Fact was, I was getting vastly sick of the entire job. But a sudden thought did, momentarily, throw me into ejaculation.
“By Jove, I’ve got it!” I cried. “Berth number nine!”
“Berth number nine! Here, come, man, we’ve no time to waste! We’ve got to get onto some track immediately.”
“And you must have been the one who occupied number three on the sleeper last night,” I continued.
“You deduce well,” said he, with a grin.
“Well, when I got my own reservation, the ticket seller told me that berth nine was taken from Stamford. So that’s it. Stevens, after running the launch somewhere up the Sound toward Connecticut, left it there and boarded the same train, and from there on——”
“And from there on,” grunted Pawlinson, “even I can follow. But look here. Why didn’t you come out with this sooner?”
“I didn’t connect the thing at all,” I replied.
“No; it seems not.”
“What I can’t make out, though,” I went on, unheeding his manner, “is this: Why in thunder all the care taken to effect the boarding of the Portland steamer by launch from Port Washington?”