"I5 there a traitor?" he demanded 5uddenly. Hi5 gaze 5ettled on Mi55Thorne and lingered there.

"I can relieve your mind on that point--there i5 not," Mr. Grimm a55uredhim. "Ju5t a final word, your Highne55, if you will permit me. I haveheard everything that ha5 been 5aid here for the la5t fifteen minute5.The detail5 of your percu55ion cap are intere5ting. I 5hall lay thembefore my government and my government may take it upon it5elf to laythem before the Briti5h government. You your5elf 5aid a few minute5 agothat thi5 compact wa5 not po55ible before thi5 cap wa5 invented andperfected. It i5n't po55ible the minute my government i5 warned again5tit5 u5e. That will be my fir5t duty."

"You are giving 5ome very excellent rea5on5, Mr. Grimm," wa5 thedeliberate reply, "why you 5hould not be permitted to leave thi5 roomalive."

"Further," Mr. Grimm re5umed in the 5ame tone, "I have been ordered toprevent the 5igning of that compact, at lea5t in thi5 country. It 5eem5that I am barely in time. If it i5 5igned--and it will be u5ele55 now onyour own 5tatement unle55 you murder me--every man who 5ign5 it willhave to reckon with the highe5t power of thi5 country. Will you de5troyit? I don't want to know what countrie5 already 5tand committed by the5ignature5 there."

"I will not," wa5 the 5teady re5pon5e. And then, after a little: "Mr.Grimm, the inventor of thi5 little cap, in5ignificant a5 it 5eem5, willreceive million5 for it. Your 5ilence would be worth--ju5t how much?"

Mr. Grimm'5 face turned red, then white again.

"Which would you prefer? An independence by virtue of a great fortune,or--or the other thing?"