Now he was granted an intimate glimpse into the workings of his employer's mind that came to him as a positive revelation. Larssen's were no mysterious powers, but the powers that every man possessed worked at white heat and with an extraordinary swiftness and exactitude. The revelation did not sweep away the glamour; on the contrary, it increased it. Lars Larssen was a craftsman taking up the commonest tools of his craft and using them to create a work of art of consummate build.
His present work was to keep alive the personality of Clifford Matheson until the Hudson Bay scheme should be launched. To use Matheson's name on the prospectus, and to use his influence with Sir Francis Letchmere and others. Dead, Matheson was to serve him better than alive.
But the shipowner did not build his edifice on the foundation merely of what Arthur Dean had told him. He had to satisfy himself more accurately.
A string of rapid, apparently unconnected orders almost bewildered the young secretary:—
"First, get a list of the big hotels at Monte Carlo. Engage the trunk telephone and call up each hotel until you find where Sir Francis Letchmere is staying. Give no name.... Buy a pair of workman's boots to fit you. Get them in some side street shop. Bring them with you—don't ask them to send.... Take this typewriting"—he took a letter from his pocket and carefully clipped off a small portion—"and match it with a portable travelling machine. Can you recognize the make of machine off-hand?"
Dean examined the portion of typed matter, and shook his head.
"You must train yourself to observe detail. Looks to me like the type on a 'Thor' machine. Try the Thor Co. first. If not there, go to every typewriter firm in Paris until it matches.... Go to the offices of the Compagnie Transatlantique and get a list of sailings on the Cherbourg-Quebec route. Give no name.... Meanwhile, 'phone your journalist friend and have him call on me."
"What reason shall I give him, sir?"
"Anything that will pull him here. Tell him I'm willing to be interviewed on the proposed international agreement about maritime contraband in time of war. Quite sure you remember all my orders?"
"I think so, sir."