"I haven't been happier during the whole cruise," said Monty. "On deck I wouldn't be noticed, but here I am quite the whole thing. Besides I can get out whenever I feel like it."
"I have a thousand dollars which says you can't," said DeMille, and Monty snapped him up so eagerly that he added, "that you can't get out of your own accord."
Monty acceded to the condition and offered odds on the proposition to the others, but there were no takers.
"That settles it," he smiled grimly to himself. "I can make a thousand dollars by staying here and I can't afford to escape."
On the third day of Monty's imprisonment the "Flitter" began to roll heavily. At first he gloated over the discomfort of his guards, who obviously did not like to stay below. "Subway" Smith and Bragdon were on duty and neither was famous as a good sailor. When Monty lighted his pipe there was consternation and "Subway" rushed on deck.
"You are a brave man, Joe," Monty said to the other and blew a cloud of smoke in his direction. "I knew you would stick to your post. You wouldn't leave it even if the ship should go down."
Bragdon had reached the stage where he dared not speak and was busying himself trying to "breathe with the motion of the boat," as he had called it.
"By Gad," continued Monty, relentlessly, "this smoke is getting thick. Some of this toilet water might help if I sprinkled it about."
One whiff of the sweet-smelling cologne was enough for Bragdon and he bolted up the companionway, leaving the stateroom door wide open and the prisoner free to go where he pleased. Monty's first impulse was to follow, but he checked himself on the threshold.
"Damn that bet with DeMille," he said to himself, and added aloud to the fleeting guard, "The key, Joe, I dare you to come back and get it!"