“Now you’ve hit a point I’ve been considering. The more I think about it the more convinced I become that the leak came before the paper reached your filing room. That means our job will be complicated. Maybe we’ll get a break one of these days.”
Dinner was served and they ate heartily, ignoring for the time the case that had enfolded both of them in its mysterious tangle.
The dinner at an end, Bob leaned back in his chair and shoved his hands in his coat pockets. The fingers of his right hand crinkled a stiff sheet of paper and he drew it out and placed it on the table.
It was not an unusual sheet, at first glance, being about eight inches wide and eleven inches long, but it was of heavy material, probably a pure rag paper.
But it was not the paper that caught and held Bob’s attention. It was the crest of the War Department which was centered at the top of the page.
Merritt Hughes saw Bob staring at the paper and looked at his nephew curiously.
“What’s the matter, Bob? Forget to file something this afternoon?”
When Bob did not answer at once, he reached over and picked up the paper. It was his turn to stare at the sheet and his eyes widened as he looked up at his nephew.
“Great heavens, Bob. Where did this come from?”
Bob shook his head.