"Good morning, Herr Hans von Rippach," exclaimed Captain Brookes. "I regret to have to inform you that owing to possible events I must ask you to take up your quarters in a cabin on the main deck."
"Beneath the armoured deck, I presume?" replied the individual who concealed his identity under the Continental equivalent of Mr. Nobody of Nowhere. The man spoke in fluent English, with hardly a trace of a foreign pronunciation. "That means you are going into action?"
The captain assented.
"Might I take this opportunity of expressing my regret for the rude manner in which I spoke to you on my arrival on board?" continued the officer.
"I accept your apologies, sir."
"And to answer your original questions I beg to announce myself as——"
"Prince E. von Bulow von Ratalewis, second son of——"
"Thank you, Lord Stanningborough," rejoined the prince with an air of a practised duellist who has effected a successful counter. "Need I recall our most pleasurable meeting in Vienna in '09?"
"You heard what the prince said?" said the captain, abruptly, as he and Gerald left the cabin after the expiration of ten minutes' conversation. "Please keep this matter to yourself, as I particularly wish to preserve my incognito."
Gerald bowed; he was on the point of replying "Yes, my lord," but, checking himself, he merely answered "Yes, sir." The revelation had momentarily staggered him, for he clearly remembered the case of the mysterious disappearance of Lord Stanningborough early in the second decade of the present century. For the first time he was able to recognise the peer's features in spite of the addition of the torpedo-beard.