"Forget, monsieur? Could Napoleon forget Waterloo? I beg that you permit me to explain."
"Oh, bother you and your explanations!" cried the chief steward with the sudden impatience common to fat men. "Take them to some less busy man. The captain, for example."
Monsieur Pettipon bowed himself from the office, covered with confusion and despair. Had not the chief steward refused to hear him? Did not the chief steward's words imply that the crime was too heinous for any one less than the captain himself to pass judgment on it? To the captain Monsieur Pettipon would have to go, although he dreaded to do it, for the captain was notoriously the busiest and least approachable man on the ship. Desperation gave him courage. Breathless at his own temerity, pink as a peony with shame, Monsieur Pettipon found himself bowing before a blur of gold and multi-hued decorations that instinct rather than his reason told him was the captain of the Voltaire.
The captain was worried about the fog, and about the presence aboard of M. Victor Ronssoy, the president of the line, and his manner was brisk and chilly.
"Did I ring for you?" he asked.
"No," jerked out Monsieur Pettipon, "but if the captain will pardon the great liberty, I have a matter of the utmost importance on which I wish to address him."
"Speak, man, speak!" shot out the captain, alarmed by Monsieur Pettipon's serious aspect. "Leak? Fire? Somebody overboard? What?"
"No, no!" cried Monsieur Pettipon, trickles of moist emotion sliding down the creases of his round face. "Nobody overboard; no leak; no fire. But—monsieur the captain—behold this!"
He extended his hand and the captain bent his head over it with quick interest.
For a second the captain stared at the thing in Monsieur Pettipon's hand; then he stared at Monsieur Pettipon.