"The Prime Minister and Lord Beamdale came down with me on Thursday night to spend the weekend," he said. "Incidentally we were to discuss a very important matter connected with this country's er— foreign policy." The hesitation was only momentary. "Lord Beamdale brought with him a document of an extremely private nature. This I had sent to him earlier in the week for consideration and comment.
"If that document were to get to a certain Embassy in London no one can foretell the calamitous results. It might even result in another war, if not now certainly later. It was, I should explain, of a private and confidential nature, and consequently quite frankly expressed."
"And you must remember——" began Mr. Llewellyn John excitedly.
"One moment, sir," said Malcolm Sage quietly, without looking up from an absorbed contemplation of a bronze letter-weight fashioned in the form of a sphinx.
Mr. Llewellyn John sank back into his chair, and Sir Lyster resumed.
"Just over an hour and a half ago, that is to say soon after eleven o'clock, it was discovered that the document in question was missing, and in its place had been substituted a number of sheets of blank paper."
"Unless it's found, Sage," cried Mr. Llewellyn John, jumping up from his chair in his excitement, "the consequences are too awful to contemplate."
For a few seconds he strode up and down the room, then returning to his chair, sank back into its comfortable depths.
"Where was the document kept?" enquired Malcolm Sage, his long, sensitive fingers stroking the back of the sphinx.
"In the safe," replied Sir Lyster, indicating with a nod a small safe let into the wall.