Even now, as he swung into Whitehall with long vigorous strides, the Prime Minister's words were still ringing in his ears.
"You have our approval and support, my boy," he had said in his quick, nervous way. "Go ahead, and when the time comes do not hesitate to look to us. We shall do everything we can to support your efforts; that is," he added, with a whimsical, twinkling smile, "subject, of course, to the permission of a certain section of the ha'penny press."
There was still a suggestion of summer in the autumn air, but the sky had lost its brilliancy, and the inevitable grey of smoke was beginning to settle upon the city. For Ruxton, however, it might have been spring. The vigor of his gait, his delighted feelings, certainly belonged to the birth rather than the old age of the summer. He saw nothing of that which moved and passed about him. His busy thoughts were alive only with those enthralling concerns which were his. Nothing seemed able to stir him out of his abstraction until a street arab selling papers, who had recognized him, with the humorous effrontery of his class raised a newspaper poster for his inspection, and almost thrust it under his nose.
"'Ere y'are, governor. Better 'ave one. Kaiser Bill an' old Tirps scrappin' it out in the Baltic."
There was no avoiding it. The boy's persistence would not be denied. Ruxton glanced at the contents bill, and a startled look crept into his eyes.
"HEAVY FIRING IN THE BALTIC
MYSTERY UNSOLVED"
Ruxton purchased a paper and passed on. But his eager eyes scanned the stop press paragraph as he went. It was a report from Copenhagen. It stated that heavy gunfire had been heard off the German coast, and fishermen stated that a German squadron had been seen twenty miles from land engaged in what appeared to be a heavy bombardment of some object in the water. It was also stated that seaplanes had been seen to be dropping bombs on the same object. Another report, from a German source, stated that a portion of the fleet had been engaged in long-range target practice. This was denied in a still further account from the captain of one of the Baltic ferries, who declared that no target had been visible to those on his vessel, which had suddenly found itself in the danger zone, with shells dropping in the water within a radius of a quarter of a mile.
A still later account hinted that the whole thing was an attempt to sink a foreign submarine discovered in the act of espionage.
It was this final paragraph which held Ruxton's attention and permanently altered the whole trend of his thoughts. The affairs discussed at the recent luncheon had been abruptly thrust out of his mind. His final triumph over prejudice and official conservatism seemed to have lost its meaning for the moment. The whole centre of his interest had been completely transferred. He was gazing out across the sea, a grey, dark, troubled autumn sea. A fierce and awe-inspiring picture filled his focus. A squadron of battleships; the hawk-like swooping of great seaplanes; a small, almost indistinct object bobbing amongst the waves. He remembered his escape from Borga. Something of such a scene had been acted there, only in that case the battleships had been absent, and in their place had been guns trained, with every spot on the narrow water carefully measured out. Was this such an adventure as his? He could not tell. But——
At that moment he hailed a passing taxi, and, giving the man an address in Kensington, he jumped in.