Morgan choked on a bit of fish and peered sideways at her. She appealed to him.
"I say, Hank, what was the name of that uncle of his Curt was telling us about? I mean the one who had the fits-and-gibbers or something in his sleep, or maybe it was claustrophobia, and used to give a terrific spring out of bed because he thought he was being strangled?"
Captain Whistler laid down his knife and fork. He had obviously been in an ill temper when he came to the table; but lie had concealed it under gruff amiability and absent-minded smiles. Wheeling round his chair he had announced that he must return to the bridge and could stay only for one course or two. Captain Whistler was stout and short of breath. He had protruding eyes of a pale brown colour, something like the hue of pickled onions, a ruddy face, and a large loose mouth which was always booming a professional and paternal "Ha-ha" to nervous old ladies. His gold braid blazed, and his short white hair stood up like the foam on a beer-glass.
Now he addressed Peggy with coy heartiness. "Come, come," he said in his best nursery manner, "and what is the little lady telling us now? Eh, my dear? Something about an accident to a friend of yours?"
"A dreadful accident," she assured him, looking round to make sure the dining-room would overhear. The only people at their own table were the captain, Dr. Kyle, Morgan, and herself; so she wanted to make sure. She described Warren's being picked up unconscious, with a wealth of graphic detail. "But, of course, poor boy, he isn't responsible for his actions when he gets into those fits… "
Captain Whistler looked concerned, and then rather alarmed. His fleshy face grew redder.
"Ah, hurrumph!" he said, clearing his throat. "Dear me! Dear me!" — it speaks much for the captain's social polish that he could sometimes force himself to say "Dear me!" — "Bad, bad, Miss Glenn! But there's nothing — ah — seriously wrong with him, is there?" He peered at her in gruff anxiety. "Is it maybe something in Dr. Kyle's line now?"
"Well, of course, I shouldn't like to say—"
"Have you known cases of the kind, Doctor?"
Kyle was not a man of many words. He was methodically disposing of grilled sole — a lean, long-faced figure with a bulging shirt-front, and traces of a thin smile had pulled down the furrows in his cheeks. He glanced at Peggy from under grizzled eyebrows, and then at Morgan. Morgan received the impression that he believed in Warren's lurid ailment about as much as he believed in the Loch Ness monster.