“Are any of the reporters your personal friends, Deedes?”
“Yes, I know several.”
“To whom shall we make our statement?” he inquired. “We want it spread throughout the country.”
“In that case I should suggest Mr Johns, of the agency that supplies the club tapes and newspapers.”
“Then send for him.”
At once I went to the door and dispatched the messenger waiting outside to find that well-known figure of the Reporters’ Gallery, who makes it his boast that for years without a break he had sat through every sitting of the House of Commons, and whose friends have a legend that he can enjoy a sleep in his “box” over the Speaker’s chair and awake at the very moment any question of public interest arises. Ten minutes had elapsed when the chosen representative of the Press entered, hot and breathless, bowing to their Lordships. He was spare, dark-haired, with sharp, aquiline features, a breadth of forehead that denoted considerable learning, a pointed, dark-brown beard, and a pair of sharp, penetrating eyes. He spoke with a broad Scotch accent, his sallow face betraying signs of considerable excitement.
“I desire, Mr Johns, to make a statement to the Press, and have sent for you with that object,” exclaimed the Minister for Foreign Affairs, glancing up at him.
“With pleasure, my Lord,” exclaimed the reporter, taking from his pocket a pencil and a few loose sheets of “copy paper.” “I’m quite ready.”
Then, as Lord Warnham dictated his message to the public, the representative of the news agency took it down in a series of rapid hieroglyphics. The words the Minister uttered were as follows:—
“In order to allay undue public alarm, I wish it to be known that, according to advices I have received, the statement in the Novoë Vremya to-day, at first believed to be correct, is without foundation.”