But I
have always fancied I had a kind of instinct about questions like
this. I don't know if I can explain myself, but I used to use my
brains as far as they went, and after they came to a blank wall I
guessed, and I usually found my guesses pretty right.
So I set out all my conclusions on a bit of Admiralty paper. They
ran like this:
FAIRLY CERTAIN
(1) Place where there are several sets of stairs; one that
matters distinguished by having thirty-nine steps.
(2) Full tide at 10.17 p.m. Leaving shore only possible at full
tide.
(3) Steps not dock steps, and so place probably not harbour.
(4) No regular night steamer at 10.17. Means of transport must
be tramp (unlikely), yacht, or fishing-boat.
There my reasoning stopped. I made another list, which I headed
'Guessed', but I was just as sure of the one as the other.
GUESSED
(1) Place not harbour but open coast.
(2) Boat small--trawler, yacht, or launch.
(3) Place somewhere on East Coast between Cromer and Dover.
it struck me as odd that I should be sitting at that desk with a
Cabinet Minister, a Field-Marshal, two high Government officials,
and a French General watching me, while from the scribble of a
dead man I was trying to drag a secret which meant life or death
for us.
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