A quarter to six! The next moment he was off as quick as he dared for Government House. He chose the gate giving on the Garden Mound as his exit from the city, since once there, he could run without fear of being stopped as a lunatic or a thief, and another reference to his watch, following on a swift calculation, warned him he had not much time to spare. Being Sunday, there were no orderlies in waiting at the office entrance, and, knowing his way and the way of the place, he did not pause to call one, but passed on through the house to the entrance-hall, where some one was certain to be found. He was right; but the person was not the one he expected. It was Lesley Drummond, ready in short skirt for a bicycle ride. 'Sir George!' he said sharply. 'I must see him at once!' She stared at his hurry, his breathlessness. 'Sir George!' she echoed. 'He is not in. He has gone to lay the foundation-stone of the College--every one has gone. I only stopped because of Jerry not being quite well.' She paused, startled, for Jack Raymond literally threw up his hands in impotent anger. Fool that he had been to forget? Of course! Everybody who could be of any use whatever, in this emergency, would be spouting rot five miles away on the other side of the city! If he had only thought of it before, and gone there instead of here! There might have been time, then, to arrange the only plan which was in the least likely--and now---- 'What is it, Mr. Raymond?' came Lesley's voice. 'Let me help if I can.' He shook his head. 'Nobody can--even I can't, though I know it's the only thing--that it ought to be done at once--that----' he broke off with an impatient gesture--'It's no use--it can't be helped!' Lesley came a step nearer to him, with an odd look of resolve on her face. 'Do you mean that it would be wrong of you to do it, or that you haven't the right? I mean, is it something you could do if--if you were Sir George?' The quickness of her perception made him say 'Yes?' frankly. 'Would Sir George do it if he were here?' followed sharply. He gave another gesture of impatience. 'Don't let us play clumps, for Heaven's sake!' he exclaimed. 'I'll tell you--though it's no good. There is a row on in the city to-night--the native regiment is in it--I have a letter here--or at any rate they won't be much help; and if once we get fighting in the streets----' he shrugged his shoulders--'the only way is to prevent it starting. And Morâki is beyond call. But there's a wing of the Highlanders at Fareedabad, forty miles down the line. If I could have got a wire sent there before the mail passes--the up-mail which left here a little ago--it could have been stopped and sent back with troops. For Fareedabad is only an outpost--no railway stock--so there is only that one chance before midnight. There would have been time then--but now----' 'Then why don't you send one?' 'I?' 'Yes, you! You know the cipher. You know that Sir George would send it.'