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you get on the National sometimes.”

“Don’t believe it, not starting T-L-T like that. I don’t know if I ought to do something

about it, but I don’t know who to send it to now. Now, when I was in the Service—”

“Oh, Lor’,” said the second mate, and unostentatiously quitted the saloon.

Young Emsworth settled himself down in his chair before the receiving set in the Foreign

Office, pulled the earphones over his head and listened with pleasure to the last movement of a

Beethoven concerto, magnificently rendered. “If only we could always hear stuff like that,” he

murmured, “instead of all the awful tosh we have to listen to.” He glanced with distaste at the

programme. A play by Klaus Lehmann called
The Radio Operator
, doubtless some of that

dreadful propaganda stuff, news, a talk on the Hitler Youth movement, a concert of light music.

He sighed and drew a writing-pad towards him, for it was his business to listen to what Germany

was being told, and report upon anything rich and strange. Also within his reach was the switch

of the recorder, an instrument which would, if required, make a record of what was said, so that

the exact wording could be studied at leisure. The German announcer’s voice ceased, and the

play began with a crackle of morse.

An expression of speechless amazement crossed Emsworth’s face, he shot out one hand

automatically to switch on the recorder and then took his headphones off, looked at them and put

them on again, an idiotic gesture sometimes seen when a man cannot believe his ears.

“To-night,” said the guttural German voice, “I sit for the last time in the little cabin they

call the wireless room, surrounded—”

Emsworth pressed a bell-switch and after a short pause a messenger came in, but

Emsworth held up his hand for silence because the morse had come on for the second time.

When it ended, he said, “Is Mr. Wilcox still here? Go and see, if he is ask him to be good enough

to come to me here.’”

Wilcox came in, an elderly man, heavy and pallid with years of sedentary employment.

“What’s the excitement, Emsworth? You only just caught me, I was putting my coat on.”

Emsworth slipped one headphone forward in order to hear what Wilcox said with one ear

and the German broadcast with the other. “D’you remember telling me the other evening about

people transmitting messages from Germany during the war? You quoted three or four call-signs,

wasn’t T-L-T one of them? Yes-well, here it is again in a morse background to a German radio

play about a wireless operator.”

“Got the recorder going? Good,” said Wilcox, snatching up another pair of headphones

and plugging them in. “Oh, he’s still talking, I dare say we’ll get some more in a minute. Yes, I

had your job in those days, but it was a bit more interest—”

He broke off and listened intently, jotting letters down on a slip of paper. “T-L-T.

RKEHOSWR39X—” When the morse had ended again, he said, “How many times has that

come in?”

“That’s the third. Once at the beginning, quite short and nothing but the call-sign

repeated, and once since, before this.”

Wilcox nodded and went on listening. “More talky-talky, lots of, my hat, how these

propagandists do gas,” he said. “No, I can’t remember exactly what this fellow was after all this

lapse of time. After all, it’s sixteen years, but I can tell you right away it’s not the same fellow

transmitting. I remember he had a distinctive, rather pedantic style. I always put him down as a

rather elderly self-taught amateur. You know, of course, that men in the habit of listening to

morse come to recognize the touch of other operators they are in the habit of hearing, much as

you recognize a man’s voice or his handwriting.”

“B-but,” spluttered young Emsworth, who found Wilcox’s calmness positively inhuman,

“do you really think it’s the same man? After all these years? Do you think it’s real?”

“Yes, I think it may be real, but we can tell better when it’s decoded. No, I don’t think

it’s the same man, I’ve said so already. As for ‘after all these years,’ stranger things have

happened and will again. When it’s all over I’ll have those old codes turned up an—Sh!”

The morse came in for the last time and was finally drowned by the Horst Wessel Song.

The two men waited till it was clear that the play was over, and Wilcox took his headphones off

and got up.

“Now I’ll leave you in peace to listen to the news,” he said, taking the thin steel strip out

of the recording machine, “while I go and see if I can worry this out.”

The next morning there was a conference on the subject attended by Wilcox and his

immediate superior, also an elderly Colonel called up by telephone from the Sussex cottage to

which he had retired when he left the War Office years before.

“The code in which these messages were sent,” said Wilcox, rustling papers, “was used

during the late war by an agent of ours named Reck, who was science master of a school at

Mülheim, near Cologne.”

“I remember,” said the Colonel. “A queer dry old stick. I only saw him once or twice. He

never came to England unless it was really urgent, he had become so German that he could

hardly speak English at all-he had forgotten it. Very useful man on his job.”

“Where is Reck now?”

“Dead. He took to drink, was removed to an asylum at Mainz, and died there,” answered

Wilcox.

“Either Reck is not dead,” said Authority, “or he was careless enough to leave his code

behind him and somebody has found it.”

“He went out of his mind,” said the Colonel. “I am sure of that, for I kept an eye on him.

Denton went to see him once and said the poor old fellow complained of bright seraphim

crawling up the walls.”

“Dear me,” said the senior officer present, “how very superior. I thought it was usually

snakes in bathing costumes wearing straw hats and playing banjoes.”

“He may well have mislaid his code,” said Wilcox. “I am sure it was not he who was

transmitting. In any case, the question remains, who sent the message? Because at the best of

times he only coded and sent messages, he did not originate them.”

“If it is genuine,” said the Foreign Office man, “it is probably somebody who was in

touch with Reck in the old days. Is there anyone who went missing without trace and may have

turned up again?”

“Plenty,” said the Colonel sadly, “but not, as it happens, connected with Reck. Let me

see. Hall died in England after the war. Inglis is in an asylum in the Midlands, poor devil.

Saunders was shot in Hampshire. Beckett runs a chicken farm in Dorset. Denton is in the

Balkans, and has been for the last couple of years. Hambledon was drowned. MacVicar is in an

engineering works on Tyneside. Thorpe is married and living quietly in Salisbury. No, none of

Reck’s contacts are what you’d call missing. May I hear the messages again?”

“The message was in four parts, in intervals in the play, you understand,” said Wilcox.

“The first was merely the call-sign repeated. Next came, ‘T-L-T. British agent in Germany begs

to report thinks he may be of assistance.’ Then, ‘Your agent Arnold Heckstall will be delivered

at Belgian frontier April 5th.’ Finally, ‘Information in diplomatic bag reaching London April

6th.’ That’s all.”

“April 5th,” said Wilcox’s superior, “is Wednesday next; to-day’s Saturday. I have

instructed the British Embassy in Berlin to watch their diplomatic bag like a mother brooding

over her sick child. They may find somebody trying to do something to it.”

“Otherwise,” said the Colonel, “there’s nothing for it but to wait and see what what’s-his-

name—Hinkson?—has to say, that is, if he turns up.”

“Heckstall,” said the Foreign Office man. “We knew, of course, that they had gathered

him in. We did not expect—er—a happy issue out of his afflictions.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” said \Wilcox.

In Berlin there had been another conference between the heads of the police. “This fellow

Heckstall,” said the Chief, “is a nuisance. I am perfectly certain he is an English agent.”

“Shoot him, then,” said the Deputy Chief cheerfully.

“I would with pleasure, but there have been too many Englishmen dying of heart-failure

in Germany lately. They will not always believe it, and our Leader does not wish for trouble over

it. There was that curate, who would have believed he really was?”

“The curate rankles with you, my dear Niehl.”

“I do not like to be misinformed,” said Niehl stiffly.

“Had I been in office at that time it would not have occurred,” said his subordinate

soothingly. “In future we will be more careful with curates. Returning to Heckstall, leave him to

me, I will manage him.”

“I should be very glad, my dear Lehmann. What plan had you in your mind?”

“If a man is put over the frontier at a quiet spot and found shot on Belgian territory in the

morning, what business is it of ours?”

The third footman at the British Embassy brought a scuttle of coal into the Ambassador’s

room, and made up the fire during His Excellency’s temporary absence. There were a number of

papers on the table, some already tied into bundles for the diplomatic bag for London. The

footman glanced hastily at the door, drew a long envelope from inside his coat, pushed it into the

middle of one of these bundles, and immediately left the room as the Ambassador returned to it.

The conference at the Foreign Office was resumed in the evening of April 6th with one

addition to the previous company, the British agent, Arnold Heckstall, who had flown from

Brussels that afternoon.

“I was picked up in Berlin on the evening of the day I got there,” he said, “and consigned

to gaol. That was on Wednesday, March the 22nd. They came and hauled me out for questioning

occasionally, but it was not too drastic. Then yesterday evening some S.S. men came in, an

officer and three others, and removed me. I thought I was going to be bumped off, of course, but

they pushed me into a car and we drove to the Tempelhof Aerodrome. A plane was all ready, so

we took off and flew for about two hours and came down near Aachen. There were some more

S.S. men there, and we all got into Mercedes cars, four of them, with the officer, two others and

myself in the second, and started off again. It was then something after midnight and perfectly

dark, but we went through Aachen, which I recognized, that was how I knew where we were.

They had refused to answer my questions, or, indeed, to speak to me at all except to give me

orders. Some time later the cars all came to a standstill, and in the headlights of the first I saw a

frontier marking post at the side of the road just ahead. The officer got out and ordered the cars

to be turned round to face the way we had come, which was done.”

Heckstall paused for a moment with an odd little smile and then continued.

“They came and told me to get out of the car, which I did. As there were about six of

them pointing automatics at me, there did not seem to be much I could do about it. Two of them

took me by the arms and marched me along the road towards the frontier, with the officer

following behind. At the mark post he sent these two men back and told me to walk on, with him

just behind prodding me with his automatic.

“When we were out of earshot of the rest of the party—we must have been out of sight

too, in the darkness—he said, ‘Keep on moving ahead of me, don’t look round. When you hear

two shots behind you, run like blazes. Remember what I’m saying, it’s important.
Don’t come

back
. Officially you’re dead, so don’t let anyone at home see you, either. Go somewhere quiet

and keep silkworms, and give my love to the Only Girl in the World!’ He spoke the last five

words in English with a strong German accent.”

“Silkworms,” said the retired Colonel thoughtfully.

“He said silkworms, sir.”

“Go on, please.”

“Then he fired two shots and I ran like blazes, as he said. I glanced back once or twice

and could see him walking back to the cars, he was silhouetted against the lighted road. I did not

know where I was except that it must be Belgium, but after wandering about for miles in the dark

I reached Limburg at about 4 a.m., got an early train for Brussels and flew back by the first

available plane.”

“Yes,” said his Foreign Office chief slowly, “we were hoping you would.”

“B-but—”

“We were told you would be released on the sixth.”

Heckstall merely stared at him.

“Tell me, did you see this officer plainly? What was he like?”

“Oh, quite plainly. Rather a nondescript little man, grey eyes, rather ginger hair going

grey, short but not fat, thin face with duelling scars across his right cheek, quick, energetic walk,

rather a pleasant voice, cheerful-looking fellow, looked as though he could see a joke. Short

nose, wide mouth rather thin-lipped, square jaw. He was evidently someone very important, his

men fairly jumped to it when he spoke.”

“Duelling scars,” said Wilcox. “Evidently a pukka German.”

“Which year,” asked the Colonel, “was that song about the Only Girl in the World

popular?”

“‘The Bing Boys’? Oh, about ’16,” said Wilcox.

“I am sorry to have come back without the information, sir,” said Heckstall.