16 — Danger in Cabin C46
Morgan said nothing. Like Captain Whistler on several occasions too well known to cite, he was incapable of speech. His first sharp fear— viz., that his eyes were deriving him, and that this might be a grotesque fantasy of champagne and weariness — was dispelled by sombre reality, Warren was here. He was here, and he had the emerald elephant. What he might have been up to was a vision which Morgan, for the moment, did not care to face. All he distinctly remembered afterwards was Valvick saying, hoarsely, "Lock dat door!"
"As for you—" continued Warren, and made a withering gesture at Peggy. "As for you — that's all the faith and trust you put in me, is it? That's the help I get, Baby! Ha! t put through a deep-laid plan; but do you trust me when I'm shamming sleep? No! You go rushing off in a tantrum… "
"Darling!" said Peggy, and rushed, weeping into his arms.
"Well, now—" said Warren, somewhat mollified. "Have i drink!" he added, with an air of inspiration, and drew f ft Mil his pocket a bottle of Old Rob Roy depleted by exactly one pint.
Morgan pressed his fists to his throbbing temples. He swallowed hard. Trying to get a grip on himself, he approached Warren as warily as you would approach a captured orang-outang, and tried to speak in a sensible tone.
"To begin with," he said, "it is no use wasting time in futile recriminations. Beyond pointing out that you are into* lulled as well as off your onion, I will say nothing. But I want you to try, if possible, to collect yourself sufficiently to give me a coherent account of your movements." A horrible suspicion struck him. "You didn't haul off and paste the captain again, did you?" he demanded. "O God!
you didn't assault Captain Whistler for the third time, did you? No? Well, that's something. Then what have you been up to?"
"You're asking me?" queried Warren. He patted Peggy with one hand and passed the bottle to Morgan with the other. Morgan instantly took a healing pull at it. "You're asking me? What did Lord Gerald do in Chapter Nine? It was your own idea. What did Lord Gerald do in Chapter Nine?"
To the other's bemused wits this was on a par with that cryptic query touching the manifesto said to have been thundered forth by W. E. Gladstone in the year 1886.