"Call it hare-brained, if you like. How would you have got at them, sir?" Hayhurst asked brusquely, resenting the other's speech. "In exactly the same manner, if I could have found anyone fool enough to volunteer." He pitched the end of his cigar out through the open window and sat up straighter. "Do you think you could find your man, Simmonds?" he asked. "And if you found him could you persuade him to come and see me here? It would be safer than my going to him. He had better come at night so as to avoid detection. We don't want him to be spotted as in with us at all. If he isn't marked he stands a better chance of success." "I can find him, right enough," the other answered. "Then do so with as little delay as possible. You needn't mention what the job is he will be wanted for, but let him know that however valuable his time is it will be paid for well, and give him thoroughly to understand the necessity for secrecy." The man addressed as Simmonds nodded without speaking; and the boy, muttering something about a headache, got up, and with a brief good-night passed out through the French window, and swinging himself off the stoep was swallowed immediately in the heavy blackness without. The two men smoked in silence while they listened to the crunching of his footsteps on the gravel path, until the sound died away in the distance and only the stirring of the trees as the fitful wind swept through their branches broke the silence of the night. Then Simmonds looked round sharply at the man who sat near the opening, his strong brows drawn together in a frown of balked annoyance, his eyes still turned in the direction whence Hayhurst had disappeared. "What on earth induced you to enlist that young fool?" he asked. The heavy brows contracted yet more fiercely as their owner answered, without moving his position: "Not such a fool as you fancy. And his youth is--or rather, was--an advantage; it put others off their guard. He was smart enough in getting on to the right trail." "And then bungled the business, and gave away the whole show." "Many an older man," the Colonel answered tersely, "has been outwitted by a woman." He mixed himself a whisky and soda, and talked of other matters until, close upon midnight, Simmonds took his leave. "Better send your man to me, not bring him," the Colonel said as he was departing,--"safer. And be careful not to mention what I am likely to want of him. I prefer to judge a man for myself before engaging his services." Then he wished his companion good-night, and held a lamp for him to light him to the gate.