Given the fact that Dangle overheard the dying man’s story, and that Dangle’s character was what it was, Cheyne now saw that the remainder of his adventure could scarcely have happened otherwise than as it had. To obtain the cipher was Dangle’s obvious course, and there was no reason to doubt his own statement of how he set about it. A search among Price’s papers showed the latter had sent the document to Cheyne, and from Cheyne Dangle had evidently decided to obtain it. But nothing could be done till after the war, nor, presumably, without financial and other help. In this lay, doubtless, the reason for the application to Blessington and Sime, and these two being roped in, the unscrupulous trio set themselves to work. Susan Dangle assisted by obtaining a post as servant at Warren Lodge, and thus gained detailed information which enabled the others to lay their plans. And so in a quite orderly sequence event had followed event, until now it looked as if the climax had been reached. Like a flash these thoughts passed through Cheyne’s mind, and like a flash he saw what depended on them. Now they knew where Joan Merrill had been taken. If she was still alive—and he simply could not bring himself to admit any other possibility—she was on that boat of Merkel’s some two hundred and fifty miles north of the Azores! From that something surely followed. He turned to French and spoke in a voice which was hoarse from anxiety. “What about an expedition to the place?” French nodded decisively. “We must arrange one without delay,” he said. “I think the Admiralty is our hope. That gold wasn’t insured—it was a government business. I’ll go and tell the chief about it now, and get him to see the proper authorities. Meanwhile,” he looked, for French, quite sharply at the others, “not a word of this must be breathed.” Intense interest was excited in the higher circles of the Admiralty by the news which reached them from the Yard. Great personages bestirred themselves to issue orders, with the result that with enormously more promptitude than the man in the street can bring himself to associate with a Government Department, a fast boat, well equipped with divers and gear, was got ready for sea. French put in a word for both Cheyne and Price, and when, some eight hours after their reading of the cipher, the boat put out into the Thames from Chatham Dockyard, it carried in addition to its regular crew not only Inspector French himself, but also his two protégés. Chapter XX The Goal of the “L’Escaut”