venture," said Mrs. Gustus. "I must keep cool."

She got up from her breakwater, holding her notebook very tightly, and
began to walk away. When she looked back, she saw the top of the man's
head moving behind the breakwater, in a parallel direction to her own
course. When he reached the point where the breakwater ended and denied
him cover, he wavered for a moment, and then, with an expression of
elaborate indifference, followed her.

"I must keep even cooler than this," thought Anonyma. "I must try and
catch the spy."

She walked across some waste land sown with memories of picnics, and
reached the main road. The man crossed the waste land behind her. He
tried in a futile way to look as if he were not doing so.

On the main road, Anonyma turned and waited for him. It seemed useless in
that empty landscape to sustain the pretence that they were unaware of
each other.

"Did you wish to speak to me?" she asked, as well as she could for the
great lump of excitement that beat in her throat. Before her eyes visions
of headlines danced: "LADY NOVELIST'S PLUCKY CAPTURE OF A SPY."

The man became dark red as she spoke. "Yes," he said. "I wanted to ask
you what you were writing in that notebook?"

Anonyma paused for a moment, as she decided what she ought to do. Then
she said in a hoarse voice: "I have detailed military information about
this coast for twenty miles round in my notebook, with accurate reports
as to the depth of the water. If you come to my lodgings in D----, I can
show you a map that I have made."

A tremor ran through the stranger.

"A map?" he repeated.

"Yes, a map," said Anonyma; and then, as he did not move, she added on
the spur of the moment, "Also a design for a new kind of bomb which I
bought from a man in London."

"A bomb?" he said.

Anonyma thought that he was evidently a foreigner, though his accent was
English. He seemed to find English rather difficult to understand.

"Why do you tell me all this?" he asked finally.

"Because I recognise your face as that of a sp--I mean a fellow-worker
in the great brotherhood of espionage," said Anonyma.

"Come on, then," said the man.

So they walked off together.

"Why did you take up this--calling?" asked the man presently. "Are you
a German?"

"Well, more or less," said Anonyma. "At least, I have never been a
Christian. I believe that one must take either War or Christianity
seriously. Hardly both."

It was a good opportunity for a m