He stopped, stiffening, as an idea struck him. Slowly he turned round a lean, hollow-eyed, startled face.
"Film!" he said, clutching at the ends of his spiked hair. "Film! In my cabin. The rest of it. Unguarded! The rest of poor old Uncle Warpus's speech, and he's probably pinching it right now…"
Before anybody could stop him, he had whirled round and was stumbling back towards his cabin along the slippery deck.
"Curt!" said Morgan, with a groan which ended deep in his stomach. "Listen! Hey! Come back! The captain—"
Over his shoulder Warren called out a suggested course of action for the captain. Whistler was out of his alcove at a bound and trumpeting. He shouted to the second officer to follow; then he stood and gibbered while Baldwin pursued the flying shirt-sleeved figure down the deck. Warren got inside the door, and Baldwin after him. In vain stout Valvick attempted to pacify his fellow skipper. Captain Whistler, imprimis, objected to being addressed as "barnacle," and described horrible surgical tortures he would like to perform.»He was in no better mood when presently Warren, with Second-Officer Baldwin keeping a firm grip on his arm, emerged from the door. Warren seemed to be expostulating as they skidded back down the deck.
"But haven't you got any heart?** he demanded. "All I ask you to do, one little thing, is go into that next cabin and see whether that poor girl is alive — whether she needs help — whether — Or let me go. But no. I've got a good mind," said Warren, closing one first with a meditative air, "to—"
"What was he up to?" Whistler demanded eagerly, as the culprit was led up "Why did he bolt?"
A very harassed-looking Baldwin regarded Warren in some uneasiness.
"I don't know, sir. He rushed in 'is own cabin, and when I got there he was kneeling on the floor throwing motion-picture films over his shoulder and saying, 'Gone! Gone!' "
"Yes," agreed Warren. Wryly he shook his head as he glanced from Peggy to Morgan. "The little joker's been there in the meantime. He's swiped it all right."
"What is gone, young man?" inquired Captain Whistler.
A little of the first shock of rage had gone from him. He was still in a thrice-dangerous mood, but the insult of the attack had been partly put aside in favour of appalling reflections as to its consequences. Evidently what bulked large in the captain's rather small brain, larger than whisky-bottles or upper-cuts, was the fact that an emerald trinket worth fifty thousand pounds had been stolen while in his possession. And Lord Sturton had a crusty reputation. Captain Whistler savagely waved aside the doctor, who had not yet completed his ministrations. A few strips of sticking-plaster lent an even subtler Cezanne touch to his purple countenance; he narrowed his good right eye, squared his shoulders, and repeated with hoarse control of his temper: "What is gone, young man?"
"I can't tell you," returned Warren. "And anyway it's not important. To you, anyway. It doesn't concern whatever he stole from you. All I would beg and plead of you, if you have any heart, is don't let that poor girl lie there, maybe dying…!"
"Mr. Warren," said the skipper, with a tense and sinister calmness, "I will have some sense out of this… I will start at the beginning, and I will tell you that there is known to be aboard this ship a dangerous criminal who hits stolen from me an object of enormous value… "
"Ay told you, Barnacle," interposed Valvick, shaking his head gloomily—"ay told you it be better to post a notice and warn all de people. Now look at what iss done."
"Never you mind what you told me, sir. You keep out of this, Sharkmeat. You stow your t'g'lant-royals and come off the high and mighty when you talk to me, Shark-meat. I remember the time—" He caught himself up. "Hurrum! No matter, I will continue, Mr. Warren. You are the nephew of a very distinguished gentleman and were confided especially to my care. I have read Mr. Morgan's stories; he has travelled with me before, and I know him. Captain Valvick, God knows, I am familiar with. I am not drunk or mad, sir. I do not believe that any of you is this notorious criminal. Kindly understand that. But I do believe, Mr. Warren, that from the time Miss Glenn told me about you at dinner to-night, you have been guilty of very odd behaviour. Now, when you tell me about a young lady who has received an injury to the back of her head, I insist on hearing your full story."
"Right!" said Warren, with the air of one coming to an agreement. "That's fair enough, Skipper, and here you are. We don't know anything about the attack on you. It happened this way. We were all together, you see, when this unknown girl staggered in, badly hurt. We knew somebody had hit her, so we rushed out to see whether we could find the assailant. While we were on deck we heard your yell—"
("Not bad for a start," thought Morgan uneasily. "Steady now.")
"I see," said the captain. "And where were you then?"
"Eh?"
"I said," repeated the captain, looking so curiously like the headmaster at old St. Just's that Morgan shivered a little, "where were you when this alleged unknown woman came in? You weren't in your cabin. I looked in there and 1 know."
"Oh! Oh! I see! No, of course not," Warren answered, with some heat. "Naturally not. We were in the empty cabin next door."
"Why?"
"Why? Well — er — well, it was just an idea, you see. A kind of idea I had. I mean," said Warren, his wits clicking out words desperately in the hope of finding the right ones, "I mean, I thought it would be a good idea. Anyway, we were there, damn it! You can ask any of them. They were sort of taking care of me…"
"Taking care of you," repeated Captain Whistler heavily. "And what were you doing there?"
"Well, we were sitting on the floor playing Geography. And then we heard the door to C deck open, and this girl who was attacked started calling my name. I don't know who she is; I only saw her once before," pursued Warren, acquiring greater assurance and fluency as he hurried on, "and that was in the wireless-room, when I got the cablegram about — euh! — I mean, when I got the cablegram— about the bears, you see."
"What bears?"
Warren's jaws moved. He glanced wildly at Morgan for assistance.
"Its quite all right, Captain," the latter explained as smoothly as he could. He had a lump in his throat and a feeling that if Warren kept on explaining he would go insane himself. "Naturally Curt's a bit upset, and I suppose he tells things in rather an odd way. But it's quite simple, after all. It's about some stocks — you understand. The bears were raiding the market, you see, and his stocks had depreciated."
"Oh! He's been worried about financial matters has he? Yes, yes," said the captain heavily. "But let's come down to terms, Mr. Morgan? Do you vouch for the truth of this crazy story?"
"Go and see, why don't you?" shouted the exasperated Warren. "That's what I've been asking you to do from the first, if you'd had any sense. Here you're keeping Miss Glenn shivering M my coat, and all of us standing out here on n zero deck when that poor girl may be dying. Aren't you coming, Doctor?"
"We are all coming," said the captain, with sudden decision. He beckoned his two subordinates, and the weird little procession went down to the door. Warren tugged it open, while they all piled through; a pale-faced Peggy, trembling and breathing deeply in the warm air. For a moment they blinked against the light.