"Serious? It's likely to involve the death of anybody concerned. Not only the victims of these machinations, but of those who interfere on their behalf. There, that's all I can say of what lies behind, and you must be satisfied, or pretend to be. Meanwhile I can tell you something which is going to be helpful to us, which I couldn't have told you if you had paid your visit an hour or so earlier. I have discovered a means by which I fancy the Princess can be rescued from these German demons." Ruxton turned, and again flung himself into his chair. He was smiling with confidence and hope. The officer insinuated his chair nearer and waited. Every faculty was alert. The other took no notice of his movements. He was absorbed in his own thoughts. He had taken a great decision, and all his imaginative faculties were at work piecing together the pictured details. The officer coughed. The long pause was becoming too extended for his patience. Ruxton started. He looked round and smiled. "Listen to this," he said, "and tell me what you think." It was well past midnight when Detective-Inspector Purdic rose to take his departure. The automatic smile on his face had broadened noticeably, and Ruxton felt that now, at least, it was inspired. He, too, was smiling. His own decision had met with something more than approval from the professional. The man had caught something of the quiet daring of the brain which had been keen enough to penetrate the meaning of certain obscure signs, and reckless enough to evolve a plan of action which promised a possibility of defeating all the trickery against which they were pitted. Furthermore, the officer had been able to point certain vital matters, and offer suggestions in several directions of importance out of his long experience. Between them they had matured carefully, and placed in concrete form, a plan which, under any other conditions of a less grave nature, must have appeared the veriest of forlorn hopes, and which either of them would certainly have classed amongst the schemes of the most advanced cases confined within the four walls of a lunatic asylum. "I'm glad I came, sir," said the officer, in his blunt fashion. "I had my doubts about it. It didn't seem to offer much hope, seeing I was dealing with a Cabinet Minister who hadn't seen his way, so far, to opening out on official secrets of his own accord; and on that score, I admit, it was no use. But you've done better than that, sir. You've taught me something which twenty years of my own business wasn't able to teach me--and it's in my own line, too. I sort of feel, sir, some one's going to wake up with a horrid start, and--it won't be us. Good-night, sir, and thank you. I'll set everything in train without delay. I shall take the five men I mentioned with me when I go north to-morrow, and look to the local police for any other force we may need."