"Was there an answer?" she inquired eagerly.
He took a yellow telegraph sheet from his pocket and held it for her to read.
"Watch presented Captain Caleb Stafford, master of propeller freighter Marvin Halch for rescue of crew and passengers of sinking steamer Winnebago off Long Point, Lake Erie."
She was breathing quickly in her excitement. "Caleb Stafford!" she exclaimed. "Why, that was Captain Stafford of Stafford and Ramsdell! They owned the Miwaka!"
"Yes," Alan said.
"You asked me about that ship—the Miwaka—that first morning at breakfast!"
"Yes."
A great change had come over him since last night; he was under emotion so strong that he seemed scarcely to dare to speak lest it master him—a leaping, exultant impulse it was, which he fought to keep down.
"What is it, Alan?" she asked. "What is it about the Miwaka? You said you'd found some reference to it in Uncle Benny's house. What was it? What did you find there?"
"The man—" Alan swallowed and steadied himself and repeated—"the man I met in the house that night mentioned it."