moment.

"Fiske goes right to the spot," he admitted, "but the question of the
leadership, so far as he is concerned, doesn't come into the sphere of
practical politics. It has been suggested, Miss Abbeway, by one or two
of the more influential delegates, suggested, too, by a vast number of
letters and telegrams which have poured in upon us during the last few
days, that I should be elected to this vacant post."

"You?" she exclaimed, a little blankly.

"Can you think of a more suitable person?" he asked, with a faint note
of truculence in his tone. "You have seen us all together. I don't
wish to flatter myself, but as regards education, service to the cause,
familiarity with public speaking and the number of those I represent--"

"Yes, yes! I see," she interrupted. "Taking the twenty Labour
representatives only, Mr. Fenn, I can see nothing against your
selection, but I fancied, somehow, that some one outside--the Bishop,
for instance--"

"Absolutely out of the question," Fenn declared. "The people would lose
faith in the whole thing in a minute. The person who throws down the
gage to the Prime Minister must have the direct mandate of the people."

They finished dinner presently. Fenn looked with admiration at the gold,
coroneted case from which Catherine helped herself to one of her tiny
cigarettes. He himself lit an American cigarette.

"I had meant, Miss Abbeway," he confided, leaning towards her, "to
suggest a theatre to you to-night--in fact, I looked at some dress
circle seats at the Gaiety with a view to purchasing. Another matter has
cropped up, however. There is a little business for us to do."

"Business?" Catherine repeated.

He produced a folded paper from his pocket and passed it across the
table. Catherine read it with a slight frown.

"An order entitling the bearer to search Julian Orden's apartments!" she
exclaimed. "We don't want to search them, do we? Besides, what authority
have we?"

"The best," he answered, tapping with his discoloured forefinger the
signature at the foot of the strip of paper.

She examined it with a doubtful frown.

"But how did this come into your possession?" she asked.

He smiled at her in superior fashion.

"By asking for it," he replied bluntly. "And between you and me, Miss
Abbeway, there isn't much we might ask for that they'd care to refuse us
just now."

"But the police have already searched Mr. Orden's rooms," she reminded
him.

"The police have be