“How’n tarnation’ll I be able to know ’em? What d’ they look like?”
“A man with a sort of stoop to his shoulders, and a mighty pretty girl,” I replied. “Anyway, you can’t fail, for if anybody shows up, it must be that——”
I stopped, for he was scratching his pate in thick-headed brain-working.
“Hold on thar!” he finally growled. “Why, dang me, man, they ain’t aboard no longer!”
“Ain’t aboard?” I cried. “Why, I could swear they haven’t yet crossed that gangplank!”
“Right you are there, my lad,” he agreed; “for them there and that same pair o’ individools must be the folks as got into a launch out yonder in the harbor when we were stopped by the fog.”
“Into a launch!” I echoed frenziedly as a sharp memory shot through me. Surely the couple did have a uniform method of boarding and quitting vessels.
“Better see the purser about it,” added the fellow; “there’s his window in there. He knows more about it as I do.”
He pointed aboard the boat where the brass grill of that officer’s office showed up plainly enough. And immediately I strode across the plank and up to the purser, who was figuring at his desk.
He acknowledged my nod genially, and asked what he could do for me.