Monk read and in silence passed this communication over to Phinuit, while Lanyard addressed the envelope.
"Quite in order," was Phinuit's verdict, accompanied by a yawn.
Lanyard folded the note, sealed it in the envelope, and affixed a stamp supplied by Monk, who meanwhile rang for a steward.
"Take this ashore and post it at once," he told the man who answered his summons.
"But seriously, Lanyard!" Phinuit protested with a pained expression.... "No: I don't get you at all. What's the use?"
"I have not deceived you, then?"
"Not so's you'd notice it."
"Alas!"--Lanyard affected a sigh--"for misspent effort!"
"Oh, all's fair outside the law. We don't blame you for trying it on. Only we value your respect too much to let you go on thinking we have fallen for that hokum."
"You see," Monk expounded--solemn ass that he was beneath his thin veneer of pretentiousness--"when we know how the British Government kicked you out of its Secret Service as soon as it had no further use for you, we can understand and sympathise with your natural reaction to such treatment at the hands of Society."