Page:The council of seven.djvu/83

 "Upon that I offer no opinion. But you remember what Verity said on his return from Tokyo?"

"Yes; and you remember what I said to Verity?"

"I do. But if I may say so, in this business Verity is the man on the spot. And he is most anxious that we should accept guidance in the matter."

Saul Hartz laughed harshly. "The sooner daylight is let into the whole thing, the better—that's my view."

The look of trouble deepened in the editor's face. "May I ask you not to forget that the police are up against the stiffest proposition they have ever had to tackle?"

"Why have you turned devil's advocate, Gage?" Saul Hartz's tone was sharply impatient.

"On public grounds," was the reluctant answer.

"Why, you are as bad as those old women in Whitehall."

"But look what has happened within a year. Three clear cases. One in Tokyo, one in New York, and now one in London. In each case a warning, a disregard of the warning, followed in one instance by a mysterious disappearance, and in the other two by an even more mysterious death."

"Well, no matter what Scotland Yard may say or what it may do, we, at any rate, shall not allow ourselves to be frightened by any kind of fee faw fum."

Mr. Gage shook his head. "This terrible affair," he said weightily, "amply confirms the opinion I have ventured already to express to you that the police are