Crabb got up from the table and opened the doors of a large locker under the companion. Burnett watched him curiously.
Garment after garment he pulled out upon the deck under the glare of the cabin lamp; shoes, hats and caps, overcoats and clothing of all sizes and shapes from the braided gray of the coster to the velvet and sash of the Niçois.
He selected a soft hat and a cap and two long, tattered coats of ancient cut and style and threw them over the back of a chair. Then he went to his stateroom and brought out a large square box of tin and placed it on the table.
He first wrapped a handkerchief around his neck, then seated himself deliberately before the box, opened the lid and took out a tray filled with make-up sticks. These he put aside while he drew forth from the deeper recesses mustachios, whiskers and beards of all shapes and complexions. He worked rapidly and silently, watching his changing image in the little mirror set in the box lid.
Burnett, fascinated, followed his skillful fingers as they moved back and forth, lining here, shading there, not as the actor does for an effect by the calcium, but carefully, delicately, with the skill of the art anatomist who knows the bone structure of the face and the pull of the aging muscles.
In twenty minutes Mortimer Crabb had aged as many years, and now bore the phiz of a shaggy rum-sot. The long coat, soft hat and rough bandanna completed the character. The fever of the adventure had mounted in Burnett’s veins. He sprang to his feet with a reckless gesture of final resolution.
“Give me my part!” he exclaimed. “I’ll play it!”
The aged intemperate smiled approval. “Good lad!” he said. “I thought you’d be game. If you hadn’t been I was going alone. It’s lucky you’re clean shaved. Come and be transfigured.”
And as he rapidly worked on Burnett’s face he completed the details of his plan. Like a good general, Crabb disposed his plans for failure as well as for success.
They would wear their disguises over their evening clothes. Then, if the worst came, vaseline and a wipe of the bandannas would quickly remove all guilty signs from their faces, they could discard their tatters, and resume the garb of convention.