I was violently excited. I was sure that I had hit on the right trail at last. One thing was clear, I must not move out of the cabin. The asaf?tida had got to be borne. I examined my facts again. To-morrow was the 22nd, and at 1 a.m. or 1 p.m. something would happen. I plumped for 1 a.m. It was now seven o’clock. In six hours I should know.
I don’t know how I got through the evening. I retired to my cabin fairly early. I had told the stewardess that I had a cold in the head and didn’t mind smells. She still seemed distressed, but I was firm.
The evening seemed interminable. I duly retired to bed, but in view of emergencies I swathed myself in a thick flannel dressing-gown, and encased my feet in slippers. Thus attired I felt that I could spring up and take an active part in anything that happened.
What did I expect to happen? I hardly knew. Vague fancies, most of them wildly improbable, flitted through my brain. But one thing I was firmly convinced of, at one o’clock something would happen.
At various times, I heard my fellow-passengers coming to bed. Fragments of conversation, laughing good-nights, floated in through the open transom. Then, silence. Most of the lights went out. There was still one in the passage outside, and there was therefore a certain amount of light in my cabin. I heard eight bells go. The hour that followed seemed the longest I had ever known. I consulted my watch surreptitiously to be sure I had not overshot the time.
If my deductions were wrong, if nothing happened at one o’clock, I should have made a fool of myself, and spent all the money I had in the world on a mare’s-nest. My heart beat painfully.
Two bells went overhead. One o’clock! And nothing. Wait—what was that? I heard the quick light patter of feet running—running along the passage.
Then with the suddenness of a bombshell my cabin door burst open and a man almost fell inside.
“Save me,” he said hoarsely. “They’re after me.”
It was not a moment for argument or explanation. I could hear footsteps outside. I had about forty seconds in which to act. I had sprung to my feet and was standing facing the stranger in the middle of the cabin.
A cabin does not abound in hiding-places for a six-foot man. With one arm I pulled out my cabin trunk. He slipped down behind it under the bunk. I raised the lid. At the same time, with the other hand I pulled down the wash-basin. A deft movement and my hair was screwed into a tiny knot on the top of my head. From the point of view of appearance it was inartistic, from another standpoint it was supremely artistic. A lady, with her hair screwed into an unbecoming knob and in the act of removing a piece of soap from her trunk with which, apparently to wash her neck, could hardly be suspected of harbouring a fugitive.
There was a knock at the door, and without waiting for me to say, “Come in,” it was pushed open.
I don’t know what I expected to see. I think I had vague ideas of Mr. Pagett brandishing a revolver. Or my missionary friend with a sandbag, or some other lethal weapon. But certainly I did not expect to see a night stewardess, with an inquiring face and looking the essence of respectability.
“I beg your pardon, miss, I thought you called out.”
“No,” I said, “I didn’t.”
“I’m sorry for interrupting you.”
“That’s all right,” I said. “I couldn’t sleep. I thought a wash would do me good.” It sounded rather as though it were a thing I never had as a general rule.
“I’m so sorry, miss,” said the stewardess again. “But there’s a gentleman about who’s rather drunk, and we are afraid he might get into one of the ladies’ cabins and frighten them.”
“How dreadful,” I said, looking alarmed. “He won’t come in here, will he?”
“Oh, I don’t think so, miss. Ring the bell if he does. Good night.”
“Good night.”
I opened the door and peeped down the corridor. Except for the retreating form of the stewarde............