“But my orders were quite precise.”
“And now, tell me, how came this gentleman on board your ship?”
“To tell the truth, sir, I don’t know exactly. We were lying in the St. Katherine Docks, and my last evening ashore I spent at home with my wife, over at Victoria Park. We were to sail at four o’clock in the morning, but I didn’t get aboard before about ten past four. When I did so, orders from the owners were put into my hand, and I was told that there was a passenger who’d been brought aboard, lying asleep below. ’Ere’s the letter;” and he drew it from his pocket and handed it to the Consul.
The latter read it through, then, with an exclamation of surprise, handed it over to me.
It certainly increased the mystery, for it was from the office of the owners, Messrs Hanway Brothers, in Leadenhall Street, ordering that I should be taken on the round voyage to the Baltic, well cared for, but kept looked in a cabin, as I had developed homicidal tendencies.
“The gentleman, whose name is Doctor Colkirk,” continued the letter, “is subject to fits, in which he remains unconscious for some hours; therefore there is no cause for alarm if he is not conscious when he reaches you. He is under an hallucination that he has been witness of some remarkable crime, and will, no doubt, impress upon you the urgent necessity of returning to London for the prosecution of inquiries. If he does this, humour him, but on no account allow him to go on deck, or to hold conversation with any one. The gentleman is a source of the greatest anxiety to his friends, and, we may add, that if the present orders are strictly carried out, the gentleman’s friends have promised the payment of a handsome bonus to yourself. We therefore place him on board the Petrel, in preference to any other vessel of our fleet, because of the confidence we entertain that you will strictly carry out your orders.”
The letter was signed by the firm.
“It seems very much as though the owners had some object in sending you aboard,” observed the Consul.
Then, turning to the skipper, he asked, “How was the gentleman brought on board?”
“He was brought in a private carriage about six o’clock in the evening, my men say. Two gentlemen carried him on board. The dock police stopped them, but they told the constable that the gentleman was drunk.”