It had gone nine by all the reliable clocks in town when the wild race to the coast came to an end, and after darting swallowlike through the wind-swept streets of Portsmouth, the limousine, mud splashed and disreputable, rushed up to the guarded entrance of the suspended dock master’s house at Portsea; and precisely one and a quarter minutes thereafter Cleek stood in the presence of the three men most deeply concerned in the clearing up of this mystifying affair.

He found Sir Charles Fordeck, a dignified and courtly gentleman of polished manners and measured speech, although now, quite naturally, labouring under a distress of mind which visibly disturbed him. He found Mr. Paul Grimsdick, his secretary, a frank-faced, straight-looking young Englishman of thirty; Mr. Alexander MacInery, a stolid, unemotional Scotsman of middle age, with a huge knotted forehead, eyebrows like young moustaches, and a face like a face of granite; and he found, too, reason to believe that each of these was, in his separate way, a man to inspire confidence and respect.

“I can hardly express to you, Mr. Cleek, how glad I am to meet you and to have you make this quick response to my appeal,” said the Admiral Superintendent, offering him a welcoming hand. “I feel that if any man is likely to get to the bottom of this mysterious business you are that man. And that you should get to the bottom of it—quickly, at whatever cost, by whatever means—is a thing to be desired not only in the nation’s interest, but for the honour of myself and my two colleagues.”“I hardly think that your honour will be called into question, Sir Charles,” replied Cleek, liking him the better for the manliness which prompted him in that hour of doubt and difficulty to lay aside all questions of position, and by the word “colleague” lift his secretary to the level of himself, so that they might be judged upon a common plane as men, and men alone. “It would be a madman indeed who would hint at anything approaching treason with regard to Sir Charles Fordeck.”

“No madder than he who would hint it of either of these,” said Sir Charles, laying a hand upon the shoulder of the auditor and the secretary, and placing himself between them. “I demand to be judged by the same rule, set upon the same plane with them. We three alone were in this house when that abominable thing happened; we three alone had access to the records from which that information was wired. It never, for so much as the fraction of one second, passed out of our keeping or our sight; if it was wired at all it must have been wired from this house, from that room, and in that case, one or other of us must positively have been the person to do so. Well, I did not; MacInery did not; Grimsdick did not. And yet, as you know, the ‘wiring’ was done—we should never stand a chance of knowing to whom, nor by whom, but for the accident which deflected the course of the message.”

“H’m! Yes! I don’t think,” commented Cleek reflectively. “It won’t wash, that theory; no, decidedly it won’t wash. Pardon? Oh, no, Sir Charles, I am not casting any doubt upon the telegraph operator’s statement of the manner in which he received the message; it is his judgment that is at fault, not his veracity. Of course, there have been cases—very rare ones, happily—of one wire automatically tapping another through, as he suggested, there being a break and an overlapping of the broken wire on to the sound one; but in the present instance there isn’t a ghost of a chance of such a thing having happened. In other words, Sir Charles, it is as unsound in theory as it is false in fact. Mr. Narkom has been telling me on the way here that the operator accounted for the sudden starting of the message to the falling of a storm-snapped wire upon an uninjured one, and for its abrupt cessation to the slipping off of that broken wire under the influence of the strong gale. Now, as we entered the town and proceeded through it, I particularly noted the fact that no broken wires were anywhere visible, nor was there sight or sign of men being engaged in repairing one.”

“Ah, yes,” agreed Sir Charles, a trifle dubiously, “that may be quite so, Mr. Cleek; but, if you will pardon my suggesting it, is there not the possibility of a flaw in your reasoning upon that point? The wire in question may not have been located in that particular district through which you were travelling.”

“I don’t think there is any chance of my having made an error of that sort, Sir Charles,” replied Cleek, smiling. “Had I been likely to do so, our friend the telegraph operator would have prevented it. He recognized at once that the communication was coming over the wire from the dockyard, I am told; and I have observed that every one of the dockyard wires is intact. I fancy when we come down to the bottom of it we shall discover that it was not the dockyard wire which ‘tapped’ a message from some other, but that the dockyard wire was being ‘tapped’ itself, and that the storm, causing a momentary interruption in the carrying on of that ‘tapping’ process, allowed a portion of the message to slip past and continue to the wire’s end—the telegraph office.”

“Good lud! Then in that case——”

“In that case, Mr. Narkom, there can be no shadow of a doubt that that message was sent by somebody in this house—and over the dockyard’s own private wire.”“But how, Mr. Cleek—in the name of all that is wonderful, how?”

“Ah, that is the point, Sir Charles. I think we need not go into the matter of who is at the bottom of the whole affair, but confine ourselves to the business of discovering how the thing was done, and how much information has already gone out to the enemy. I fancy we may set our minds at rest upon one point, however, namely, the identity of the person whose hand supplied the drawing found upon the body of the drowned man. That hand was a woman’s; that woman, I feel safe in saying, was Sophie Borovonski, professionally known to the people of the underworld as ‘La Tarantula.’”

“I never heard of her, Mr. Cleek. Who is she?”

“Probably the most beautiful, unscrupulous, reckless, dare-devil spy in all Europe, Sir Charles. She is a Russian by birth, but owns allegiance to no country and to no crown. Together with her depraved brother Boris, and her equally desperate paramour, Nicolo Ferrand, she forms one of the trio of paid bravos who for years have been at the beck and call of any nation despicable enough to employ them; always ready for any piece of treachery or dirty work, so long as their price is paid—as cunning as serpents, as slippery as eels, as clever as the devil himself, and as patient. We shall not go far astray, gentlemen, if we assert that the lady’s latest disguise was that of Miss Greta Hilmann.”

“Good God! Young Beachman’s fiancÉe?”

“Exactly, Sir Charles. I should not be able to identify her from a photograph were one obtainable, which I doubt—she is far too clever for that sort of thing—but the evidence is conclusive enough to satisfy me, at least, of the lady’s identity.”

“But how—how?”

“Mr. Narkom will tell you, Sir Charles, that from our time of starting this morning to our arrival here we made but one stop. That stop was at the Portsmouth mortuary before we appeared at this house. I wished to see the body of the man who was drowned. I have no hesitation, Sir Charles, in declaring that that man’s name is not, and never was, Axel von Ziegelmundt. The body is that of Nicolo Ferrand, ‘La Tarantula’s’ clever lover. The inference is obvious. ‘Miss Greta Hilmann’s’ anguish and despair were real enough, believe me (that is why it deceived everybody so completely). It is not, however, over the frightful position of young Beachman that she sorrowed, but over the death of Ferrand. Had he lived, I believe she has daring enough to have remained here and played her part to the end, but she either lost her nerve and her mental balance—which, by the way, is not in the least like her under any circumstances whatsoever—or some other disaster of which we know nothing overtook her and interfered with her carrying on the work in conjunction with her brother.”

“Her brother?”

“Yes. He would be sure to be about. They all three worked in concert. Gad! if I’d only been here before the vixen slipped the leash—if I only had! Let us have the elder Mr. Beachman in, if you please, Sir Charles; there’s a word or so I want to have with him. You’ve had him summoned, of course!”

“Yes, he and the telegraph operator as well; I thought you might wish to question both,” replied he. “Grimsdick, go—or, no! I’ll go myself. Beachman ought to know of this appalling thing; and it is best that it should be broken by a friend.”

Speaking, he left the room, coming back a few minutes later in company with the telegraph operator and the now almost hysterical dock master. He waited not one second for introduction or permission or anything else, that excited father, but rushed at Cleek and caught him by the hand.“It’s my boy and you’re clearing him—God bless you!” he exclaimed, catching Cleek’s hand and wringing it with all his strength. “It isn’t in him to sell his country; I’d have killed him with my own hand years ago, if I thought it was. But it wasn’t—it never was! My boy! my boy! my splendid, loyal boy!”

“That’s right, old chap, have it out. Here on my shoulder, if you want to, daddy, and don’t be ashamed of it!” said Cleek, and reached round his arm over the man’s shoulder and clapped him on the back. “Let her go, and don’t apologize because it’s womanish. A man without a strain of the woman in him somewhere isn’t worth the powder to blow him to perdition. We’ll have him cleared, daddy—gad, yes! And look here! When he is cleared you take him by the ear and tell him to do his sweethearting in England, the young jackass, and to let foreign beauties alone; they’re not picking up with young Englishmen of his position for nothing, especially if they are reputed to have money of their own and to be connected with titled families. If you can’t make him realize that by gentle means, take him into the garden and bang it into him—hard.”

“Thank you, sir; thank you! I can see it now, Mr. Cleek. Not much use in shouting ‘Rule Britannia’ if you’re going to ship on a foreign craft, is there, sir? But anybody would have been taken in with her—she seemed such a sweet, gentle little thing and had such winning ways. And when she lost her father, the wife and I simply couldn’t help taking her to our hearts.”

“Quite so. Ever see that ‘father,’ Mr. Beachman?”

“Yes, sir, once; the day before he sailed—or was supposed to have sailed—for the States.”

“Short, thick-set man was he? Carried one shoulder a little lower than the other, and had lost the top of a finger on the left hand?”“Yes, sir; the little finger. That’s him to a T.”

“Boris Borovonski!” declared Cleek, glancing over at Sir Charles. “No going to the States for that gentleman with a ‘deal’ like this on hand. He’d be close by and in constant touch with her. Did she have any friends in the town, Mr. Beachman?”

“No, not one. She appeared to be of a very retiring disposition, and made no acquaintances whatsoever. The only outside person I ever knew her to take any interest in was a crippled girl who lived with her bedridden mother and took in needlework. Greta heard of the case, and went to visit them. Afterward she used to carry work to them frequently, and sometimes fruit and flowers.”

“Ever see that bedridden woman or that cripple girl?”

“No, sir, never. Harry and I would be busy here most of the days, so she always went alone.”

“Did she ever ask Mrs. Beachman to accompany her?”

“Not that I ever heard of, sir. But it would have been to no purpose if she had. The wife is a very delicate woman; she rarely ever goes anywhere.”

“Hum-m-m! I see! So, then, you really do not know if there actually was a woman or a girl at all? Any idea where the persons were supposed to live?”

“Yes. They hired a room on the top floor of a house adjoining the Ocean Billow Hotel, sir. At least, Reggie—that’s my youngest son, Mr. Cleek—saw Greta go in there and look down from one of the top floor windows one day when he was on his way home from school. He spoke to her about it at the dinner table that night, and she said that that was where her ‘pensioners lived.’”

“Pretty good neighbourhood that, by Jove! for people who were ‘pensioners’ to be living in,” commented Cleek. “The Ocean Billow Hotel is a modern establishment—lifts, electric lights, liveried attendants, and caters to people of substance and standing.”“Yes,” admitted Beachman. “When I was suspended, sir, during the examination and this house taken over by Sir Charles, I took Mrs. Beachman and Reggie there, and we have remained at the place, nominally under guard, ever since. You see, being convenient and in a straight line, so to speak, it offered extra advantages in case of my being summoned here at a moment’s notice.”

“H’m! Yes! I see!” said Cleek, stroking his chin. “In a straight line from here, eh? House next door would, of course, offer the same advantages; and from a room on the top floor a wire-tapping device——Yes, just so! I think, Sophie, I think I smell a very large mouse, my dear, and I shan’t be surprised if we’ve hit upon the place of reception for your messages the very first shot.”

“Messages, Mr. Cleek? Messages?” interposed Sir Charles. “You surely do not mean to infer that the woman telegraphed messages from this house? Do you forget, then, that there is no instrument, no wire, attached to the place?”

Cleek puckered up his brows. For the moment he had forgotten that fact.

“Still, there are wires passing over it, Sir Charles,” he said presently; “and if a means of communication with those were established, the ‘tapper’ at the other end could receive messages easily. She is a devil of ingenuity is Sophie. I wouldn’t put it beyond her and her confederates to have rigged up a transmitting instrument of some sort which the woman could carry on her person and attach to the wire when needed.”

Here Sir Charles threw in something which he felt to be in the nature of a facer.

“Quite so,” he admitted. “But do not forget, Mr. Cleek, that the deflected message was sent last night, and that the woman was not then in this house.”