"Well, I don't know if it will prove to be anything—worth while."
He fumbled at an inner pocket of his dinner coat, and produced a letter written on thin paper. When they reached the great hall and stood under the brilliant electrolier he unfolded it and held it out for his son's perusal.
"I get lots of them," he said almost apologetically, "and few enough turn out worth while. This one reads a little different. That's all."
"Sir,
"You are a great shipmaster. You owned a fleet of merchant shipping when war broke out of forty-two coastwise and thirty-five ocean-going ships. At the end of the war you owned thirteen coastwise and twenty-one ocean-going traders. I have a means of saving you any such loss by submarine in the future. May I be permitted to show you my invention?
"Truly yours,
"Charles Smith.
"P.S.—Absolute secrecy is necessary. A simple 'yes' addressed by wire to Veevee, London, will be sufficient."
"The wording of it is so unusual that it—interested me," Sir Andrew went on, as Ruxton began to read the letter a second time.
Presently the younger man looked up from his reading.
"That's your imagination working, Dad," he said, smiling. Then he added: "Let it work. Let it run riot. That's what we want in England—now. I should see this man. I think he is a foreigner—in spite of his English name."