'Sit down and take a gander over that, young feller. Those are the boys and girls who wittingly, or unwittingly, finance some of these unofficial strikes, and probably other Communist activities as well.'

Barney took the wad of sheets and ran his eye down one after another. In several instances there were in-payments of as much as a thousand pounds, and against these the names were nearly all foreign; but the great majority were British and most of them appeared regularly early in every month for amounts ranging from twenty to one hundred pounds. The contributors were men and women in about equal numbers but, apart from the names of a film star, a Conservative M.P., and a big motor-car manufacturer, they meant nothing to him.

Handing the list back, he said: 'I don't get it, Sir. To contribute such big sums, most of these people must be jolly well off. That's not to say that some of them may not be generous enough to give lavishly to all sorts of charities; and presumably, in this case, they have no idea of the use to which their money is being put. But it seems odd that a Tory M.P. should cough up forty pounds a month regularly to a workers' benevolent, and old Benson, who runs Roadswift Motors, has the reputation of a skinflint.'

'I don't get it either,' agreed C.B. 'During the past week we have managed to identify most of the contributors. They are all rich and there are a number of titled people among them. With the assistance of the Treasury we've worked it out that, on average, they are putting into this show about twenty-five per cent of their incomes; and, super-tax being what it is, what in the world can induce them to do that? It doesn't make sense. Neither do the bigger payments. One is from a Dutch bulb-grower, another from an Indian Rajah, a third from an Argentine meat shipper. They were all on visits to this country at the time their payments were made. Why should wealthy foreigners, who are here only temporarily, suddenly donate big sums to help along British working families that have struck it unlucky?'

'Ask me another, Sir. Unless . . .' Barney paused a moment, 'unless they do know what the money is being used for and are fellow travellers. There are rich people who believe that Communism is bound to get the upper hand here in the long run, and this crowd may be paying a form of insurance to be allowed to hang on to the bulk of their fortunes if the worst happened.'