It was a mixed train, and the day coaches appeared to have much the better of the sleepers as to occupancy. Seagraves noted casually that, besides themselves, their car boasted but two other passengers, and though they might have been snugly asleep in their respective berths, they had apparently elected to sit out the short run, evidently preferring reclining to rising and dressing at 1:30 or 2 o’clock A. M.
“Do you see the man sitting all alone in the last seat with the handkerchief over his face, to keep the light out of his eyes?” Olga’s ruminant voice finally broke in upon the monotonous clackety-clack of wheels upon rail-joints.
“Yes—what about him?” asked Seagraves.
“Nothing, only he—he looks like Paul,” she answered in a guarded voice, as though she feared Brandon, cat-napping now, might overhear her strange language.
“Olga!” ridiculed the detective, “get a grip on yourself.”
Having thus counseled the prisoner, Seagraves was thoughtful for a long space; then he looked over at Olga, saw an odd, uneasy expression on her pretty face and quickly said:
“Here—have another cigarette, Olga. Burn ’em up!”
AT MIDNIGHT the conductor passed through the car.
“We’ll make the city a little before two o’clock,” he said in answer to a sleepy-voiced interrogation from Brandon, who seemed to have banished sleep and was blinking about the car.