Then Trustram strode out and, hailing a passing taxi, drove home to his quiet rooms off Eaton Square. The moment he had gone Mrs Kirby, wearing a small, close-fitting hat and blue serge walking-gown, quickly joined Rodwell in the hall. "I've learnt something of importance, Molly. I must get away down to old Small's at once. _Gott strafe England_!" he added very seriously. "_Gott strafe England_!" the woman repeated after him in fervent earnestness, as though it were a prayer. Then she asked in surprise, "Going to-night? It's a long way. Why, you won't get there before morning!" "I must be there as soon as possible. Our submarines can get some troop-ships--if we are slick enough! Every moment's delay is of the utmost importance," he exclaimed hurriedly. "Ring up Penney, will you, and tell him to bring round the car at once. Then come into the dining-room and have a snack with me before I go. But to what do I owe a visit at this hour? Have you anything to report?" "Yes," she said. "I'll tell you when I've been on the 'phone," she answered. "It's something urgent, and very important. I don't like the look of things." CHAPTER SEVENTEEN. THE SUPER-SPY. Dawn was breaking, chill and stormy, over the grey North Sea. On the far, misty horizon showed four little puffs of black smoke at regular intervals upon the sky-line--four British destroyers steaming on patrol duty. Beyond, as Lewin Rodwell approached Tom Small's cottage, he also distinguished two trawlers moving towards the left, off Sutton-on-Sea, engaged in the perilous work of mine-sweeping. Rodwell, wearing a thick and somewhat shabby overcoat, and a golf-cap pulled well down, had trudged across from those branch roads where Penney had dropped him after his night run of nearly a hundred and sixty miles. He was tired, yet he plodded forward through the mud, for the little low-built old tarred cottage was at last in sight. "If we can get those troop-ships it will be a grand _coup_ for us. Molly is quite right," he exclaimed to himself in German. "From Norddeich they can wireless away to Pola, on the Adriatic, and the Austrian submarines can go out to meet them in the Mediterranean-- providing we have no undersea boats there just now." Old Tom Small was outside his door mending a net when Rodwell approached. "Hulloa, Tom!" cried the visitor cheerily. "Didn't expect me--eh?" "No, sir," grinned the bronzed, wrinkle-faced old fellow in the tanned smock--tanned in the same tub as his lines and nets. "This is unusual for you to come 'ere at this 'our--isn't it?" "Yes. I've just come from London," he explained, as he entered the little sitting-room, which smelt so strongly of stale fish and rank tobacco. "Where's Ted?" "'E's gone along to Skegness to get me some tackle. 'E only started 'arf an 'our ago." "Well," asked Rodwell, throwing off his coat and cap, and flinging himself upon the old wooden armchair. "Anything happened since I was here last week?"