John Dene of Toronto: A Comedy of Whitehall

CHAPTER VIII

DOROTHY WEST AT HOME

"Mother mine," cried Dorothy West, as she withdrew the pins from her hat, "John Dene's a dear, and I think his passion for me is developing."

"Dorothy!" cried Mrs. West, a tiny white-haired lady whose face still retained traces of youthful beauty.

"You needn't be shocked, lovie; John Dene is as worthy as his namesake in Evangeline." She laughed lightly. "Now I must eat. John Dene's like sea air, he's so stimulating;" and she began to eat the dinner that Mrs. West always prepared with such care.

For some minutes she watched with a smile of approval her daughter's healthy appetite.

"I think I should like Mr. Dene, Dorothy," she said at length. "I have always heard that Canadians are very nice to women. You must ask him to call."

"Oh, you funny little mother!" she laughed. "You forget that we have come down in the world, and that I'm a typist."

"A secretary, dear," corrected Mrs. West gently.

"Well, secretary, then; but even a secretary doesn't invite her employer to tea, even when the tea is as mother makes it. It's not done, so the less that's said of John, I think, the better," she quoted gaily. "Oh! by the way," she added, "you might get his goat; Sir Lyster does."

"His goat, dear!" Mrs. West looked up with a puzzled expression.

Dorothy explained the allusion. She went on to tell of some of the doings of John Dene, his impatience, his indifference to and contempt for constituted authority. In short she added a few vivid side-lights to the picture she had already given her mother of how John Dene had come and carried all before him.

"I think," she said in conclusion, screwing up her pretty features, "that John Dene is rather a dear." Then after a pause she added, "You see, he is also a man."

"A man, my dear," questioned Mrs. West, looking at her daughter with a smile.

"Yes, mother, he's so intensely masculine. I get so fed up with——"

"Dorothy!" expostulated Mrs. West.

"Yes, I know it's trying, mother, but I get so weary of the subaltern and junior naval officer. Of course they're splendid and brave; but they don't seem men."

"But think of how they have given their lives," began Mrs. West.

"Yes; but we see those who haven't, mother, and very few of them have chevrons on their sleeves. Now John Dene is quite different. He always seems to be a man; yet he never forgets that you are a woman, although he never appears to be conscious of your being a woman."

Dorothy caught her mother's eye, and laughed.

"Of course it sounds utterly ridiculous I know; but there it is, and then think of what——" She suddenly broke off.

"Yes, dear," said Mrs. West gently.

"I was nearly letting out official secrets, mother. Of course I mustn't do that, must I?"

"Of course not, dear," said Mrs. West.

"Yes," continued Dorothy, her head on one side, "I like John Dene. It must be ripping to be able to bully a First Lord of the Admiralty," she added irrelevantly.

"Bully a First Lord," said Mrs. West. Mrs. West seemed to be in a perpetual state of repeating in a bewildered manner her daughter's startling statements.

"He doesn't care for anybody. He calls Mr. Blair, that's Sir Lyster's secretary, the prize seal, and I'm sure he takes a delight in frightening the poor man. That's the best of being a Canadian, you see you don't care a damn——"

"Dorothy!" There was horror in Mrs. West's voice.

"I'm so sorry, mother dear; but it slipped out, you know, and really it's such an awfully convenient word, isn't it? It's so different from not caring a bother, or not caring a blow. Anyway, when you're a Canadian you don't care a—well you know, for anybody. If a man happens to be a lord or a duke, you're rude to him just to show that you're as good as he is. Sometimes, mother, I wish I were a Canadian," said Dorothy pensively. "I should so like to 'ginger-up' Sir Lyster."

"Your language, my dear," said Mrs. West gently.

"Oh, that's John Dene," said Dorothy airily. "That's his favourite expression, 'ginger-up.' He came over here to 'ginger-up' the Admiralty, and in fact 'ginger-up' anybody who didn't very strongly object to being 'gingered-up,' and those who did, well he gingers them up just the same. You should see poor Mr. Blair under the process." Dorothy laughed as she thought of Mr. Blair's sufferings. "The girls call him 'Oh, Reginald!' and he looks it," she added.

Mrs. West smiled vaguely, finding it a little difficult to follow her daughter along these paths of ultra-modernism.

"You see, if Sir Lyster says to me 'go,' I have to go," continued Dorothy, "and if he says to me 'come,' I have to come; but if he says to John Dene 'go,' he just says 'shucks.'"

"Says what, Dorothy?"

"Shucks!" she repeated with a laugh, "it means go to—well, you know, mother."

"And does he say that to Sir Lyster?" enquired Mrs. West in awe-struck voice.

Dorothy nodded vigorously.

"The only one that seems to understand him is Sir Bridgman North, and he never stands on his dignity, you know. If I were in the Navy," said Dorothy meditatively, "I should like to be under Sir Bridgman, he's really rather a dear."

"But why do——" began Mrs. West, "why does Sir Lyster allow——"

"Allow," broke in Dorothy. "It doesn't matter what you allow with John Dene. If you agree with him he just grunts; if you don't he says 'shucks,' or else he questions whether you've got any head-filling."

"Any what?" asked Mrs. West.

"Head-filling, that means brains. Oh, you've got an awful lot to learn," she added, nodding at her mother in mock despair. "I think John Dene very clever," she added.

"Dorothy, you mustn't call him 'John Dene."

"He's always called 'John Dene,'" said Dorothy. "You can't think of him as anything but John Dene, and do you know, mother, all the other girls are so intrigued. They're always asking me how I get on with 'the bear,' as they call him. That's because he doesn't take any notice of them, except Marjorie Rogers, and she's as cheeky as a robin."

"But he isn't a bear, is he, Dorothy?"

"A bear? He's the most polite creature that ever existed," said Dorothy—"when he remembers it," she added after a moment's pause. "You see they all expect me to marry him."

"Dorothy!"

"I'm not so sure that they're wrong, either," she added naïvely. "You see, he's got plenty of money and——"

"I don't like to hear you talk like that, dear," said Mrs. West gravely.

"Oh, I'm horrid, aren't I?" she cried, running over to her mother and putting her arm round her neck. "What a dreadful thing it must be for you, poor mother mine, to have such a daughter! She outrages all the dear old Victorian conventions, doesn't she?"

"You mustn't talk like that, Dorothy dear," said Mrs. West. There was in her voice that which told her daughter she was in earnest.

"All right, mother dear, I won't; you know my bark is worse than my bite, don't you?"

"Yes, but dear——"

"You see, way down, as John Dene would say, in his own heart there is chivalry, and that is very, very rare nowadays among men. He is much nicer to me than he would be to Lady Grayne, or Mrs. Llewellyn John, or to the Queen herself, I believe. I'm sure he likes me," added Dorothy half to herself. "You see," she added, "he broke my teapot, and he owes me something for that, doesn't he?"

"Dorothy, you are very naughty." There was no rebuke in Mrs. West's voice.

"And you're wondering how it came about that such a dear, sweet, conventional, lovely, Victorian symbol of respectability and convention should have had such a dreadfully outrageous daughter as Dorothy West. Now confess, mother, aren't you?"

Mrs. West merely smiled the indulgent smile that Dorothy always interpreted into forgiveness for her lapses, past, present and to come.

"You see, mother, John Dene has got it into his head that we're hopelessly out of date," she said. "He's quite sincere. He thinks we're fools, Sir Lyster, Sir Bridgman and the whole lot of us, and as for poor Mr. Blair, he knows he's a fool. He thinks that Mr. Llewellyn John is almost a fool, in fact he's sure in his own mind that unless you happen to be born a Canadian you're a fool and can't help it. He's quite nice about it, because it really isn't your fault."

"I'm afraid he must be very narrow-minded," said Mrs. West gently.

"No, he isn't, that's where it's so funny, it's just his idea. He looks upon himself as a heaven-sent corrective to the British Government. I'm afraid poor John Dene is going to have a nasty jar before he's through, as he would say himself."

"How do you mean, Dorothy?" enquired Mrs. West.

"I mustn't say any more, because I should be divulging official secrets. The other girls are so curious to know what is happening. Bishy, that's Miss Bishcroft, asked me whether John Dene made love to me, and Rojjie is sure that he kisses me." Dorothy rippled off into laughter.

"How impertinent of her!" Mrs. West was shocked.

"It wasn't impertinence, mother, it was funny. If you could only see John Dene, and imagine him making love to anyone. It really is funny. Sometimes I sit and wonder if he knows how to kiss a girl."

"Dorothy, you are——" began Mrs. West.

"Why shouldn't we be frank and open about such matters? Every man kisses a girl at some time during his life, except John Dene," she added. "In Whitehall it's nothing but minutes and kisses. Why shouldn't we talk about it? It's helping to win the war. It's so silly to hide everything in that silly Victorian way of ours. If a nice girl meets a nice man she wants him to kiss her, and she's disappointed if he doesn't. Now isn't she?" challenged Dorothy as she perched herself upon the arm of her mother's chair and looked down at her, her eyebrows and mouth screwed up, impertinent and provocative.

"I wish you wouldn't talk like that, dear," said Mrs. West, as she regarded her daughter's pretty features.

"Why, mother?" she enquired, bending and brushing a swift kiss upon her mother's white hair.

"It—it doesn't seem——" she paused, then added rather weakly, "it doesn't seem quite nice."

Dorothy jumped up and stood before her mother, smiling mischievously.

"And so you don't think I'm quite nice, Mrs. West?" She made an elaborate curtsey. "Thank you very much indeed. At the Admiralty there are quite a lot of young men, and some old ones, too, who don't agree with you," she added, returning to her chair.

"But you mustn't say such—such things," protested Mrs. West weakly.

"But, mother, when you were a girl and knew a nice man, didn't you want him to kiss you?"

"We never thought about such things. We——"

"Didn't you want father to kiss you?" persisted Dorothy.

"We were engaged, my dear, and your dear father was so——"

"But before you were engaged. Suppose father had tried to kiss you. What would you have done?"

The girl's eyes were on her mother, mischievous and challenging. A faint blush tinged Mrs. West's cheeks.

"I'll tell you what you'd have done, you dear, naughty little mother. You'd have pretended to be shocked, but in your heart you would have been glad, and you'd have lain awake all night thinking what an awful rip you had been." She nodded her head wisely.

"Sometimes," said Mrs. West after a pause, "I wish it had not been necessary for you to work. Girls seem so different nowadays from what they were when I was young."

"We are, you dear little mouse," smiled Dorothy. "We know a lot more, and to be forewarned is to be forearmed. I'm glad I didn't live when you had to faint at the sight of a mouse, or swoon when you were kissed. It would be such a waste," she added gaily.

Mrs. West sighed, conscious that a new age of womanhood had dawned with which she was out of touch.

"Mother," said Dorothy presently, "what made you love father?"

Mrs. West looked up in surprise at her daughter, but continued to fold her napkin and place it in her ring before replying.

"Because your father, Dorothy, was——" she hesitated.

"My father," suggested Dorothy.

Mrs. West smiled; but there was a far-away look in her eyes. "Everybody loved your father," she went on a moment later.

"Yes, mother, but everybody didn't marry him," she said practically.

"Noooo——" hesitated Mrs. West.

"But you mean to say that everybody would have liked to marry him."

"He was very wonderful," said Mrs. West, a note of sadness creeping into her voice.

"But you haven't answered my question," persisted Dorothy. "Why is it that we women love men?"

Mrs. West was not conscious of the quaint phrasing of her daughter's remark.

"We don't love men, Dorothy," she cried, "we love a man, the right man."

"But," persisted Dorothy, "why do we do it? They're not pretty and they're not very interesting," she emphasised the "very," "and only a few of them are clever. Sometimes in the Tube coming home I see a girl and a man holding hands. What is it that makes them want to hold hands?"

"It's natural to fall in love," said Mrs. West gently.

"But that's not falling in love," protested Dorothy scornfully. "If I fell in love with a man I shouldn't want to hold his hand in a train. I should hate him if he expected it."

"It's a question of class," said Mrs. West a little primly.

"Oh! mother, what an awful snob you are," cried Dorothy, jumping up and going round and giving her mother a hug. "Let's go into the drawing-room and be comfy and have a chat."

When they were seated, Mrs. West in an armchair and Dorothy on a stool at her feet, the girl continued her interrogations. "Now suppose," she continued, "I were to fall in love with a man who was ugly, ill-mannered, badly dressed, with very little to say for himself. Why should I do it?" Dorothy looked challengingly up at her mother.

"But you wouldn't, dear," said Mrs. West with gentle conviction.

"Oh, mother, you're awfully trying you know," she cried in mock despair. "You've got to suppose that I have, or could. Why should I do it?" Mrs. West gazed at her daughter a little anxiously, then shook her head.

"Now I can quite understand," went on Dorothy, half to herself, "why a man should fall in love with me. I'm pretty and bright, wear nice things, particularly underneath——"

"Dorothy!" broke in Mrs. West in a tone of shocked protest.

She laughed. "Oh, mother, you're a dreadful prude. Why do you think girls wear pretty shoes and stockings, and low cut blouses as thin as a cobweb?"

"Hush! Dorothy, you mustn't say such things." There was pain in Mrs. West's voice.

"I wish we could face facts," said Dorothy with a sigh. "You see, mother dear," she continued, "when you're in a government office, with heaps of other girls and men about, you get to know things, see things, and sometimes you get to hate things."

"I have always regretted," began Mrs. West sadly.

"You mustn't do that, mother dear," cried Dorothy; "it has been an education. But what I want to know is, what is it in a man that attracts a girl?"

"Goodness, honour and——" began Mrs. West.

"No, it isn't," said Dorothy, "at least they don't attract me."

Mrs. West looked pained but said nothing.

"You see," continued Dorothy, "there are such a lot of good men about, and honourable men, and—and—they're so dreadfully dull and monotonous. I couldn't marry that sort of man," she added with conviction.

"But——" began Mrs. West. "You wouldn't——"

Then she paused.

"I can't explain it, mother," she said, "but I should hate to be doing the same thing always."

"But we are doing the same things always, Dorothy," said Mrs. West.

"Oh! no we're not," protested Dorothy. "I never know until I get home on Saturday where I'm going to take you. Now if I had a husband, a good and honourable husband, he would begin about Thursday saying that on Saturday afternoon we would go to Hampstead, or to Richmond, or to—oh! anywhere. Then when Saturday came I should hate the very name of the place he had chosen. Then on Sunday we should go to church in the morning, for a walk in the afternoon, pay a call or two, then church or a cinema in the evening. That's good and honourable married life," she concluded with decision.

Mrs. West looked down with a puzzled expression on her face.

"Wait a minute, mother," said Dorothy. "Now we'll imagine the real me married to a good and honourable man. At twelve-thirty on the Saturday that he has arranged to lose himself and me at the maze at Hampton Court, I telephone to say that we're going to Brighton, and that he's to meet me at Victoria at half-past one, and I'll bring his things. Now what do you think he'd do?" With head on one side she gazed challengingly at her mother.

"I—I don't know," faltered Mrs. West.

"I do," said Dorothy with conviction. "He'd have a fit. Then if I wanted him to come for a 'bus ride just as he was going to bed," went on Dorothy, "he'd have another fit; and if one fine morning, just as he was off to the office, I were to ask him not to go, but to take me to Richmond instead, he'd have a third fit, and then I should be a widow."

"A widow!" questioned Mrs. West. "What are you talking about?"

"Third fits are always fatal, mother," she said wisely. Then with a laugh she added, "Oh, there's a great time in store for the man who marries Dorothy West. He will have to have a strong heart, a robust constitution and above all any amount of stamina," and she gave a mischievous little chuckle of joy. Then a moment after, looking gravely at her mother she said, "You must have been very wicked, lovie, or you'd never have had such a daughter to plague you. I'm your cross;" but Mrs. West merely smiled.

CHAPTER IX

DEPARTMENT Z. AT WORK

"Naylor isn't satisfied then." Colonel Walton glanced across at Malcolm Sage, who was gazing appreciatively at his long, lender fingers.

"He's the shyest bird I've ever come across," said Sage without looking up. "He gave Finlay a rare wigging for that call. Now he's having him watched."

"I expected that," said Colonel Walton, engrossed in cutting the end of a cigar.

"I think it's jealousy," continued Sage. "He's afraid of the special agent getting all the kudos—and the plunder," he added. "It was a happy chance getting that Bergen chap."

"I'm rather concerned about Finlay," said Colonel Walton.

"Good man, Finlay." There was a note of admiration in Sage's voice. "He's quite cut adrift from us. He's nothing if not thorough. I can't get in touch with him."

"Of course he knows?"

"That he's being watched? Yes."

"Who's looking after him?"

"Hoyle." Sage drew his pipe from his pocket and proceeded to charge it from a chamois-leather tobacco-pouch. "I've had to call Thompson off, I think they linked him up with us."

"That's a pity," said Colonel Walton, gazing at the end of his cigar. "He's a better man than Hoyle."

"It's that little chap they've got," continued Sage, "lives at Wimbledon, retired commercial-traveller, clever devil." Malcolm Sage never grudged praise to an opponent.

"How about John Dene?"

"He's not taking any risks," said Sage, as he applied a match to his pipe. "But they'll never let him go north."

"Then we must prevent him."

"Perhaps you'd like to take on that little job, chief." There was a momentary suspicion of a twinkle in Sage's eye before a volume of tobacco smoke blotted it out.

"I'm afraid it'll force our hand," said Colonel Walton.

"That burglary business complicated things," said Sage, as he sucked in his lips, with him a sign of annoyance. "It was a mistake to keep it dark."

"That was Sir Lyster."

"It made Naylor suspicious."

"Has Finlay seen him since?" enquired Colonel Walton.

"Naylor must have given him the secret-code. They've met several times; but I believe Naylor is determined to act on his own. He's a weird creature. I wish I could get in touch with Finlay, however."

"Why not try the taxi?"

"I've had Rogers following him round all the time; but Finlay hasn't once taken a taxi."

"I'm afraid he's taking a big risk——" began Colonel Walton. "That Naylor fellow——" He paused.

Sage nodded.

During the previous ten days Department Z. had learned a great deal about the comings and goings of Mr. Montagu Naylor of Streatham. It had become manifest to Sage that he had to do with a man who had reduced cunning and caution to a fine art. His every act seemed to have been carefully thought out beforehand, not only in relation to himself, but to what might grow directly out of it.

During a walk he would sometimes turn suddenly and proceed swiftly in the direction from which he had come, as if he had forgotten something, looking keenly at every one he passed. At others he would step into a shop, where he could be seen keeping a careful watch through the window. A favourite trick was to walk briskly round a corner, then stop and look in some shop window with a small mirror held in the palm of his hand.

From the first Malcolm Sage had realised that the conventional methods of shadowing a suspect would be useless for his purpose. Those in whom Department Z. were interested would be old hands at the game, and to set a single person to watch them would inevitably result in the discovery of what was afoot. He therefore set at least three men, or women, to dog the footsteps of the suspect.

These would follow each other at intervals of from twenty-five to a hundred yards, according to the district in which they were operating. At a signal that the first in the line was dropping out, the trail would be taken up by number two, who in turn would relinquish the work to number three. Sometimes as many as six were allocated to one shadowing.

This method had the additional advantage of enabling the Department to assure itself that the watchers were not in turn being watched.

It was no uncommon thing for a suspect to arrange to have himself shadowed in order to ascertain whether or no there were any one on his track. This was a favourite device with Mr. Naylor.

For nearly two years Department Z. had been endeavouring to solve the problem of a secret organisation, with the offshots of which they were constantly coming into contact. The method this organisation adopted was one of concentration upon a single object. At one time it would be at the sailing of vessels from home ports, at another the munitions output, or again the anti-aircraft defences of London.

Malcolm Sage was convinced that somewhere there was at work a controlling mind, one that weighed every risk and was prepared for all eventualities. Individuals had been shadowed, some had been arrested, much to Sage's disgust. The efforts of the organisation had frequently been countered and its objects defeated; but Department Z. had hitherto been unable to penetrate beyond the outer fringe. The most remarkable thing of all was that no document of any description had been discovered, either on the person of those arrested, or through the medium of the post.

Scotland Yard stoutly denied the existence of the organisation. They claimed to have made a clean sweep of all secret service agents in their big round-up on the outbreak of war. Whatever remained were a few small fry that had managed to slip through the meshes of their net. Malcolm Sage merely shrugged his shoulders and worked the harder.

When it had been discovered that the famous Norvelt aeroplane, which was to give the Allies the supremacy of the air, had been copied by the Germans, the War Cabinet regarded the matter as one of the gravest setbacks the Allied cause had received. Mr. Llewellyn John had openly reproached Colonel Walton with failure. Again when time after time a certain North Sea convoy was attacked, the Authorities knew that it could be only as a result of information having leaked out to the enemy. A raid into the Bight of Heligoland had been met in a way that convinced those who had planned it that the enemy had been warned, although the utmost secrecy had been observed. All these things had tended to cause the War Cabinet uneasiness, and Department Z. had been urged to redouble its efforts to find out the means by which information was conveyed to the enemy.

"We must watch and wait, just hang about on the outer fringe. When we find the thread it will lead to the centre of things," Sage had remarked philosophically. In the meantime he worked untiringly, keeping always at the back of his mind the problem of this secret organisation.

Day by day the record of Mr. Montagu Naylor's activities enlarged. With him caution seemed to have become an obsession. As Malcolm Sage went through the daily reports of his agents he was puzzled to account for many of Mr. Naylor's actions other than by the fact that circumlocution had become with him a habit.

Among other things that came to light was Mr. Naylor's fondness for open spaces, and the frequency with which he got into conversation with strangers. He would wander casually into Kew Gardens, or Waterlow Park, or in fact anywhere, seat himself somewhere on a bench, and before he had been there ten minutes, someone would inevitably select the same bench on which to rest himself or herself, with the result that they would soon drift into desultory conversation with Mr. Naylor.

The same thing would happen at a restaurant at which Mr. Naylor might be lunching, dining or taking tea. With strangers his manner seemed irresistible.

It would sometimes happen that he would keep one of the telephone appointments, pass through the thoroughfare indicated, and proceed either to a park or a tea-shop, where later he would find himself in casual conversation with someone who, curiously enough, had been in that particular thoroughfare when he passed through it.

For some time Malcolm Sage was greatly puzzled by the fact that even when the name of a long thoroughfare were indicated in one of the telephone messages, such as Oxford Street, Marylebone Road, or even the Fulham Road, Mr. Naylor never experienced any difficulty in locating the whereabouts of his subordinate. Sage gave instructions for the exact position of each thoroughfare to be indicated. As a result he discovered that contact was always established in the neighbourhood of the building numbered 10.

"It's the German mind," remarked Sage one day to Colonel Walton. "It leaves nothing to chance, or to the intelligence of the other fellow."

As each one of Mr. Naylor's associates was located, he or she was continuously shadowed. In consequence the strain upon the resources of Department Z. became increasingly severe. It was like an army advancing into an enemy country, and having to furnish the lines of communication from its striking force. Sometimes Sage himself was engaged in the shadowing, and once or twice even Colonel Walton.

"By the time we've finished, there won't be even the office cat left," Thompson one day remarked to Gladys Norman, a typist whom Malcolm Sage had picked out of one of the Departments through which he had passed during his non-stop career. She had already shown marked ability by her cleverness and resource, to say nothing of her impudence.

"Never mind, Tommy," she had replied. "It's all experience, and after the war, when I marry you and we start our private inquiry bureau——" She nodded her head knowingly. "Why, I've got enough facts from my own department to divorce half the officers on the staff," she added.

The work of shadowing Mr. Naylor was not without its humours. Sometimes Department Z. was led away on false scents. On one occasion a week was spent in tracking a venerable-looking old gentleman, he turned out to be a quite respectable pensioned civil servant, who, out of the kindness of his own heart, had passed the time of day with Mr. Naylor.

The plan decided upon by Colonel Walton and Malcolm Sage was carefully to watch all Mr. Naylor's associates and, at a given time, make a clean sweep of the lot. To achieve this effect a zero hour was to be established on a certain day. Each was to be arrested as soon after that time as it was possible. This was mainly due to Malcolm Sage's suspicion that some scheme of warning existed between the various members of the combination, whereby any danger threatening one was quickly notified to all the others.

"In all probability we shall get a few harmless birds into the net," Malcolm Sage had remarked. "Probably the sister of an M.P., or the head of a department in one of the new Ministries; but that can't be helped."

"Still I should prefer that it didn't happen," Colonel Walton had said drily. "You know the Skipper hates questions in the House."

"By the way," said Malcolm Sage to Colonel Walton one day, "Thompson sent in an interesting report this morning."

"Naylor?" queried Colonel Walton.

Malcolm Sage nodded.

"He's having a sort of small greenhouse arrangement fitted in the window of the front-room of the basement. It may be for flowers or for salad."

"Or——?" interrogated Colonel Walton.

Malcolm Sage merely shrugged his shoulders as he proceeded to dig the ashes out of his pipe.

The work of Department Z. continued quietly and unostentatiously. John Dene was never permitted out of sight, except when in some private place. This meant the constant changing of those responsible for keeping him under observation.

The necessity of this was not more evident to Department Z. than to John Dene himself. In spite of his scornful manner, he was not lacking in caution, as soon became obvious to Malcolm Sage. At the hotel he was careful, taking neither food nor drink in his room. He never dined two consecutive nights at the same restaurant, and he consistently refused all overtures from strangers.

It soon became evident to Malcolm Sage that John Dene realised how great was the danger by which he was threatened.

The ransacking of his room at the Ritzton left John Dene indifferent. The fact that he never locked the small safe he kept at his office at Waterloo Place was not without its significance for Malcolm Sage.

In the course of the next few weeks Malcolm Sage learned a great deal about John Dene of Toronto. Although proof against the wiles of confidence men, always on the look-out for the colonials, he fell an easy victim to the plausible beggar. He never refused a request for assistance, and the record of his unostentatious charities formed a no inconsiderable portion of the rapidly increasing dossier at Department Z.

Many were the incidents recorded of John Dene's kindness of heart. A child smiling up into his eyes would cause him to stop, bend down and ask its name, or where it lived. Whilst the little one was sucking an embarrassed finger John Dene would be feeling in his pocket for a coin that a moment later would cause the youngster to gaze after him in speechless wonder, clutching in his grimy hand a shilling or a half-a-crown.

Once he was observed leading a tearful little girl of about five years old up the Haymarket. The child had apparently become lost, and John Dene was seeking a policeman into whose care to consign her. It became obvious to Malcolm Sage that John Dene's weak points were children and "lame dogs."

Thompson, who first had charge of the guarding of John Dene, reported that one of the most assiduous of those who seemed to interest themselves in the movements of the Canadian, was a little man in a grey suit, with a pair of shifty eyes that never remained for more than a second on any one object.

"He's clever, sir," Thompson had remarked to Sage, "clever as a vanload of monkeys, and he takes cover like an alien," he added grinning, at his own joke.

"Has he linked up with Naylor yet?"

Thompson shook his head. "The old bird's too crafty for that, sir," he said. "He only comes up against the small fry. This little chap in the grey suit is something bigger."

The officials at Department Z. soon discovered that the chiefs of the organisation, against which they were working, never came into contact with each other. Communication was established verbally by subordinates. Another thing that added to the difficulties of Sage's task was that a man, who had for some days been particularly active, would suddenly drop out, apparently being superseded by someone else with whom he had not previously been in contact. Later, the man who had dropped out would pick up an entirely different thread. This meant innumerable loose ends, all of which had to be followed up and then held until they began to develop along new lines.

"It's a great game played slow, Gladys," Thompson remarked one day to Gladys Norman as they sat waiting for Malcolm Sage.

"Slow," cried the girl. "If this is slow, what's fast?"

"Her initials are G. N.," was the reply.

Malcolm Sage entered at the moment when Gladys had succeeded in making her colleague's hair look like that of an Australian aborigine.