All except Leithen, the man who was afterwards Solicitor-General. "Lucky devils," he said. "You've had all the fun out of life. I've had my nose to the grindstone ever since I left school. All the same," he went on, "I once played the chief part in a rather exciting business without ever once budging from London. And the joke of it was that the man who went out to look for adventure only saw a bit of the game, and I who sat in my chambers saw it all and pulled the strings. 'They also serve who only stand and wait, ' you know." Then he told us this story. . . . it was the tale of the maniac who dreamed of the "Powerhouse." There were dark scenes in the drama before it was played out.

Author Biography

John Buchan (1875 - 1940) was a Scottish novelist, historian and Unionist politician who served as Governor General of Canada, the 15th since Canadian Confederation. After a brief legal career, Buchan simultaneously began his writing career and his political and diplomatic careers, serving as a private secretary to the colonial administrator of various colonies in southern Africa. He eventually wrote propaganda for the British war effort in the First World War. Buchan was in 1927 elected Member of Parliament for the Combined Scottish Universities, but he spent most of his time on his writing career, notably writing The Thirty-Nine Steps and other adventure fiction.