“We have searched the houses you named in Paris,” he said, “and there are half a dozen men under lock and key. They have arrested five in Berlin, and the world has read the story of the coup made in New York. To be frank with you, that is all we can do. This Jew of yours appears in none of these successes. He is not named anywhere. There is no trace of him—not a word, or a letter, or a trinket. The Governor of the Island of Santa Maria declares that the mines there are just what they pretend to be; that he has been over them with General Fordibras, and that he finds the General a very simple, soldierly gentleman. As to your Diamond Ship—they will believe in that when she comes to port. I have traced the various steamers you have named to me, and their papers are in all cases correct. To be candid, Dr. Fabos, if the Jew himself had come to this office, I should have had no evidence to offer against him. There is only one of his company threatened so far by your revelations, and she is Miss Fordibras.” We laughed together, and I showed him at once that I was not disappointed. “You are face to face with a master,” I exclaimed, “and you expect to find childs’ toys in his hands. If Valentine Imroth is to be hanged by any thieves’ den in Germany or in Paris—to say nothing of London—then he is a hundred miles from being the man I met at Santa Maria, or that brother Jew who commands the Diamond Ship. Do not believe it, Murray. The success of this organisation is a success of delegation. Nine out of ten men in Imroth’s employ have never heard his name, never seen him, or become aware of his existence. The greater rogues, who form his cabinet, are as little likely to be taken in any _café des assassins_ as the Jew himself is likely to make a speech at Westminster. We have touched the fringe of a splendid fabric, but threads of it only are in our hands. To-day, at the Admiralty, Sir James Freeman tells me that a second cruiser will be despatched to the South Atlantic next week. If they discover the derelict, I shall be astounded. Ask me for a reason and I can give you none. It is mere premonition. Sitting here in London I can depict that sagging hulk as clearly as if I watched her from the deck of my own yacht. She is drifting there, peopled by devils, a ship of blood and death—drifting God knows where, without hope, or idea, or haven. She may so drift to the Day of Judgment, but man will never discover her. That is my belief. I have no reason for it—I admit freely that it is ridiculous.”