"Great heavens!" I gasped, staring astounded at the white medical plaster on the gas-pipe along the cornice. "What a narrow escape I've had!"
"Yes. While I was in London, Vera went up with her maid and stayed at the 'Star' at Kingussie, where she overheard the two men in conversation, and learnt the clever trick they were playing with Goldstein as the spy. She suspected that they intended to rid themselves of your unwelcome surveillance, and returned at once to me in London. Fortunately I discovered the dastardly plot, and that morning I cut the cord."
"That fellow Straus is a much more desperate character than he looks."
"Yes. But we'll just go back and you can tell him your opinion of him," he laughed.
We went together along to No. 11. The spy had already left, but ascending the stairs was Vera, in a long travelling-coat, her maid following with the wraps.
She had just arrived from London, and after she had greeted us in her usual merry manner, told us that she was the bearer of very important news—news of the activity of spies in another quarter.
We quickly told her how we had managed to outwit Straus, while I, on my part, thanked her warmly for having made that startling discovery which had, no doubt, saved me from falling a victim to that dastardly plot formed by one of the most ingenious of the many unscrupulous spies of the Kaiser.