“I’ve read about people falling down into holds,” said Miss Smith. “Do you think—”
“I shouldn’t count on that,” said Mr. Powers. “No—it seems pretty clear to me that they changed their minds at the last moment, for some reason, and remained ashore.[Pg 239]”
Mr. Patterson change his mind at the last moment? That was the most impossible solution of all.
“It can’t be that,” said Miss Smith, shaking her head. “No! Something has happened!”
Mr. Powers looked down at her in silence for a moment.
“Is it—serious?” he asked. “I mean, does it make very much difference to you, your friends not being here?”
“Difference!” cried Miss Smith. “Why, it—” She stopped short. “You see,” she went on, in an altered tone, “I’m their governess.”
She looked steadily at the stranger as she said this, because she knew that to some persons a governess would be quite a different creature from an independent traveler. If it made a difference to this young man, she thought she would like to know it. As far as she could judge, it did not. He returned her glance in the same friendly, quiet fashion.
“I see!” he said.
Miss Smith was quite sure, however, that he did not see, or even imagine. If he had, he wouldn’t have suggested her sending a radio message to the Pattersons’ house.