He looked rather malevolently about the boat-deck, which was crowded and noisy. Warren's triumphal progress to the brig had taken place belowdecks and by a devious way, but the news was already flying, so that there was a note of shrillness in the clatter of talk. Somnolent figures in deck chairs, set out to dry themselves under the sun, were sitting up from their rugs; a game of shuffleboard had been suspended and two deck-tennis players came up to the net lor a conference. The ship's reigning belle — there is always one — had stopped her professional smiling, her beret pushed over one ear and a cigarette half-way to her mouth, and was bending to listen in a whispering group of admirers. She stood on a raised platform by a lifeboat, her gaudy green scarf blowing against the sky. Far above their heads, on one of the three vast black funnels that showed; a faint stain of smoke, the liner's whistle emitted a sudden hoarse Whooo! as though it were giving an alarm. A suggestion of lunch was now in the air. There was a good deal of laughter. Morgan scowled.)
They found Whistler getting his cabin set to rights and being particularly rough on the steward.
"I won't discuss it," he said, "any more. Maybe I was hasty. I won't say I wasn't. But I acted within my rights, and I'll let that young drunkard or lunatic stop there until; I damned well get ready to let him out. We'll say nothing of his story. But take a look around my cabin, just look at; it, and then tell me whether I didn't do the right thing.' He thrust out his jaw, the good eye narrowed in his battered face, and the gold stripes on his sleeves gleamed as he jammed his fists on his hips. But there was something: curiously conciliating about him. "Come now!" he said suddenly. "We're alone. There's no need for you to defend your friend. What's the truth of the matter?"
They could hear the breath whistling from his nose.
"Does this mean, Captain," said Peggy, after a pause in which she seemed taken aback, "that you really don't think Curt is mad, after all? Oooh, you villain! After you ordered those nasty men to manhandle and," she gasped, "and mistreat—"
"I want the truth, madam. The truth, that's all. In my s position—" i
"I say, Captain," said Morgan, after another pause in which Whistler shut his teeth hard, "does this mean something new has happened?"
"Why should it?".
"Oh, I only wondered… He was looking quickly, round the cabin, searching a clue, and then he saw it. j Rolled into a wad at one side of the wardrobe lay what] looked very much like a sheet tied round stained blankets.] "So," said Morgan, "do you mean to tell us a steward saw something queer about the cabin next to Curt's? And went I in and found the berth full of bloodstained sheets? And] then reported to you? Excellent. Here's the razor that was j used in the killing." He took it out of his pocket and laid It on the table, while Whistler stared at him fixedly. "Now everything is fine. All you've done is accuse the wrong man of being a liar and a lunatic, and locked him up under guard. If old Sturton can only get you convicted of criminal negligence to the extent of fifty thousand pounds, the officials of this steamship line will be in an even better humour."
As a matter of fact, he was (despite himself) feeling lorry for the old mackerel. A persistent voice told him that the whole mess was their own fault. All that made him wild was that circumstances seemed conspiring to prevent belief in something he still fiercely felt to be true.
"Murder!" said the captain, in a sort of gulp. "Murder! You have the nerve to stand there and talk to me of murder when there's nobody not accounted for on the whole ship? Where's the murdered person?… And don't try to talk to me about what my superiors will think. I put that young lunatic in confinement for an offence against discipline. That's all. An offence against discipline, wild that's my right. My word is law, and any maritime court—"
"It would make a good story, though," the other pointed out, "printed in the newspapers. Impassioned Defence of Captain Whistler. 'The Dastardly Villain Set on Me with a Dug-powder Gun.' That also would gratify the Green Star Line. Yes, it would. In your eye."
The captain seemed slightly awed.
"Isn't there any justice?" he inquired suddenly, and looked rather blankly about the cabin. "In all God's green earth, isn't there any justice? What have I done to deserve (his?"
It was only the beginning of a genuinely powerful, if rather pathetic, oration, for which there was undeniably dome justification. It was pitched in a rather Biblical strain. Captain Whistler pointed out and enumerated his afflictions. Masked foreigners, he said, attacked him with stilettos and bottles. Uninsured jewels belonging to?!<£&/!! viscounts were stolen while murdering thieves posed as Harley Street doctors at his table. Blood-stained blankets and razors mysteriously appeared in the cabins; women vanished but did not vanish; the nephews of eminent American administrators first went mad and gibbered of bears and geography then ran amok with bug-powder guns, tried to poison him and finally threatened him with razors. Indeed, an unprejudiced listener would have decided that the situation aboard the Queen Victoria was past hope. An unprejudiced listener would have said this boat had been chosen for the annual convention of the Ancient Order of Sorcerers, and that the boys must have been showing off a bit. Captain Whistler said it was too much. He said he was a strong man, but he would rather be thrown to the sharks.
"I know it, Captain," Morgan agreed, uncomfortably, when the typhoon began to die and the skipper went to pour himself a drink with shaking hands. "And, believe it or not, we feel as badly about it as you do. So the first thing we must do—"
"There is nothing to do," said the other, with finality, "except maybe get drunk."
"… is to join forces and start to unwind this tangle. So here's a guarantee of good faith. We'll go with you to Sturton and clear you absolutely. We'll say we saw you suddenly struck down without a chance to defend yourself; for all you know, it may be true… "
"You'd do that?" demanded the skipper, sitting up. "I was damned if I'd ask a favour of you, but if you would— could… man, I'll do anything. I'll even let that madman out of the brig."
Morgan reflected. "As a matter of fact," he said, hesitantly, "for the next few hours I'd rather you didn't."
"Hank!" said Peggy. But she stopped.
"Yes, you see how it is," nodded Morgan, after some thought. "When we thought the captain wouldn't listen to reason, we'd have blown the wall down to get him out. But if we do have co-operation — have we Captain?"
"To the water-line, man."
"Then it may be much the best thing to leave him where he is for the moment. He's thoroughly comfortable, and we have a breathing-space while he's in a place where he can't possibly get into trouble. At least," Morgan amended, rather doubtfully, "I don't see how he can get into trouble. The whole thing was in your attitude, Captain. If you'd like us to talk to Sturton now, we're ready."
They met storm signals at the door of the peer's large Mild rather elaborate suite of cabins on B deck. The door to the drawing-room was on the latch, and they penetrated Into a stuffy finery of curtains drawn at the portholes, gilt furniture disarranged, and an array of medicine-bottles sprawled round a chaise-lounge on which Sturton had evidently taken his hitherto sea-sick rest. Whether his recovery had been due to smooth weather or the loss of the emerald they did not know; but he had definitely recovered. From behind the door of the bedroom rose a dry, quick, high-pitched voice in a sort of pounce.