never found. The assistants themselves proved to be respectable young fellows who had been employed only a few weeks and who clearly knew nothing of the nefarious conspiracy.

Nothing but the Mohawk had prevented Barakoff’s escape! And Dick Manton received later on the official thanks of the British Government for his daring exploit.

Chapter Five.

The Master Atom.

“Oh! la la! How horribly dull life is! I do wish something really startling would happen, Dick!”

The words were spoken in pretty broken English by Yvette Pasquet, who, charming and chic, as usual, was sitting with Jules and Dick Manton. The adventurous trio were dining al fresco in the leafy garden of the old-world “Hôtel de France” on the river bank at Montigny, that delightful spot on the outskirts of the great Forest of Fontainebleau, a spot beloved by all the artists and littérateurs of Paris.

“Something will happen suddenly, no doubt,” Dick laughed, glancing at his beloved. “It always does!”

“I sincerely hope it will,” declared Jules in good English. “We’re really getting rather rusty. I met Regnier yesterday out at Pré Catalan with Madame Sohet, and he hinted to me that some great mystery had arisen; but he would tell me nothing further.”

“Regnier, as head of the Service, is always well informed, and like an oyster,” Yvette remarked with a laugh. “So I suppose we must wait for something to happen. I hate to be idle.”

“Yes. Something will surely happen very shortly,” said Dick. “I have a curious intuition that we shall very soon be away again on another mission. My intuition never fails me.”

Dick Manton’s words were prophetic, for on that same evening before a meeting of the Royal Society in London, Professor Rudford, the world-famed scientist, made an amazing speech in which he said:

“Could we but solve the problem of releasing and controlling the mighty forces locked up in this piece of chalk, we should have power enough to drive the biggest liner to New York and back. We should have at our disposal energy unlimited. The daily work of the world would be reduced to a few minutes’ tending of automatic machinery. And, I may add, the first nation to solve that problem will have the entire world at its mercy. For no nation, or combination of nations, could stand even against a 

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