At that instant Thorne got the long desired signal. Without a moment’s hesitation, he turned to the key. He picked up the despatch with his wounded left hand and with the other began to manipulate the sounder. “She must be there,” said Arrelsford, “or else she’s stepped into the next room, the Commissary General’s Office, the window was open, tell him to—ah!” as the sound of the clicking caught his ear, “Stop him! He is sending it now!” Mr. Arrelsford’s distress was so overwhelming and so genuine that something of the man’s suspicion was communicated to the General. “One moment, Captain,” he said. Captain Thorne, of course, had no option but to release the key. He stopped sending and dropped the despatch, saluting. “Now, Mr. Arrelsford,” said the General, “what have you to do with the Military Telegraph Department?” “This is a Secret Service case; they assigned it to me, sir.” “What is a Secret Service case?” “The whole plot to send the order. It’s the Yankee Secret Service. He is a member of it and his brother brought in the signal to-night.” “I beg your pardon, sir,” said Thorne, “this despatch ought to go out at once, sir. It came from the Secretary of War and it is very urgent.” “Go ahead with it,” said General Randolph. Thorne needed no further permission than that, dropped to his seat, and once more seized the fatal key. “No, no!” cried Arrelsford. “Don’t let him—I tell you it’s a——” “Silence, sir,” thundered Randolph. “Do you know what he is telling them?” persisted Arrelsford. “No, do you?” “Yes,” returned the Secret Service Agent. “Wait a moment, Captain Thorne,” said the General, impressed in spite of himself by this man’s earnestness, which made him disregard all orders, commands, and everything else. “Where is the despatch?” Captain Thorne picked up the paper and handed it to the General, and then stepped back. He had played his last card. He played it desperately, boldly, and well. “Well?” asked the General, looking from the despatch to the accuser, “what has he been telling them?” “He began to give an order to withdraw Marston’s Division from its present position,” said Arrelsford, making a brilliant and successful guess at the probable point of attack in “Plan 3.” “That is perfectly correct,” said General Randolph, looking at the paper. “Yes, by that despatch, but that despatch is a forgery. It is an order to withdraw a whole division from a vital point. A false order, he wrote it himself. This is the turning point of the whole plot.” “But why should he write it himself? If he wanted to send a false order, he could send it without putting it down on paper, couldn’t he?” “Yes,” admitted Arrelsford, but he went on with great acuteness, “if any of the operators came back they would catch him doing it. With that order and the Secretary’s signature he could go right on. He could even order one of them to send it.”