80 WITH MR. CHAMBERLAIN IN THE 



astonishment, for it is very seldom Mr. Chamber- 

 lain says " Come up." Generally he says " Not in." 

 The reporter followed the servant around the turn- 

 ing of a number of dark, narrow corridors to a large 

 parlour on the ground floor, in a remote part of the 

 building. The door of the parlour was open, and 

 three gentlemen were near the door waiting to see 

 the reporter. These gentlemen were not Mr. 

 Chamberlain and the Foreign Office officials, but 

 simply " Mr. Chamberlain's friends," as the Pinker- 

 ton detectives on guard choose to call themselves. 

 They had seen the card and passed it favourably ; 

 but they wanted also to see the man to assure them- 

 selves that there was no deception. They are alive 

 to the fact that a bold, bad man with hostile inten- 

 tions towards Mr. Chamberlain might possibly get 

 possession of the card even of the British Minister, 

 and attempt in that way to smuggle himself past the 

 guards. The detectives do not by any means re- 

 gard the card in itself as sufficient. No person 

 whatever can pass up to Mr. Chamberlain's apart- 

 ments without passing an English Civil Service 

 Examination, so to speak, before the guards. 



The servant simultaneously presented the card 

 and the reporter to the gentlemen in the parlour, and 

 as the reporter had the good fortune to be known to 

 one of them, the order was given after some little 

 questioning : " Show the gentleman up." Two 

 flights of stairs, and then the door leading into one of 

 Mr. Chamberlain's sitting-rooms was opened. It 

 was the room where Mr. Chamberlain the day after 

 his arrival in Washington was entertained by forty 



