"Tell me, Mr. Farlow. Tell me of it all," he cried, in his swift, impulsive way. "I have heard so much and know so little. I have lived through a fever since yesterday morning. I have listened to the wildest stories of conspiracies and plots. It is said, even, that your father's offices have been destroyed; that he has been injured. But I knew that was not right. You will tell me it all." Ruxton was reluctantly forced to abandon his own purpose for the moment. He even smiled in answer to the old man's wide, eager eyes. "They have started on us," he said, with quiet confidence. "Oh, yes, they have started. The purpose was well intentioned, but of childish inception and indifferent execution. They have delayed work for perhaps two weeks. They have become obsessed with the use of bombs, which was a disease during the war." "But the explosions--they were terrific. I heard them here, in this bed." "The German race can do nothing without bluster, and they seem to regard bluster as achievement. They destroyed the slipways of two of the new submersibles, with little damage to the vessels themselves. They have destroyed an office, and the working-plans therein. We have many others, and your originals are safely disposed. It is nothing. It is scarcely worth discussing." The old man shook his head--that wonderful head--which still fascinated the Englishman. The latter noted the added intellectuality of the face since it had been clean shaven. It was a splendid face. "No." There was an anxious light still lurking in the wide eyes of the inventor. "But it is the beginning. Only the beginning. Who knows what may happen next?" Ruxton threw up his head. His eyes were full of a world of pain and suffering. The change had been wrought by the man's last words. "That is it," he cried. "It is not the destruction at the yards. It is that which also they may do--which they have done. It is that which has brought me here now. I am nearly mad with anxiety and dread. I am thinking of your--daughter, sir. I can find no trace of her at her house, or elsewhere. She has gone, vanished, spirited away without a word to her--friends." The Prince's face became a study in bewilderment. His luminous eyes looked to have grown bigger than ever. He opened his lips to speak. Then he closed them. Then he fumbled in his pocket. "Since when has she----?" But he was not permitted to complete his question. "Since the day of your arrival here, sir," Ruxton cried. "I wired her a message, and it remained unanswered." "Tell me of it." The puzzled expression remained, but there was more confidence in the Prince's manner. He was grasping his folded letter in his hand. He had remembered its contents, and the promise it had demanded.