"What a question to ask! Thinking! I've been doing nothing else since we struck."
"But you know what I mean?"
"Putting two and two together?" asked Ned significantly, with a glance at the steering-wheel house that had been their place of concealment.
"That's it exactly. Have you been doing that?"
"Hum, yes, but they don't make four—yet."
"But you've come to the conclusion that the accident may not have been quite so accidental as it appeared?"
"I didn't say so. What I do say, though, is this, that there is one person on board who was quite willing to take advantage of it, accident or no accident, to discredit us."
"And that was——?"
"Mr. Midshipman Kenworth. The rascal! caught him in the wireless room trying to send a message to the Manhattan."
Ned went on to relate all that had occurred at that momentous encounter, being frequently interrupted by Herc's exclamations of indignation.