He reached the offices of the _Telephone_ at length and crawled up a dingy flight of stairs. Without knocking he passed the barrier of a door marked "strictly private." The controlling genius of the _Telephone_ sat limp and bereft of coat and vest. His greeting of Chase was not burdened with flattering politeness. He merely asked what the blazes he wanted. Chase nodded sweetly and drew a large sheet of paper before him. After a little thought he dashed in half-a-dozen vigorous lines with a blue pencil. "Things pretty slack lately," he remarked amicably. "So hot that even the East End can't rise to its weekly brutal murder. Still you get on to a pearl sometimes. Grady, my boy, what do you think of that for a contents bill?" He held the white sheet aloft so that the flare of the gas should fall upon it. The tired look faded from Grady's eyes; he sat up alert and vigorous. Here was the tonic that his fretted soul craved for. "Chapter and Verse?" he said, speaking fast as if he had run far. [Illustration: "I overheard a conversation between him and Doctor Langdale."] "Got it all from Derbyshire," Chase replied. "I overheard a conversation between him and Doctor Longdale in his own house. Also I managed to get hold of some notes to copy." "It wants pluck," Grady remarked, "A scare like that might ruin the Empire; if----" "None of that," Chase cut in. "Take it or leave it. If you haven't got the grit, Sutton of the _Flashlight_ will jump at the chance." He held the contents bill up to the light again and Grady nodded. He was going to do this thing deliberately, once he was sure of his ground. He remarked cynically that it sounded like a fairy story. "Not a bit of it," Chase, said briskly. "The plague breaks out on this barque and the crew know it. There's no ceremony with sailors of that class. They just lose their vessel and strike for the nearest land. Knowing something of our quarantine laws they make themselves scarce as soon as they can. A local doctor calls the plague English cholera, too much bad fruit in very hot weather, and there you are." Grady nodded again. The sweltering heat of the place no longer affected him. Down below the presses were already beginning to clang and boom. There was a constant clatter of feet along the passages. "Sit down right away," Grady snapped. "Make two columns of it. I'll get some statistics out for you." Chase peeled off his coat and got to work at once. Grady found the book he required and proceeded to compile his facts therefrom. The further he dived into the volume the more terribly grave the situation appeared. The upper waters of the Thames were poisoned beyond doubt. And the Thames for some time past had been little better than a stagnant ditch under a fiery sun. Let that water only find its way into the pipes under London and who could forecast the magnitude of the disaster? Nearly all London derived its supply from the Thames.