Jasper Thrale’s mission was no easy one. England, it appeared, was slightly preoccupied at the moment, and had no ear for warnings. Generally, he was either treated as a fanatic and laughed at, or he was told that he greatly exaggerated the danger and that these matters could safely be entrusted to the Local Government Board, which had brilliantly handled the recent outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease. But there were some exceptions to this rule.

His first definite statement had been made to his own editor, Watson Maxwell of the Daily Post.

“Yes,” said Maxwell, when he had given Thrale a patient hearing, “it is certainly a matter that needs attention. Would you care to go out as our special commissioner and report at length?...”

“There isn’t time,” replied Thrale. “The thing is urgent.”

Maxwell brought his eyebrows together and looked keenly at his correspondent. “Do you really think it’s so serious, Thrale?” he asked. “After all, what evidence have you, beyond the Chinese reports?”

“I know there are several cases in Russia,” said Thrale.

“Yes, yes; I don’t doubt that,” returned Maxwell, with a touch of impatience. “But unless you can bring evidence to show that this new disease is as deadly as you say, it is not a matter that I could give space to at the present time. For one thing, the Evening Chronicle has been making rather a feature of it for the last three or four days, and I don’t see that I could do much unless we had some special inside information. Then, the House will be sitting again next week, and it seems to me not altogether improbable that we shall have a stormy session, which will mean that a good deal of ordinary matter will have to give way....” He broke off, and then added, with a friendly smile: “But if you would go out as our commissioner, we should be glad to make you a proposal.”

“There will be no need for a commissioner in a week’s time,” replied Thrale. “You don’t seem to understand that I’m not looking out for a job. I don’t want to write articles; I don’t want to be paid for the information I can supply. I foresee a grave danger, which is growing more grave hourly by reason of the Russian Government’s censorship of all reports referring to the plague. It is a danger which should be understood at once. If you send any commissioner, send the cleverest physician you can find, and a bacteriologist.”

There could be no doubt of Thrale’s earnestness, and Maxwell, who was not only a very capable editor, but also an able and intellectual man, was impressed. Unfortunately, the interests of his proprietors at that moment necessitated a great effort to prop up the very unstable Liberal Government, which had been in power for four years and was now on its last legs. It was so essential from the proprietors’ point of view—three of them were on the Government front bench—that the dissolution should be postponed until such time as the Ministry could go to the country with a reasonable prospect of success. A tentative English Church Disestablishment Bill was to be introduced in the coming session, and it was hoped that if the Government had to go to the country they could make a platform on that one clear issue. It was a good Bill, designed to win the Nonconformist vote, without completely alienating the High Church party. In other words, the Government was eager at that moment to please the majority of the electors, which is, presumably, the highest object of a representative government.

“If it had been at any other time,” said Maxwell, and pushed his chair back.

Thrale understood that the interview was at an end. He rose from his chair and picked up his hat.

“We shall be glad to print any articles you care to send us,” said Maxwell, with his kind smile, “but I can’t undertake a campaign, you understand, at the present moment.”

It was nearly four o’clock, but Thrale just managed to catch Groves of the Evening Chronicle.

Groves had his hat on, and was just off to tea at his club when Thrale’s name was sent in to him. He told the messenger that he would see Mr Thrale in the waiting-room downstairs.

Thrale had had some experience of newspaper methods, and he inferred that the reception was equivalent to a refusal to see him. He knew what those interviews in downstairs waiting-rooms implied. It was not the first time that he had been treated like an insurance agent or a tradesman and told, in effect, “Not to-day, thank you.”

In this case he was mistaken in his inference. Groves had had an eye on Thrale’s articles for some time past, and though he thought it a diplomatic essential to keep his man waiting for ten minutes, he had no intention of offending him.

Groves came into the waiting-room with a slightly abstracted air. “Sorry to keep you waiting Mr Thrale,” he said. “The fact is, that I wanted to finish before I left. Did you want to see me about anything particular?”

“Yes,” returned Thrale; “I have some facts about the new plague which ought to be given publicity at once.”

Groves pursed his thick lips and shook his head. “Well, well,” he said, “will you come and have tea with me at the club?”

He took Thrale’s assent for granted, and went out abruptly, leaving his guest to follow.

In the taxicab Groves talked of nothing but the lack of originality in invention in reference to aeroplanes. He seemed to take it as a personal affront that no workable adaptation of the aeroplane had been made to short-distance passenger traffic.

Indeed, it was not till after “tea”—in Groves’ case an euphemism for whisky and soda—that he would approach the subject of Thrale’s visit.

“The fact is, my dear fellow,” he said, “that our campaign hasn’t caught on. I’m going to let it down gently and drop it after to-day’s edition. You see, we’ve got to get the Government out this session, and I’m going to start a new campaign. Can’t give you any particulars yet, but you’ll see the beginning of it next Monday.” Like Maxwell, Groves differentiated between the uses of the singular and plural pronouns in speaking of his work. There was a distinction to be inferred between the initiation and responsibilities of the editor and those of his proprietors.

Groves was not at all impressed by any earnestness or forebodings. He seemed to think that a touch of the plague in London might be rather a good thing in some ways. People wanted waking up—especially to the importance of getting rid of the present Government.

It appeared that Thrale’s articles on other subjects would be acceptable to the readers of the Evening Chronicle, but there was no suggestion that he should go out to Russia as a special commissioner.

Grant Lacey, of The Times, listened seriously to Thrale’s exposition, and then, in a finely delivered speech which lasted twenty minutes, proved to his own complete satisfaction that Thrale’s premises, deductions, and whole argument were thoroughly unsound. Lacey, however, was greatly interested in the condition of Russia, and promised Thrale magnificent terms if he would tour St Petersburg, Moscow, Kiev, Warsaw—and then return and contribute a special series of articles. References to the new plague would not be prohibited in the series if Thrale still found any cause for alarm.

In all, Thrale had interviews with the editors of nine important journals; the other six developed on the general lines already indicated—either he was not taken seriously or was told that the danger was greatly exaggerated. The real causes of his failure were two:—first, the critical position of the Government; second, the precocious campaign of the Evening Chronicle—the latter had taken the wind out of the sails of less enterprising journals.

Thrale’s next step was to obtain introductions to Ministers and prominent members of the Opposition; but from them he received even less attention—he did not obtain interviews on many occasions—and, if possible, less encouragement. The President of the Local Government Board informed him that the matter was already engaging that department’s energies; the others were all manifestly preoccupied with more immediate interests.

But little less than a fortnight after the initiation of his campaign Thrale received a special message from the editor of the Daily Post. It was nearly midnight, and the messenger was waiting with a taxicab.

The message ran: “Received through news agency report of three cases of plague in Berlin. Can you come down at once?—Maxwell.”