“But, my dear Haupt, you know the basis, and where it commences! You will surely succeed!” Challas cried, frantically.
The old man shook his head very dubiously.
“As I have already told you,” he responded in his deep voice, “a single misplaced number throws it all out. We are again at an absolute deadlock—and must remain as ignorant as we were before.”
“But have you made every possible effort?” asked Jim Jannaway, with eager face, as he bent over the old man’s shoulders.
“I have tried all the combinations of the Apocalyptic Number, but they are futile!” replied the old German, laying down his pen, and blinking through his glasses.
“Then the girl has failed us after all,” remarked Challas in a low, hard voice. “Griffin has deciphered the record and we’re absolutely ‘in the cart.’”
“I won’t give up!” declared Jannaway. “I’m hanged if I will! This may be one of Charlie’s tricks, remember! He may have learnt the truth and got hold of Laura to put us on the wrong scent.”
“He may—curse him!” muttered Sir Felix. “Why didn’t he take my warning and get away abroad?”
“Because he’s quite as cute as we are. He knows full well that while he remains in England circumstances will continue to be propitious. So he lives quietly down in Kent, with both eyes very much open.”
Already Jim Jannaway’s ingenious mind was active; already he was devising a way out of the awkward cul-de-sac in which they now found themselves.