s the trouble, Oppner?" inquired Rohscheimer thickly. "Is there a
thief here or something?"

"Worse!" drawled the other. "Severac Bablon's here!"

"Oh, Lord!" groaned Rohscheimer, and surreptitiously slipped all his
rings off and into his trousers pocket. "Let's get out before we're all
held up!"

"He don't figure on a hold-up," replied Oppner; "it ain't a strong line
at a matinee. A hop-parade is the time for the crystals. We don't know
what he's layin' for, but it's a cinch he's here."

"How do you know?" asked a brother officer of Haredale's, who had joined
the group.

Mr. Oppner took a cigarette-case from his tail-pocket and held up
between finger and thumb a cigarette stump of an unusual yellow colour.

"We've got on his trail at last!" he said. "He sheds these cigs. like a
moulting chicken sheds feathers. This one was in the tray inside a
taxi--and the taxi dropped his fare right here!"

He returned the cigarette stump to the case, the case to his pocket, and
pushed on after Sheffield. As his stooping form disappeared from view
Sheard entered the room. Immediately he was claimed by Mr. Rohscheimer.

"Hallo, Sheard!" called the financier, and for the moment even the
imminence of the Severac Bablon peril was forgotten--"what's the latest?
Is war declared?"

"There was nothing official up to the time I left," replied the
pressman; "but we are expecting it every minute. Mr. Belford and Lord
Evershed have just been summoned to Buckingham Palace. I met them going
as I came in."

Rohscheimer confidently seized the lapel of the journalist's coat.

"What do you think that means, now?" he asked cunningly.

"It means," replied Sheard, "that within the hour Europe may be in arms!
Haredale is on duty this evening--so there will be no honeymoon!
Everything is at sixes and sevens. I have a couple of cubs watching; and
if Baron Hecht, when he leaves the conference at the Palace, proceeds
home, there may be no war. If he starts for Victoria Station--war is
declared!"

An excited young lady wearing pince-nez, through which she peered
anxiously in quest of someone, tapping her rather prominent front teeth
the while with an HB pencil, sighted Sheard.

"Oh, there you are!" she cried, in evident relief. "Really, Mr. Sheard,
I was despairing of finding _anyone_ to tell me--but you always know
everything."

Sheard bowed ironically. The lady represented one of the oldest families
in Warwichshire and the Fashionable Inte