In the meantime Mark and Perry had gone into the dining room, and by a strange coincidence took a seat at the same table where Clemmons and Breslin had had dinner together.
“I beg pardon, sir, but are you from the cruising ship now in port?” asked the waiter.
“We are, and we wish the best dinner you can give two fresh young salts,” said Perry.
“I’ll give you a good dinner, sir; but the two gentlemen who were here awhile since, one of them wearing a uniform like yours, left this paper. I just picked it up as you came in.”
Perry took the paper and said, after glancing at it:
“I will deliver it to the gentleman whose name is here, for he is on our ship. Now, my man, we are hungry, so do your best,” and a liberal fee was slipped into the hand of the waiter.
“Oh, thank you, sir; but what wines will you drink?”
“We will not take wine, my man.”
The waiter disappeared with a look of surprise upon his face that any one in uniform ate dinner and drank no wine.
“See here, Merrill, I am going to do perhaps a mean thing, but I am curious to know a few things, and I shall question that waiter.”