r in by another gate.

"Primitive?" he said.

"Yes. We have become rather primitive, especially the women. They have
lost a deal of self-consciousness. They exact less. They give more--oh,
superbly more! It's the effect of war, of course. They have jumped down
off their little pinnacles. Let me put it coarsely. They are saved from
rape by the fighting man, and they know it. Consequently all men benefit
and not least," Sir Charles lit his cigarette, "that beast of
abomination, the professional manipulator of women, the man who lives by
them and on them, who cajoles them first and blackmails them afterwards,
who has the little attentions, the appealing voice, in fact all the
tricks of his trade ready at his fingers' ends. However, Millie Splay's
awake to the danger now."

"Danger!" Hillyard sharply exclaimed.

"Quite right. It's too strong a word. I take it back," Hardiman agreed
at once. But he was not in the habit of using words wildly. He had said
exactly what he meant to say, and having aroused the attention which he
meant to arouse, he calmly withdrew the word. "I rubbed it into
Chichester's thick head that Escobar was overmuch at Rackham Park, and
in the end--it percolated."

Much the same account of Escobar, with this instance of Rackham Park
omitted, was given to Hillyard by Commodore Graham on the Friday
morning.

"He is the kind of man whom men loathe and women like. He runs about
London, gets a foot in here and there. You know what London is, even now
in the midst of this war, with its inability to be surprised, and its
indifference to strange things. You might walk down Regent Street
dressed up as a Cherokee Indian, feathers and tomahawk and all, and how
many Cockneys would take the trouble to turn round and look at you
twice? It was pretty easy for Escobar to slip about unnoticed."

Commodore Graham bent his head over the case of tubes which Hillyard had
brought with him.

"We'll have a look-out kept for these things. There have been none of
them in England up till now."

Martin Hillyard returned to the personality of Mario Escobar.

"Did you suspect him before?" he asked.

Commodore Graham pushed the cigarettes towards Hillyard.

"Scotland Yard has kept an eye on him. That sort of adventurer is always
dangerous."

He rang the bell, and on Miss Cheyne's appearance called for what
information the office had concerning Mario Escobar. Miss Cheyne
returned with a book in which Escobar's dossier w