“Suppose I say that I believe in you, Evelyn?” said his friend, quite good-naturedly; “and some day, when you can convince me that your newly discovered faith is all right, you may find me becoming your meek disciple, and even your apostle.  But I shall want something more than Union speeches, you know.”

By this time the carriage had passed along Coventry Street, turned into Prince’s Street, and been pulled up opposite a commonplace-looking house in that distinctly dingy thoroughfare, Lisle Street, Soho.

“Not quite Leicester Square, but near enough to serve,” said Brand, with a contemptuous laugh, as he got out of the barouche, and then, with the greatest of care and gentleness, assisted his companion to alight.

They crossed the pavement and rang a bell.  Almost instantly the door was opened by a stout, yellow-haired, blear-eyed old man, who wore a huge overcoat adorned with masses of shabby fur, and who carried a small lamp in his hand, for the afternoon had grown to dusk.  The two visitors were evidently expected.  Having given the younger of them a deeply respectful greeting in German, the fur-coated old gentleman shut the door after them, and proceeded to show the way up a flight of narrow and not particularly clean wooden stairs.

“Conspiracy doesn’t seem to pay,” remarked George Brand, half to himself.

On the landing they were confronted by a number of doors, one of which the old German threw open.  They entered a large, plainly furnished, well-lit room, looking pretty much like a merchant’s office, though the walls were mostly hung with maps and plans of foreign cities.  Brand looked round with a supercilious air.  All his pleasant and friendly manner had gone.  He was evidently determined to make himself as desperately disagreeable as an Englishman can make himself when introduced to a foreigner whom he suspects.  But even he would have had to confess that there was no suggestion of trap-doors or sliding panels in this ordinary, business-like room; and not a trace of a dagger or a dark lantern anywhere.

Presently, from a door opposite, an elderly man of middle height and spare and sinewy frame walked briskly in, shook hands with Lord Evelyn, was introduced to the tall, red-bearded Englishman (who still stood, hat in hand, and with a portentous stiffness in his demeanor), begged his two guests to be seated, and himself sat down at an open bureau, which was plentifully littered with papers.

“I am pleased to meet you, Mr. Brand,” he said, speaking carefully, and with a considerable foreign accent.  “Lord Evelyn has several times promised me the honor of making your acquaintance.”