thing if not thorough.

CHAPTER VII

MR. NAYLOR RECEIVES A VISITOR

I

"Height five feet six and a half inches."

"Five feet eight, sir."

"Chest thirty-eight."

"Thirty-eight and a half, sir."

"Weight eleven stone nine."

"Twelve stone, sir."

"Near enough."

"Yes, sir," replied Thompson.

"You've got everything?"

"Down to his under-wear, sir," was the response.

"The ring?"

"Yes, sir."

Malcolm Sage looked up from the buff-coloured paper before him, then
picking up a photograph from the table, proceeded to study it with
great intentness.

"Yes," he said, "Finlay can do it."

At that moment Colonel Walton strode into the room, smoking the
inevitable cigar. Thompson straightened himself to attention, Malcolm
Sage nodded, then once more became absorbed in the photograph.

"I hear Finlay's here," said Colonel Walton.

Sage looked up and nodded. "We've just been checking his
measurements," he said.

"With that Bergen fellow's?"

Sage nodded.

"It's a considerable risk," said Colonel Walton.

"Finlay likes 'em," retorted Sage without looking up. "I'd give a good
deal to solve that little mystery."

The mystery to which Malcolm Sage referred was the arrest of a man on a
Bergen-Hull boat some ten days previously. Although his passport and
papers were in order, his story when he had been interrogated was not
altogether satisfactory. It had been decided to deport him; but
Malcolm Sage, who had subjected him to a lengthy cross-examination, had
decided that it would be better to detain him for the time being, and
the suspect was consequently lodged in the Tower. Both Malcolm Sage
and Colonel Walton were convinced that he had been sent over on a
special mission.

"Where's Finlay?" asked Colonel Walton.

"He's painting the lily," said Sage with a glint in his eye.

"In other words?" enquired Colonel Walton.

"Seeing how near he can get to this Bergen fellow. I took him down to
the Tower to see the men together."

Colonel Walton nodded.

Malcolm Sage regarded disguise as exclusively the asset of the
detective of fiction. A disguise, he maintained, could always be
identified, although not necessarily penetrated. Few men could
disguise their walk or bearing, no matter how clever they might be with
the aid of false beards and wigs.

"You remember the lost code-book?" Sage queried.

"I do," said Colonel Walton.

"A remarkable piece of work of Finlay's," continued Sage