room in Cadogan Gardens. The dark plush curtains were drawn, and against them the big bowl of daffodils stood out in all their artistic beauty beneath the electric-light. His hostess was elaborately dressed, as was her wont, yet with a quiet, subdued taste which gave her an almost aristocratic air. She posed as a giddy bridge-player, a theatre and night-club goer; a woman who smoked, who was careless of what people thought, and who took drugs secretly. That, however, was only her mask. Really she was a most careful, abstemious, level-headed woman, whose eye was always directed towards the main chance of obtaining information which might be of use to her friend Lewin Rodwell, and his masters abroad. Both were German-born. The trail of the Hun was over them--that Teuton taint of a hopeful world-power which, being inborn, could never be eradicated. "Well?" she was asking, as she lolled artistically in the silk-covered easy chair in her pretty room, upholstered in carnation pink. "So you can't see him till to-morrow? That's horribly unfortunate. I'm very disappointed," she added pettishly. "No," replied the young man, who, fair-haired and square-jawed, was of distinctly German type. "I'm sorry. I tried my best, but I failed."