"What for?" Fischer demanded, breathing a little thickly.
"I have no certain information," the secretary replied, with a noncommittal air. "All I know is that I had a long-distance telephone to burn certain documents, but before I could do so the room and the house were searched by New York detectives, whose warrant it was useless to resist."
"But what's the charge against Mr. Bookam?"
"It's something to do with the disasters in——," the young man confided. "The Governor of the State, who is Mr. Bookam's cousin, is in the same trouble…. Better sit down a moment, sir. You're looking white."
Mr. Fischer threw himself into an easy-chair. He felt like a man who has built a mighty piece of machinery, has set it swinging through space, and watches now its imminent collapse; watches some tiny but ghastly flaw, pregnant with disaster, growing wider and wider before his eyes.
"What papers did the police take away with them?" he asked.
"There wasn't very much for them," the secretary replied. "There was a list of the names of the proposed organisation which, owing to your very wise intervention, was never formed. There was a list of factories throughout the United States in which munitions are being made, with a black mark against those holding the most important contracts. And there was a letter from Governor Roughton."
"Mr. Bookam hasn't drawn any cheques lately for large amounts?" Fischer inquired eagerly.
"There are three in his private cheque-book, sir, the counterfoils of which are not filled in," was the somewhat dreary admission.
Fischer groaned as he received the news.