The super-chief thought for a moment, and then quickly,
“What do you think?”
The editor laughed.
“I think the threat will never be fulfilled; for once the Four have struck against a snag. If they hadn’t warned Ramon they might have done something, but forewarned——”
“We shall see,” said the super-chief, and went home.
The editor wondered, as he climbed the stairs, how much longer the Four would fill the contents bill of his newspaper, and rather hoped that they would make their attempt, even though they met with a failure, which he regarded as inevitable.
His room was locked and in darkness, and he fumbled in his pocket for the key, found it, turned the lock, opened the door and entered.
“I wonder,” he mused, reaching out of his hand and pressing down the switch of the light …
There was a blinding flash, a quick splutter of flame, and the room was in darkness again.
Startled, he retreated to the corridor and called for a light.
“Send for the electrician,” he roared; “one of these damned fuses has gone!”
A lamp revealed the room to be filled with a pungent smoke; the electrician discovered that every globe had been carefully removed from its socket and placed on the table. From one of the brackets suspended a curly length of thin wire which ended in a small black box, and it was from this that thick fumes were issuing.
“Open the windows,” directed the editor; and a bucket of water having been brought, the little box was dropped carefully into it.
Then it was that the editor discovered the letter—the greenish- grey letter that lay upon his desk. He took it up, turned it over, opened it, and noticed that the gum on the flap was still wet.
Honoured Sir (ran the note), when you turned on your light this evening you probably imagined for an instant that you were a victim of one of those “outrages” to which you are fond of referring. We owe you an apology for any annoyance we may have caused you. The removal of your lamp and the substitution of a “plug” connecting a small charge of magnesium powder is the cause of your discomfiture. We ask you to believe that it would have been as simple to have connected a charge of nitro-glycerine, and thus have made you your own executioner. We have arranged this as evidence of our inflexible intention to carry out our promise in respect of the Aliens Extradition Act. There is no power on earth that can save Sir Philip Ramon from destruction, and we ask you, as the directing force of a great medium, to throw your weight into the scale in the cause of justice, to call upon your Government to withdraw an unjust measure, and save not only the lives of many inoffensive persons who have found an asylum in your country, but also the life of a Minister of the Crown whose only fault in our eyes is his zealousness in an unrighteous cause.
(Signed)
The Four Just Men
“Whew!” whistled the editor, wiping his forehead and eyeing the sodden box floating serenely at the top of the bucket.
“Anything wrong, sir?” asked the electrician daringly.
“Nothing,” was the sharp reply. “Finish your work, refix these globes, and go.”
The electrician, ill-satisfied and curious, looked at the floating box and the broken length of wire.
“Curious-looking thing, sir,” he said. “If you ask me——”
“I don’t ask you anything; finish your work,” the great journalist interrupted.
“Beg pardon, I’m sure,” said the apologetic artisan.
Half an hour later the editor of the Megaphone sat discussing the situation with Welby. Welby, who is the greatest foreign editor in London, grinned amiably and drawled his astonishment.
“I have always believed that these chaps meant business,” he said cheerfully, “and what is more, I feel pretty certain that they will keep their promise. When I was in Genoa”—Welby got much of his information first hand—“when I was in Genoa—or was it Sofia?—I met a man who told me about the Trelovitch affair. He was one of the men who assassinated the King of Servia, you remember. Well, one night he left his quarters to visit a theatre—the same night he was found dead in the public square with a sword thrust through his heart. There were two extraordinary things about it.” The foreign editor ticked them on off his fingers. “First, the General was a noted swordsman, and there was every evidence that he had not been killed in cold blood, but had been killed in a duel; the second was that he wore corsets, as many of these Germanised officers do, and one of his assailants had discovered this fact, probably by a sword thrust, and had made him discard them; at any rate when he was found this frippery was discovered close by his body.”
“Was it known at the time that it was the work of the Four?” asked the editor.
Welby shook his head.
“Even I had never heard of them before,” he said resentfully. Then asked, “What have you done about your little scare?”
“I’ve seen the hall porters and the messengers, and every man on duty at the time, but the coming and the going of our mysterious friend—I don’t suppose there was more than one—is unexplained. It really is a remarkable thing. Do you know, Welby, it gives me quite an uncanny feeling; the gum on the envelope was still wet; the letter must have been written on the premises and sealed down within a few seconds of my entering the room.”
“Were the windows open?”
“No; all three were shut and fastened, and it would have been impossible to enter the room that way.”
The detective who came to receive a report of the circumstances endorsed this opinion.
“The man who wrote this letter must have left your room not longer than a minute before you arrived,” he concluded, and took charge of the letter.
Being a young and enthusiastic detective, before finishing his investigations he made a most minute search of the room, turning up carpets, tapping walls, inspecting cupboards, and taking laborious and unnecessary measurements with a foot-rule.
“There are a lot of our chaps who sneer at detective stories,” he explained to the amused editor, “but I have read almost everything that has been written by Gaboriau and Conan Doyle, and I believe in taking notice of little things. There wasn’t any cigar ash or anything of that sort left behind, was there?” he asked wistfully.
“I’m afraid not,” said the editor gravely.
“Pity,” said the detective, and wrapping up the “infernal machine” and its appurtenances, he took his departure. Afterwards the editor informed Welby that the disciple of Holmes had spent half an hour with a magnifying glass examining the floor.
“He found half a sovereign that I lost weeks ago, so it’s really an ill wind——”
All that evening nobody but Welby and the chief knew what had happened in the editor’s room. There was some rumour in the sub-editor’s department that a small accident had occurred in the sanctum.
“Chief busted a fuse in his room and got a devil of a fright,” said the man who attended to the Shipping List.
“Dear me,” said the weather expert, looking up from his chart, “do you know something like that happened to me: the other night——”
The chief had directed a few firm words to the detective before his departure.
“Only you and myself know anything about this occurrence,” said the editor, “so if it gets out I shall know it comes from Scotland Yard.”
“You may be sure nothing will come from us,” was the