"No," answered Ommaney. "I am not going to speculate on it either. I am beginning to realise what we are dealing with. One man's brain cannot hold all this. So let me ask you to regard this matter for the present simply from the standpoint of the paper, and through it, of course, from the standpoint of public policy——"
He broke off suddenly, for there was a knock at the door. A commissionaire entered with a telegram. It was for Spence. He opened the envelope, read the contents with a groan, and passed it to the editor.
The telegram was from Hands:
"Schmöulder entirely confirms discovery, is communicating first instance with Kaiser privately, fuller details in mail, confer Ommaney, make statement to Secretary Society, use Wire medium publicity, leave all to you, see Prime Minister, send out Llwellyn behalf Government immediately, meanwhile suggest attitude suspended decision, personally fear little doubt.—Hands."
"We must act at once," said Ommaney. "We have a fearful responsibility now. It's not too much to say that everything depends on us. Have you got any of that brandy left? My head throbs like an engine."
A sub-editor who came in and was briefly dismissed told his colleagues that something was going on in the editor's room of an extraordinary nature. "The chief was actually drinking a peg, and his hand shook like a leaf."
Ommaney drank the spirits—he was an absolute teetotaler as a rule, though not pledged in any way to abstinence—and it revived him.
"Now let us try and think," he said, lighting a cigarette and walking up and down the room.
Spence lit a cigarette also. As he did so he gave a sudden, sharp, unnatural chuckle. He was smoking when the Light of the World—the whole great world!—was flickering into darkness.
Ommaney saw him and interpreted the thought. He pulled him up at once with a few sharp words, for he knew that Spence was close upon hysteria.