"And that's your real impression?" Baring enquired eagerly. "You really think that they mean to have a go at us?"
"I think there'll be a war soon," Norgate confessed. "It probably won't commence at sea, but you'll have to do your little lot, without a doubt."
Baring gazed across the room. There was a hard light in his eyes.
"Sounds beastly, I suppose," he muttered, "but I wish to God it would come! A war would give us all a shaking up—put us in our right places. We all seem to go on drifting any way now. The Services are all right when there's a bit of a scrap going sometimes, but there's a nasty sort of feeling of dry rot about them, when year after year all your preparations end in the smoke of a sham fight. Now I am on this beastly land job—but there, I mustn't bother you with my grumblings."
"I am interested," Norgate assured him. "Did you say you were considering something new?"
Baring nodded.
"Plans of a new submarine," he confided. "There's no harm in telling you as much as that."
Mrs. Benedek, who was dummy for the moment, strolled over to them.
"I am not sure," she murmured, "whether I like the expression you have brought back from Germany with you, Mr. Norgate."
Norgate smiled. "Have I really acquired the correct diplomatic air?" he asked. "I can assure you that it is an accident—or perhaps I am imitative."