house down by Bishopsbridge, so it will be necessary to speak clearly.'
Sir James looked at the telephone, not affectionately, and took up the receiver. 'Well?' he said in his strong voice, and listened. 'Yes,' he said. The next moment Mr. Silver, eagerly watching him, saw a look of amazement and horror. 'Good God!' murmured Sir James. Clutching the instrument, he slowly rose to his feet, still bending ear intently. At intervals he repeated 'Yes.' Presently, as he listened, he glanced at the clock, and spoke quickly to Mr. Silver over the top of the transmitter. 'Go and hunt up Figgis and young Williams. Hurry.' Mr. Silver darted from the room.
The great journalist was a tall, strong, clever Irishman of fifty, swart and black-moustached, a man of untiring business energy, well known in the world, which he understood very thoroughly, and played upon with the half-cynical competence of his race. Yet was he without a touch of the charlatan: he made no mysteries, and no pretences of knowledge, and he saw instantly through these in others. In his handsome, well-bred, well-dressed appearance there was
