The policy to be pursued was to be something quite different.
Everything was to go on as usual. Sports, golf, cricket, croquet, tennis-tournaments, polo-matches, race-meetings, automobile-meetings, "all the usual fooleries and frivolities"—with crowds of sight-seers, men in flannels and ladies in beautiful toilets—were to be encouraged to proceed. The police-bands were to play in the public gardens, the squares, the streets, everywhere.
"Say nothing to anybody. Give no sign of any kind. Let the conspiracy go on as if we knew nothing about it. But——"
"Yes, my lord? Yes?"
"Keep an eye on the 'Bedouin.' Let every train that arrives at the railway-station and every boat that comes down the river be watched. As soon as you have spotted your man, see where he goes. He may be a fanatical fool, miscalculating his 'divine' influence with the native soldier, but he cannot be working alone. Therefore find out who visit him, learn all their movements, let their plans come to a head, and, when the proper time arrives, in one hour, at one blow we will crush their conspiracy and clap our hands upon the whole of them."
"Splendid! An inspiration, my lord!"
"I've always said it would some day be necessary to forge a special weapon to meet special needs, and the time has come to forge it. Meantime undertake nothing hurriedly. Make no mistakes, and see that your men make none."
"Certainly, my lord."
"Investigate every detail for yourself, and above all hold your tongue and guard your information with inviolable secrecy."
"Surely, my lord."