"Of course," he said. "Ortmann and your father were well aware that Merton Mansfield is still the strongest man in the whole Government, a marvellous organiser, and the really great man upon whom Britain has pinned her faith." "They mean to work some evil upon him," the girl said apprehensively. "I'm quite certain of it! Cannot we warn him?" "I did so. I wrote to him, urging him to take precautions, and declaring that a plot was in progress," said Kennedy. "I suppose his secretary had the letter and probably held it back in order not to disturb him. Secretaries have a habit of doing that." Ella, whose cigarette he had just lit, blew a cloud of blue smoke from her lips, and replied: "Well, if that's the case then it is exceedingly wrong. The greatest care should be taken of those who are leading us to victory. Ah! dearest," she added with a sigh, "you do not know how bitter I feel when I reflect that my own father is a German and, moreover, a most deadly enemy." "I know, darling, I know," the man responded. "That's the worst of it. To expose the organiser of these conspirators would be to send your own father to prison--perhaps to an ignominious end." "Yes. All we can do is to watch closely and thwart their devilish designs, as far as we are able," the girl said. "Unfortunately, I'll have to go back to the air-station to-night, but I'll try to come up again for the week-end." Disappointment overspread the girl's face, but a second later she declared: "In that case I shall go and stay with father over at Barnes, and endeavour to discover what is intended." Therefore, that night, after her work at the theatre, she went to Theodore Drost's house at Barnes, instead of returning to the flat at Kensington. As she always kept her room there and her visits seemed to delight old Drost, she was always able to keep in touch with Kennedy and so help to frustrate the evil machinations of her father. As the days passed she became more than ever confident that another deep-laid plot was in progress. Nor was she mistaken, for, truth to tell, Ortmann was having many long interviews with his clever catspaw, the man who posed as the plain and pious pastor of the Dutch Church, old Theodore Drost. An incident occurred about a week later which showed the trend of events. The old pastor called one day at that modest, dreary little house close by Wandsworth Common, where Count Ernst von Ortmann, the man who secretly directed the agents of Germany in England, lived as plain Mr Horton whenever he grew tired of his beautiful house in Park Lane. Leading, by the fact of his occupation a dual existence, it was necessary for his nefarious purposes that he should frequently disappear into South London, away from the fashionable friends who knew him as Mr Henry Harberton. The pair were seated together that evening, smoking and discussing the cause of the failure of Rozelaar and the reason of his death by his own bomb.