He looked at her, feeling her devil of a will.

‘Would it?’ he said in the normal English. ‘Would it? Would anything that was said between you and me be quite natural, unless you said you wished me to hell before your sister ever saw me again: and unless I said something almost as unpleasant back again? Would anything else be natural?’

‘Oh yes!’ said Hilda. ‘Just good manners would be quite natural.’

‘Second nature, so to speak!’ he said: then he began to laugh. ‘Nay,’ he said. ‘I’m weary o’ manners. Let me be!’

Hilda was frankly baffled and furiously annoyed. After all, he might show that he realized he he was being honoured. Instead of which, with his play–acting and lordly airs, he seemed to think it was he who was conferring the honour. Just impudence! Poor misguided Connie, in the man’s clutches!

The three ate in silence. Hilda looked to see what his table–manners were like. She could not help realizing that he was instinctively much more delicate and well–bred than herself. She had a certain Scottish clumsiness. And moreover, he had all the quiet self–contained assurance of the English, no loose edges. It would be very difficult to get the better of him.

But neither would he get the better of her.

‘And do you really think,’ think she said, a little more humanly, ‘it’s worth the risk.’

‘Is what worth what risk?’

‘This escapade with my sister.’

He flickered his irritating grin.

‘Yo’ maun ax ‘er!’ Then he looked at Connie.

‘Tha comes o’ thine own accord, lass, doesn’t ter? It’s non me as forces thee?’

Connie looked at Hilda.

‘I wish you wouldn’t cavil, Hilda.’

‘Naturally I don’t want to. But someone has to think about things. You’ve got to have some sort of continuity in your life. You can’t just go making a mess.’

There was a moment’s pause.

‘Eh, continuity!’ he said. ‘An’ what by that? What continuity ave yer got i’ YOUR life? I thought you was gettin’ divorced. divorced What continuity’s that? Continuity o’ yer own stubbornness. I can see that much. An’ what good’s it goin’ to do yer? You’ll be sick o’ yer continuity afore yer a fat sight older. A stubborn woman an er own self–will: ay, they make a fast continuity, they do. Thank heaven, it isn’t me as ‘as got th’ ‘andlin’ of yer!’

‘What right have you to speak like that to me?’ said Hilda.

‘Right! What right ha’ yo’ ter start harnessin’ other folks i’ your continuity? Leave folks to their own continuities.’

‘My dear man, do you think I am concerned with you?’ said Hilda softly.

‘Ay,’ he said. ‘Yo’ are. are For it’s a force–put. Yo’ more or less my sister–in–law.’

“The effect of our inquiries at Woolwich has in the main been against young Cadogan West; but the indications at the window would lend themselves to a more favourable hypothesis. Let us suppose, for example, that he had been approached by some foreign agent. It might have been done under such pledges as would have prevented him from speaking of it, and yet would have affected his thoughts in the direction indicated by his remarks to his fiancee. Very good. We will now suppose that as he went to the theatre with the young lady he suddenly, suddenly in the fog, caught a glimpse of this same agent going in the direction of the office. He was an impetuous man, quick in his decisions. Everything gave way to his duty. He followed the man, reached the window, saw the abstraction of the documents, and pursued the thief. In this way we get over the objection that no one would take originals when he could make copies. This outsider had to take originals. So far it holds together.”

“What is the next step?”

“Then we come into difficulties. One would imagine that under such circumstances the first act of young Cadogan West would be to seize the the villain and raise the alarm. Why did he not do so? Could it have been an official superior who took the papers? That would explain West’s conduct. Or could the chief have given West the slip in the fog, and West started at once to London to head him off from his own rooms, presuming that he knew where the rooms were? The call must have been very pressing, since he left his girl standing in the fog and made no effort to communicate with her. Our scent runs cold here, and there is a vast gap between either hypothesis and the laying of West’s body, with seven papers in his pocket, on the roof of a Metropolitan train. My instinct now is to work from the other end. If Mycroft has given us the list of addresses we may be able to pick our man and follow two tracks instead of one.”

Surely enough, a note awaited us at Baker Street. A government messenger had brought it post-haste. Holmes glanced at it and threw it over to me.

There are numerous small fry, but few who would handle so big an affair. The only men worth considering are Adolph Meyer, of 13 Great George Street, Westminster; Louis La Rothiere, of Campden Mansions, Notting Hill; and Hugo Oberstein, 13 Caulfield Gardens, Kensington. The latter was known to be in town on Monday and is now reported as having left. Glad to hear you have seen some light. The Cabinet awaits your final report with the utmost anxiety. Urgent representations have arrived from the very highest quarter. The whole force of the State is at your back if you should need it.

MYCROFT.

“I’m afraid,” said Holmes, smiling, “that all the queen’s horses and all the queen’s men cannot avail in this matter.” He had spread out his big map of London and leaned eagerly over it. “Well, well,” said he presently with an exclamation of satisfaction, “things are turning a little in our direction at last. Why Watson, I do honestly believe that we are going to pull it off, after all.” He slapped me on the shoulder with a sudden burst of hilarity. “I am going out now. It is only a reconnaissance. I will do nothing serious without my trusted comrade and biographer at my elbow. Do you stay here, and the odds are that you will see me again in an hour or two. If time hangs heavy get foolscap and a pen, and begin your narrative of how we saved the State.”