Mr. Webster sat down limply on the settee. He was undecided whether to roar with laughter or shriek with rage; while he struggled for a decision Andrew Bowers blew smoke rings at the ceiling.
“Haven't I seen you before?” Webster queried presently.
“I wouldn't be surprised. I drove you down to the steamer in a taxi half an hour ago. You will recall that the taxi driver carried your luggage aboard.”
Webster gazed around the stateroom. “Where have you hidden your livery?” he demanded.
“I wrapped it in a newspaper; then, seeking a moment when the deck outside was deserted, I stepped forth in my—I beg your pardon, your—pyjamas and tossed it overboard.”
“But apparently you did not bring aboard with you a suit of clothes to take the place of your livery?”
“Quite true—lamentably so, Mr. Webster. Perhaps you will accept my desperate need as an excuse for borrowing your pyjamas. I notice you have another suit of them. Fortunate man!”
When confronted by something mysterious it was not John Stuart's habit to ask innumerable questions, and for the space of two minutes he gave himself up to deduction and a close scrutiny of his companion.
Andrew Bowers was a man of perhaps thirty years, five feet ten inches tall, and apparently in excellent health. He might have weighed a hundred and seventy pounds and he was undeniably handsome. His head was nobly formed and covered with thick, wavy hair, shiny and black as ebony; his eyes were dark blue; the eyebrows, thick but fine and silky, almost met over the bridge of a thin, high nose that was just a trifle too long for his face. Webster decided it was the nose of a thinker. Andrew Bowers's forehead was broad and high and his head was thick forward of the ears, infallible sign of brains; his mouth and chin were full of determination, although capable of a smile of singular sweetness; while the skin on his legs was milk-white, his hands and face were tanned to the colour of a manzanita stick, seeming to indicate that he had lived an outdoor life.
While Webster was wondering whether his companion was merely a high-class tramp or an absconding bank cashier, a knock sounded on the stateroom door. He opened it and the purser stood in the entrance.