Part 11 (1/2)

”Yes. I was aroused before that,--I do not know how,--and found I was locked in. I thought it might be a joke--forecastle hands are fond of joking, and they resented my being brought here to sleep. I took out some of the screws with my knife, and--then I broke the door.”

”You saw no one?”

”It was dark; I saw and heard no one.”

”But, surely--the man at the wheel--”

”Hush,” I warned her; ”he is there. He heard something, but the helmsman cannot leave the wheel.”

She was stooping to the lock again.

”You are sure it was locked?”

”The bolt is still shot.” I showed her.

”Then--where is the key?”

”The key!”

”Certainly. Find the key, and you will find the man who locked you in.”

”Unless,” I reminded her, ”it flew out when I broke the lock.”

”In that case, it will be on the floor.”

But an exhaustive search of the cabin floor discovered no key. Jones, seeing us searching, helped, his revolver in one hand and a lighted match in the other, handling both with an abandon of ease that threatened us alternately with fire and a bullet. But there was no key.

”It stands to reason, miss,” he said, when we had given up, ”that, since the key isn't here, it isn't on the s.h.i.+p. That there key is a sort of red-hot give-away. No one is going to carry a thing like that around. Either it's here in this cabin--which it isn't--or it's overboard.”

”Very likely, Jones. But I shall ask Mr. Turner to search the men.”

She went toward Turner's door, and Jones leaned over me, putting a hand on my arm.

”She's right, boy,” he said quickly. ”Don't let 'em know what you're after, but go through their pockets. And their shoes!” he called after me. ”A key slips into a shoe mighty easy.”

But, after all, it was not necessary. The key was to be found, and very soon.

CHAPTER X

”THAT'S MUTINY”

Exactly what occurred during Elsa Lee's visit to her brother-in-law's cabin I have never learned. He was sober, I know, and somewhat dazed, with no recollection whatever of the previous night, except a hazy idea that he had quarreled with Richardson.

Jones and I waited outside. He suggested that we have prayers over the bodies when we placed them in the boat, and I agreed to read the burial service from the Episcopal Prayer Book. The voices from Turner's cabin came steadily, Miss Lee's low tones, Turner's heavy ba.s.s only now and then. Once I heard her give a startled exclamation, and both Jones and I leaped to the door. But the next moment she was talking again quietly.

Ten minutes--fifteen--pa.s.sed. I grew restless and took to wandering about the cabin. Mrs. Johns came to the door opposite, and asked to have tea sent down to the stewardess. I called the request up the companionway, unwilling to leave the cabin for a moment. When I came back, Jones was standing at the door of Vail's cabin, looking in. His face was pale.

”Look there!” he said hoa.r.s.ely. ”Look at the bell. He must have tried to push the b.u.t.ton!”