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WHEN dinner was over, the two men retired to coffee and cigars in the library. Lord Brooke seemed able to talk of nothing but the disaster to the fleet.

“Think of it,” he said. “Cradock and all the others, drowned like dogs. I can t believe it.”

“I confess,” said Hoffman, “that I cannot either. I understood, from what I have seen in the papers, that the flagship carried nine-inch guns. That should have given her the range of the Germans, Von Spee’s vessels carried nothing above an eight.”

“It is true,” Lord Brooke replied, “that the Good Hope had nine-inch guns in her main battery, but there was nothing aboard any of the other ships of our squadron of larger calibre than six-inch. The two German cruisers, the Scharnhorst and the Gneisenau, are able ships, and very fast. Our squadron must have been out-manoeuvered, and battered to pieces by the enemy’s eight-inch guns, without being able to bring their shorter range batteries into action. England has got to face the bitter truth. Our Pacific squadron has been defeated.”

Hoffman nodded. The instructions of the morning crowded into his brain. Lord Brooke, the man with the keen grey eyes had said, was at times apt to be indiscreet, to talk. He seemed on the point of doing so, now.

“I suppose you will send out a new squadron, and hunt down the enemy’s vessels,” Hoffman remarked, carelessly.

“Yes,” his companion assented. “That must be our object, of course. But it is easier said than done. We have plenty of vessels available, older battle cruisers, of the Inflexible, the Invincible type, with both the guns and the speed to make short work of von Spee’s squadron, but the problem is to find him. The chase may lead around the world. We know that the German admiral is off the coast of Chile, at present, but where will he be next week, the week after? Even without facilities for docking, for replenishing fuel, the enemy’s ships are very fast. A stern chase, you know, is a long one. And after all, we have no knowledge as to which way they will go. They may turn north, and strike the San Francisco-Yokohama route. Or they may turn south, round the Horn, and be half-way to the African coast, before our squadron could reach the south Atlantic. What orders shall we give our commander—to End von Spee? I confess that, were I to put to sea with such instructions I should be at a loss to know what to do.” The Englishman gazed into the fire, his ruddy face wrinkled in thought. Hoffman said nothing. The truth of what his companion had told him was self-evident.

“The worst thing of all,” Lord Brooke went on, “would be to have the Germans separate. They would be wise to do so, for in that way they would be able to play havoc with our commerce at any number of widely separated points, and it would take months to hunt down each ship separately. The Naval Staff has been considering the problem all the afternoon, from every possible angle. I am tired out.” He lay back in his chair, and puffed nervously at his cigar.

Again Hoffman hesitated to speak, although the opportunity was such a golden one. Lord Brooke, it appeared, wanted to talk, to cofide his difficulties, his problems, to someone’s ears. Hoffman emptied his demi-tasse.

“Did you arrive at any conclusion?” he asked, hating himself for the words.

“Yes. In a way. It has been decided to send out a fast battle-cruiser squadron under Vice Admiral Sir Frederick Sturdee. His flagship will be the Inflexible. He will set sail a week from tomorrow, to find von Spee.”

Hoffman listened to the words in amazement. The importance of the information so carelessly vealed, by means of a slight accent, his Teutonic origin. Someone pointed to the package under his arm, and suggested that it might be a bomb. The man, frightened by the demonstration, started to run, dropping the package as he did so. One of the crowd picked it up, stripped off the wrappings and disclosed what appeared to be a metal cylinder, with a screw cap at one end. The bystanders, convinced that it was a bomb, rushed after the fellow with loud cries, caught him, and before the police could intervene he had been badly beaten. In fact, but for the arrival of the police, he would certainly have been killed. The metal cylinder, Patricia said in conclusion, turned out to be nothing but a somewhat battered vacuum bottle, containing hot coffee. She mentioned the matter to show how bitter the feeling was against spies and the like.

“If the crowd had had three minutes more, the man would have been torn to pieces,” she said. “Yet, in spite of the terrible danger, it is well known that London is filled with German secret agents. Even the movements of the fleet, the crossing of transports, the location of training camps, aircraft defenses, munition works, are known, and reported in some mysterious way to the enemy. It is certain that there are several German wireless stations along the southeast coast, and news of the most intimate character, involving even the decisions of the Army and Navy staffs, is constantly being transmitted by means of them. No one knows how this news gets out, and yet it does. It’s scarcely safe to trust anyone, nowadays.”

Hoffman felt the blood rising to his cheeks. How simple, after all, were the means of which the girl spoke. He glanced at Lord Brooke, wondering if Patricia’s words would cause him to remember that he himself had, not ten minutes before, been guilty of the very sort of indiscretion of which his sister now complained. The nobleman, however, seemed singularly placid and unmoved. He puffed with contentment at his cigar. One might have supposed that his confidence of a few minutes before had passed completely from his mind.

And yet, Hoffman argued, his complacency arose, no doubt, from a firm belief that he had no cause to doubt the honesty and good faith of the members of his own family. It was a silent compliment that made the young man squirm. Only an amazing bit of knowledge, that he alone, of all those in the room possessed, served to bolster up his courage. He would go through with what he had undertaken, even if it cost him not only Patricia’s friendship and respect, but his life. There were conditions, in the oath he had taken, that gave to his determination the strength of steel. Scarcely even to himself could he admit what those conditions were.

Patricia spoke again, her face flushed, her eyes shining.

“I would rather be cut to pieces with knives or thrown into boiling oil, than be a spy,” she burst forth. “Nothing in the world could be more despicable.”

“And yet,” Lord Brooke remarked, after a moment’s silence, “there are English spies, as well, my dear, and they risk their lives, just as those of the enemy do, a thousand times a day, in the service of their country.”

This aspect of the case seemed not to have occurred to the girl. She turned to Lord Brooke with a look of chagrin.

“I ’m wrong, I suppose,” she exclaimed. “Everything is fair, they say, in love and war. But I would rather serve my country in some other way.”

“And yet,” her brother went on, with a quiet smile, “I am sure, Patricia, that if you were to learn, tonight, that the German fleet had left Wilhelmshaven, to attack our transport service to France, you would not hesitate an instant, to deliver that information to the war office. In fact, I fancy, you would take a positive pleasure in doing so.” He smiled, and patted his sister’s hand. “Instead of condemning spies, I only wish we had a few more, as efficient, as unscrupulous, as daring, as those of the enemy. But let us talk of something else. These war discussions are becoming tiresome.”

Hoffman, when the conversation turned to his unfulfilled desires to go to the front, found himself unable to join in the discussion. He was leaving in the morning, yet found his lips sealed. What would Patricia, what would they all think, when they learned of his departure? He determined' to write to the girl, from Rotterdam, and give her some plausible explanation of his sudden disappearance. Forbidden, by his instructions, to speak in advance of his movements, there existed no reason, he argued, why he should not refer to them, in retrospect. A little later he took his leave, pleading as his excuse some letters that must be dispatched by the morning’s post.