“There is a duplicate on the table.”
He saluted, and went aft to find the Reverend Samuel.
“I think,” murmured the skipper, with a twinkle in his eye, “that I will now inspect the wireless installation. Would you care to come with me?”
And this is what we, most reprehensibly, read:
Dear Brother how lovely the gentleman who guides our ship tells me we pass quite close about midday the day after tomorrow will lean over railings and wave pocket handkerchief.
Ferdinand.
“My sainted aunt!” spluttered the skipper. “‘Lean over railings and wave pocket handkerchief!’”
“I think I prefer ‘the gentleman who guides our ship,’ said Jim gravely. “Anyway, James, I shall borrow your telescope as we come abreast of Ferdinand. I’d just hate to miss him. Good night, old man. You’d better have that message framed.”
It was about half an hour later that the door of my cabin opened and Jim entered abruptly. I was lying in my bunk smoking a final cigarette, and I looked at him in mild surprise. He was fully dressed, though I had seen him start to take off his clothes twenty minutes before, and he was looking grave.
“You pay attention, Dick,” he said quietly, sitting down on the other bunk. “I had just taken off my coat when I remembered I’d left my cigar case in a niche up on deck. I went up to get it, and just as I was putting it in my pocket I heard my own name mentioned. Somewhat naturally I stopped to listen. And I distinctly heard this sentence—‘Don’t forget—you are absolutely responsible for Maitland.’ I listened for about five minutes, but I couldn’t catch anything else except a few disconnected words here and there, such as ‘wireless’ and ‘midday.’ Then there was a general pushing back of deck chairs, and those seven black-coated blighters trooped off to bed. They didn’t see me; they were on the other side of the funnel—but it made me think. You remember that remark you heard as we came on board? Well, why the deuce is this bunch of parsons so infernally interested in me? I don’t like it, Dick.” He looked at me hard through his eyeglass. “Do you think they are parsons?”