On a certain day some weeks after the adjourned inquest and funeral of Lord Dorminster, Nigel obtained a long-sought-for interview with the Right Honourable Mervin Brown, who had started life as a factory inspector and was now Prime Minister of England.

The great man received his visitor with an air of good-natured tolerance.
"Heard of you from Scotland Yard, haven't I, Lord Dorminster ?" he said, as he waved him to a seat.

"I gather that you disagreed very strongly with the open verdict which was returned at the inquest upon your uncle ?" "The verdict was absolutely at variance with the facts," Nigel declared.
"My uncle was murdered, and a secret report of certain doings on the continent, which he was decoding at the time, was stolen." "The medical evidence scarcely bears out your statement," Mr.Mervin Brown pointed out dryly, "nor have the police been able to discover how any one could have obtained access to the room, or left it, without leaving some trace of their visit behind.

Further, there are no indications of a robbery having been attempted." "I happen to know more than any one else about this matter," Nigel urged,--"more, even, than I thought it advisable to mention at the inquest--and I beg you to listen to me, Mr.Mervin Brown.

I know that you considered my uncle to be in some respects a crank, because he was far-seeing enough to understand that under the seeming tranquillity abroad there is a universal and deep-seated hatred of this country." "I look upon that statement as misleading and untrue," the Minister declared.