“No raids or invasions, I hope, Colonel?” the latter asked.
“Nothing quite so serious as that, I am glad to say. We have had a little excitement of another sort, though. One of my men caught a spy this morning.”
Every one was interested. Even after three years of war, there was still something fascinating about the word.
“Dear me!” Lord Maltenby exclaimed. “I should scarcely have considered our out-of-the-way part of the world sufficiently important to attract attentions of that sort.”
“It was a matter of communication,” the Colonel confided. “There was an enemy submarine off here last night, and we have reason to believe that a message was landed. We caught one fellow just at dawn.”
“What did you do with him?” the Bishop asked.
“We shot him an hour ago,” was the cool reply.
“Are there any others at large?” Julian enquired, leaning forward.
“One other,” the Colonel acknowledged, sipping his wine appreciatively. “My military police here, however, are very intelligent, and I should think it very doubtful whether he can escape.”
“Was the man who was shot a foreigner?” the Earl asked. “I trust that he was not one of my tenants?”
“He was a stranger,” was the prompt assurance.
“His companion is believed to have been quite a youth. There is a suggestion that he escaped in a motor-car, but he is probably hiding in the neighbourhood.”
Lord Maltenby frowned. There seemed to him something incongruous in the fact that a deed of this sort should have been committed in his domain without his knowledge. He rose to his feet.
“The Countess is probably relying upon some of us for bridge,” he said. “I hope, Colonel, that you will take a hand.”
The men rose and filed slowly out of the room. The Colonel, however, detained his host, and Julian also lingered.
“I hope, Lord Maltenby,” the former said, “that you will excuse my men, but they tell me that they find it necessary to search your garage for a car which has been seen in the neighbourhood.”
“Search my garage?” Lord Maltenby repeated, frowning.
“There is no doubt,” the Colonel explained, “that a car was made use of last night by the man who is still at large, and it is very possible that it was stolen. You will understand, I am sure, that any enquiries which my men may feel it their duty to make are actuated entirely by military necessity.”