It was nearly eleven when the man, half-dozing in a deck-chair, heard his name called. Instantly he sprang up.
“Yes, sir? That you, sir? Nothing the matter, I hope, sir?”
In the moonlight Preston and Yootha Hagerston could be seen standing together on the bank.
“Are you alone, Tom?” Preston asked. His voice had a curious timbre.
“Yes, sir. Doctor Johnson came to dinner, sir, but as you had not returned by nine o’clock I gave him dinner alone, sir.”
“You did quite right.”
After speaking a few words under his breath to Yootha, Preston came aboard alone, leaving her standing on the bank.
“Tom,” he said in a low tone; “Miss Hagerston is in rather an embarrassing position. Things have happened which have prevented her returning to town with Mrs. Hartsilver, who was to have met her after leaving her friends, and there isn’t a bed to be had anywhere, and of course the last train to London has gone. There is nothing for it but for Miss Hagerston to sleep here, but nobody must know about it, you understand. Now, what can we arrange?”
Tom rubbed his chin. Then suddenly he looked up.
“I can sleep on deck, sir, in a deck-chair; very nice on a night like this. Then if you would sleep in my quarters, Miss Hagerston could have your quarters and be completely cut off, sir.”