“It will be in the nature of a diplomatic coup,” he said presently.  “Of that much I feel sure.  England will be forced into such a position that she will have no alternative left but to declare war.  That, of course, will be the end of us.  With our ridiculously small army and absolutely no sane scheme for home defence, we shall lose all that we have worth fighting for—­our colonies—­without being able to strike a blow.  The thing is so ridiculously obvious.  It has been admitted time after time by every sea lord and every commander-in-chief.  We have listened to it, and that’s all.  Our fleet is needed under present conditions to protect our own shores.  There isn’t a single battleship which could be safely spared.  Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Egypt, India, must take care of themselves.  I wonder when a nation of the world ever played fast and loose with great possessions as we have done!”

“This is a nice sort of thing to hear almost one’s first night in England,” Hamel remarked a little gloomily.  “Tell me some more about this conference.  Are you sure that your information is reliable?”

“Our information is miserably scanty,” Kinsley admitted.  “Curiously enough, the man who must know most about the whole thing is an Englishman, one of the most curious mortals in the British Empire.  A spy of his succeeded in learning more than any of our people, and without being arrested, too.”

“And who is this singular person?” Hamel asked.

“A man of whom you, I suppose, never heard,” Kinsley replied.  “His name is Fentolin—­Miles Fentolin—­and he lives somewhere down in Norfolk.  He is one of the strangest characters that ever lived, stranger than any effort of fiction I ever met with.  He was in the Foreign Office once, and every one was predicting for him a brilliant career.  Then there was an accident—­let me see, it must have been some six or seven years ago—­and he had to have both his legs amputated.  No one knows exactly how the accident happened, and there was always a certain amount of mystery connected with it.  Since then he has buried himself in the country.  I don’t think, in fact, that he ever moves outside his place; but somehow or other he has managed to keep in touch with all the political movements of the day.”

“Fentolin,” Hamel repeated softly to himself.  “Tell me, whereabouts does he live?”

“Quite a wonderful place in Norfolk, I believe, somewhere near the sea.  I’ve forgotten the name, for the moment.  He has had wireless telegraphy installed; he has a telegraph office in the house, half-a-dozen private wires, and they say that he spends an immense amount of money keeping in touch with foreign politics.  His excuse is that he speculates largely, as I dare say he does; but just lately,” Kinsley went on more slowly, “he has been an object of anxiety to all of us.  It was he who sent the first agent out to Germany, to try and discover at least where this conference was to be held.  His man returned in safety, and he has one over there now who has not been arrested.  We seem to have lost nearly all of ours.”