Nan said nothing, but sat staring at the contents, a puzzled expression on her face. The girls looked from the trunk to Nan and back to the trunk again.
“Everything is all right, isn’t it?” Bess asked the question.
“I—don’t——know.” Nan answered slowly and doubtfully. “Everything seems to be as I left it. Yet somehow it’s all changed too.”
“What do you mean?” Grace questioned timidly.
Nan looked up from her place on the floor into the anxious faces of the girls around her. “I’m as baffled as you are,” she admitted. “I can’t really tell whether anyone has touched the things in my trunk or not. The underwear—slips—stockings—blouses” she touched each pile of things as she named it,—“pajamas, and even the dresses, are folded the same and in the same places as they were when I packed. I’m sure of that.
“Still, when that case flew open, I had a peculiar feeling that someone besides myself had been through it and touched everything there.”
“Ugh.” Bess shuddered. “Don’t say things like that, Nan. They give me the creeps.”
“Me too,” Grace was really pale. “Especially when I remember the expression on that hunchback’s face when he asked for you.”
“What are you going to do about it?” Rhoda inquired. Generally calm, Rhoda was seriously worried now. The red-headed man had looked mean.
“Yes, what are you going to do?” Bess repeated the question. She was more troubled than any of the rest, because she had more reason than they to be suspicious.
“Come, Nan,” Amelia urged, as Nan sat, silently considering. “You’ve got to do something.”
“Oh, girls, I don’t know what to do,” Nan finally burst forth. “It can’t be reported. The whole thing would sound silly. The purser would probably pat us on the back, tell us to be good, and warn us not to read so many detective stories. I’m afraid that there is just nothing to do but keep quiet and see what happens next, if anything. After all, it might have been a very innocent mistake.”
Laura snickered. “I only hope no innocent mistakes come walking into my cabin,” she said. Then she grew serious. “Really, Nan, I’m not generally a fraidy-cat, but if I were you, I would be carefuland watch out for red-headed men. I can’t for the life of me see why anyone in the world would be after you, but strange things do happen.”
“I will be careful,” Nan agreed. “Now, I wonder what that gong was I heard a few minutes ago.”
“Girls, girls, girls!” It was Dr. Prescott at the doorway. “What have you been doing? Don’t you know that the second gong for dinner has rung and that if you don’t hurry you won’t get anything to eat.”
“Nothing to eat! And me so starved after the whiffs I’ve been getting of the fresh salt air.” Laura was up and out of the room before she had finished the sentence. Amelia followed after. Ten minutes later the girls were headed down the corridor to the ship’s dining room.
“Have you got your ticket?” Nan asked as she held up a little red card that resembled the seat stubs in a theatre.
“Ticket, what ticket?” Laura stopped short.
“The ticket for your place in the dining room.” Bess was proud of this bit of knowledge.
“Why, I never had one,” Laura declared. “They never even gave me one.”
“Oh, yes they did,” Bess assured her. “Remember, after the purser looked at our passports when we came aboard ship, he sent us to a windowwhere the dining room steward was sitting. The steward had a plan of the dining room before him, with all the tables pictured on it. He looked at us and at our passports and then gave us this little stub. Remember?”
Laura looked perfectly blank. “What will I do now?” she asked.
“Here, you take mine,” Bess was feeling generous. “Since I know just where to go, I’ll go up and get another. You all start eating, though. Don’t wait for me.” With this she was off to the purser’s office.
“Come on, Laura.” Nan took Laura’s arm as the girl hesitated wondering whether, if, after all, she shouldn’t get her own ticket.
“Yes, or we won’t get anything to eat.” Amelia was slightly impatient. “Come, let’s hurry. There doesn’t seem to be anybody else around at all. Do you know where the dining room is?” she turned to Nan with the question.
“I do,” Laura answered. “It’s up on Deck B. I looked in when I first came down to our cabin. Just follow me.”
There was music as the girls hurried up the stairway and in through wide double doors. “Looks like a hotel dining room,” Grace whispered as the chief steward came toward them.
“Your stubs, please?” he asked and then escortedthem to a big round table in the center of the room, a table all their own, perfectly set for seven people.
There was a low bowl of flowers in the center and a card which read,
“To Nan Sherwood,S. S. Lincoln,c/o Chief Steward.
“May each day of your journey be more exciting and more pleasant than the one past.”
“Who is it from, Nan?” Even Dr. Prescott was eager to know. She had been sitting at the table waiting for the girls to appear.
Nan turned the card over. “Why, how nice!” she exclaimed, “and how thoughtful!” Then she looked up at Dr. Prescott and the girls waiting at their places. “It is from a famous movie actress,” she said rather shyly, and her face was all aglow, “whom I met once in Chicago. She’s a perfectly grand person.” Nan was silent as the details of that meeting rushed through her mind, as she remembered how an unfortunate encounter with Linda had brought it about. As she sat down, she wondered idly whether the summer holidays that were before her would be as exciting as those winter holidays, spent in Chicago at Grace’s home, had been.
“What’s happened to Elizabeth?” Dr. Prescott asked as she picked up her menu. “Not sea-sick already, I hope?”
“Far from it,” Nan laughed. “Bess is too busy being an ocean traveller to even have time to think of such a thing. Really, Dr. Prescott,” Nan leaned across the table and said earnestly, “you can’t imagine what a kick we are getting out of all of this. It’s like something girls do in story books.”
“And the journey has just begun.” Dr. Prescott smiled at her young charges. “It all brings my first trip—I was a little older than you are now—back to me most vividly. Now, what will we have to eat?”
“Oh-h-h, will you look at this menu,” Laura spoke up now. “Not much like one of Mrs. Cupp’s—” she stopped suddenly and blushed. It was hard to remember that Dr. Prescott, the head of Lakeview Hall, was present. Laura looked up over the top of her menu, ready to apologize. But Dr. Prescott seemed not to have heard. She seemed wholly occupied in choosing the mid-day meal. “What a brick she is!” Laura thought to herself as she, too, turned to the business at hand.
“Just one warning,” Dr. Prescott cautioned before the girls turned to the table steward to give him their orders. “You eat about six timesa day on the boat—” She paused as the girls gasped. “You have a big breakfast, bouillon and wafers in the middle of the morning, lunch, tea and cakes in the afternoon, dinner, and then before you go to bed, there are sandwiches and perhaps something warm to drink. If you are going to eat each time,” she went on, “you’ll have to be careful. Otherwise you’ll be spending the hours in your stateroom. There,” she finished, “that is my only lecture for the day. Now, do as you will.”
So they chose—carefully, except Laura, who could not resist having both French pastry and ice-cream for desert. “Bess will never forgive me,” she spoke up after she had ordered, “if she doesn’t get here in time for this first meal on the boat.”
“She ought to be here any time now,” Amelia looked at her watch. “It doesn’t take long to get your table card. You don’t suppose they lock the dining room doors when everyone is in and that they won’t let her through now?” she directed the question to Dr. Prescott.
“Why, I hardly think so.” Dr. Prescott smiled. “People are coming and going all the time, you see.”
“Bess will get here. Never fear.” Nan spoke up confidently. “Let’s eat. She told us not to wait.” As the lunch progressed, however, from soupthrough a dainty salad and slices of cold chicken to dessert, Nan grew uneasy.
“It is strange that she doesn’t appear,” she finally admitted, and was about to leave the dining room and go in search of her when Bess was ushered to the table.
“I’m sorry to be so late,” Bess murmured as she sat down and unfolded her napkin, “but I couldn’t help it.” Her face was flushed. She looked confused and angry.
“Please don’t say anything now,” she begged as Nan was about to speak. “I’m afraid I’ll make a scene, if you do, but if ever I see that girl again—”
She stopped short as the steward presented her with a menu.
“Now tell us what happened!” The Lakeview girls were reclining in deck chairs on the sun deck in the late afternoon. Dr. Prescott was in her stateroom, making it more presentable, she said, so it was the first opportunity to talk over Bess’ experience.
Bess raised herself up and tucked the steamer rug more securely around her legs. The April breezes were fresh, and rather chilly.
“It still makes me mad,” she fumed as she yanked the rug around further. “You can’t go anyplace, not even across the ocean, but what that girl turns up.”
“What girl?” Laura feigned innocence.
“Linda Riggs, of course.” Bess was utterly disgusted. “When I left you down in the corridor, I went straight up to the steward’s window. I took my place in line with others, paying no attention to anyone. All I cared about was getting my ticket and getting down to the dining room. I moved along in line like the others and was just about ready to show the steward my passport, when someone gave me a shove.
“Well, I wasn’t going to stand for that, so I stood my ground.”
“You mean,” Nan interpreted, “that you shoved right back.”
“Well, if you want to call a little push that, yes,” Bess admitted. “But if I’d known who it was, I would have knocked her down.”
“Why, Bess!” Nan was horrified and amused. “You little beast! I’m surprised at you.”
“She’s always getting us into trouble.” Bess was indignant all over again. “There I was, minding my own business, thinking nice thoughts, and having quite a perfect time. No one was farther from my concern than she. And what happens? She walks right into me, pushes me aside, never begs my pardon, and presents her passport first.”
“Then what did you do?” Laura asked. She was as amused as Nan.
“What could I do?” Bess inquired sharply. “I couldn’t fight with her there in front of all those people. She had the advantage and knew it. She’s the most unfair person I’ve ever come across. I hate her!”
“Was that all that happened?” Laura was reluctant to let the subject drop.
“All! Wasn’t that enough?” Bess exploded again.
“Well—yes.” Laura admitted. “But don’t you know anything more about her. Did you leave right away?”
“Of course not!” Bess answered resentfully. “How could I? I didn’t even have my check yet for the table. There wasn’t anything to do,” she added regretfully, “except to take a place behind her in line and listen to her make her demands of the steward.”
“Now we are getting someplace,” Laura leaned forward as Bess let drop this piece of information. “What did you find out about her?”
Nan shook her head at this line of conversation. She did not approve of eavesdropping. But no one paid any attention to her.
“Oh, it makes me angry all over again to think of it,” Bess jerked at the steamer rug again. “As I said before, she didn’t pay any attention to me. I might have been just anyone.”
“She gave the steward her passport, stepped back slightly, almost treading on my feet, and looked at him through a lorget—”
“You mean lorgnette,” Laura interrupted, “but it doesn’t matter. Go ahead.”
“Lorgnette, then,” Bess corrected. “Anyway, she looked at the steward through it as though he had been put there just to do as she ordered,as though he was a puppet that she could dangle as she wished.
“You know how she does it in that stuck-up way of hers. Why, if I had been him, I would have thrown the plans right in her face. But he was just as meek as I am before Mrs. Cupp, the fool!”
“Bess, do be careful,” Nan put a restraining hand over her mouth, “other people will hear you.”
Bess lowered her voice as she went on. “She told him that he had made a mistake, a perfectly dreadful mistake. Devastating, I think, was the word she used—whatever that means. At any rate, he had given her a stub for a table down here in Tourist Class.”
“And, my dears, Linda Riggs,” Bess mimicked Linda’s voice as she continued, “the daughter of the great railway magnate, never has anything but the best, the very best, when she travels.”
At this Nan hooted. She was remembering her own encounter with Linda at the travel agent’s a few weeks previously.
“And then—” Laura wanted more about this exciting encounter.
“Then he begged her pardon. Can you imagine that?” Bess looked at her friends for an answer. There was none. “Gave her a new stub, asked her if there was anything else he could do for her, andall but personally escorted her back to First Class.
“She didn’t even thank him for his trouble. She just turned, looked some of the people up and down as though they were curiosities in a zoo, and swept over to the elevator.”
“What? She didn’t walk on you again,” Laura was purposely baiting Bess now.
“I should say not!” Bess answered emphatically. “Before she turned, I stepped way back so that there wasn’t any more danger of that.”
“Good for you, Bess,” Rhoda now spoke up for the first time.
“It seems to me,” Nan grinned impishly as she thought about it, “That one or two of us made a New Year’s resolution about Linda Riggs. Remember Bess?”
“Remember, why should I remember?” Bess asked. “I never in all this wide world made a resolution about Linda, unless it was to get even with her for the times she has embarrassed us.”
“Oh, but Bess,” Nan pursued her train of thought, “You remember how, after the New Year’s Eve party at Grace’s, we went up to our room and made resolutions?”
“You did.” Bess corrected her abruptly and very positively. “You and Grace said that for one month you would be nice to Linda, no matter whathappened. Then Linda never did come back to school, so it didn’t count.”
“Anyway,” Nan attempted to dismiss the unpleasant subject, “There’s no reason why she should bother us. She’s up in First Class.”
“Yes, and we’re down here in Tourist.” It was a sore point with Bess, who was always irritated when Linda was able to show her superiority in money matters. Bess wanted most intensely to be able to look down on Linda. She wanted to have something so much better than Linda that the arrogant girl would envy her.
“Even so,” Nan resolved as she rose from her deck chair, “I’m not going to let her spoil my trip. Come,” she half coaxed, “Come, Bess, let’s all take a turn about deck.”
“Yes, let’s,” Grace encouraged, “I’d like to walk once, clear around the boat.”
“But you can’t,” Laura supplied the information, as she looked at Bess, “You can walk only so far and then there’s a gate that separates you from first class.”
“Please, forget it!” Nan looked reprovingly at Laura. “Come with me,” she invited again. “I know a place where you can stoop under some rigging and come out on a little part of the deck that’s almost like a balcony with the ocean below it and nothing but the sky above.”
“And I know a place,” Rhoda contributed, “where you can get way up front, so that you are at the prow of the boat. When you stand there, you feel as though you yourself are cutting through the water.”
“A mermaid at large.” Laura laughed. “I know that place, too. I found it right after lunch and thought, until now, that it was my private property.”
“But I know a place that’s even better than that,” Grace boasted. “It’s a large room with portholes all along both ends. There are tables in it—”
“And tea and cakes for all who come,” Laura finished. “Let’s go there.”
They went, but neither tea nor cakes could make Bess forget that she had a score to even up with Linda.
“Hello, down there!” Nan stretched her head over the edge of her berth and looked down to the bunk below where Bess was still sleeping. “Hello, I say,” she repeated a little louder when the first call brought no response. Then she waited. She could feel the vibration of the great ship as it forged ahead and hear faintly the steady throb of its engines. It was nice to be getting someplace, she thought, even while you were asleep.
“Hello!” Nan called again. “You awake?”
Bess rubbed her eyes and leaned out so she could see Nan above. “Of course I am,” she declared. “How long have you been awake?”
“Oh, for hours and hours,” Nan responded. “I heard the first gong for breakfast and then the second. After that I went back to sleep.”
“You didn’t either!” Bess was really awake now. “But if you did,” she continued half hopefully, “it’s too late to get breakfast in the dining-room, so we’ll just have to ring that bell over there by the door and ask the stewardess to bring our breakfast to the cabin. Just think of being ableto order anything you want and having it brought to you on a big tray!”
Bess stretched luxuriously and then turned over on her side. “You know,” she said, “I feel like a movie queen. My pajamas are of satin and fine lace. My robe is long and trailing with marabou around the neck. These bed covers are made of silk and down, and your bunk up there is not really a bunk. It’s the canopy of my bed.”
Nan looked over the side. “I beg your pardon?” she asked as though she hadn’t heard.
Bess started to repeat, “Your bunk is the canopy”—but didn’t finish, for Nan was up and on her way down the ladder which stretched from the floor to her upper berth.
“I can’t sleep any longer on this canopy,” she laughed. “Moreover, I’m starved and a tray would never hold all I’m going to eat this morning. You may stay here, my movie queen, and eat daintily from a tray while your back is propped comfortably against pillows. I want bacon and eggs,” she finished, as she opened the wardrobe at the end of the berths and took out a skirt and bright sweater.
“You may spend your morning in the cabin,” she went on, washing and dressing the while, “but I’m going out on the deck and see what’s doing.” She combed her hair before the mirror over thewashstands and sat down at a small dressing table while she tied a three-cornered scarf around her head. With a small hand mirror, she looked at it from all sides, and then pulled a wisp of hair out at the front and looked again. Satisfied, she put the mirror down, blew a kiss to her lazy chum, and was off.
Not waiting for the elevator, she walked up the stairs, opened a door, and stepped out. The morning sun was already high above the horizon, and the deck was bright with its light. Nan squinted her eyes. Then, as she became accustomed to the dazzle and opened them wide, she saw approaching her a merry looking, pleasant person, the ship’s hostess.
“You are—” the stranger paused and smiled at Nan.
“Nan Sherwood.” With this Nan was introduced to a group of young people her own age.
First, there was Hetty Warren, a young English girl whom Nan liked right away. She had blond hair and blue eyes and a complexion even fairer than that of most English girls. She had, she told Nan a little wistfully, just left her parents in Washington, where her father was a member of the English Embassy. Her grandmother was taking her back to London to witness an event which she said, no grandchild of hers would evermiss, the crowning of the new King and Queen.
Then, there was Jeanie MacFarland, a brown-eyed Scotch lass whose father, she said proudly, was on the Edinburgh committee to buy a gift for the king. And Maureen O’Grady, Irish as her name, headed first for home and then for London. Her mother was helping to make the lace for the Queen’s train.
Oh, they all had stories, these girls. One had lived once in far away India, in Bombay. Another, in the British colony in Shanghai. The father of one was a caretaker at the King’s favorite castle and the brother of another, a lieutenant in His Majesty’s Fleet stationed at Gibraltar.
They were coming from all corners of the world, Nan found, to be in England in May, to see the King and Queen parade in a golden coach from Buckingham Palace to Westminster Cathedral, to attend the balls and the garden parties and the Colonial fairs, to see the King review the British fleet at Spithead and hear the crowds cheer the pretty little princess at her party for the English school children. Everyone, young and old, Hetty’s grandmother said, was to have a part in the joyous week.
School children throughout the Empire were to have seven days of vacation. “Boy Scouts from Australia and India and British South Africa areeven now,” she told Nan, “coming on boats to act as a special guard for the little prince. Others, in England and Scotland have charge of the tremendously big bonfires that will be lighted on each hilltop the night after the king and queen are crowned. These beacon fires will proclaim to everyone that a new King and Queen have come to the throne. And, with the lighting of the fires, the people all over the British Empire will sing ‘God Save the King.’”
“Yes, and the Girl Scouts,” Hetty went on, “are having a big party in the gardens of Buckingham Palace. The little princess will be there and the Queen too. A thousand poor children have been invited and the princess has a gift for each one. They have a gift for the princess too, and one for the Queen. Oh, I can hardly wait until the big day arrives.”
“And,” Jeanie contributed, “All over Scotland, the wee lassies and laddies have each given a tuppence piece to their school teachers. When the King and Queen come to Edinburgh after the golden crowns have been put on their heads, all this money will be put in a golden bag and presented to the Queen. Her Majesty will use it to help the children whose fathers were killed in the wars. An orphan from one of Her Majesty’s orphanageswill present it at a banquet which the Lord Mayor will give.”
“Will you be there?” Nan was wide-eyed,
“If I only could.” Jeanie’s voice was full of longing.
“If we only could,” Hetty echoed the statement and included everybody.
“But it’s not for the likes of us,” Maureen shook her head as everyone fell silent. “It’s for the great ladies, they who live up in the castles on the hills and in the palaces in the cities. They were born to such things. No, it’s not for the likes of us,” she repeated.
“Don’t, Maureen,” Hetty said earnestly. “Don’t say that. Don’t say it isn’t for the likes of us!”
Hetty’s grandmother smiled at the seriousness of her grand-daughter. “Hetty is remembering,” she said, “the time the Queen stopped at our country cottage.”
“Were you there?” The girls all looked at Hetty.
“No, it was before she was born,” the bright-eyed old lady went on. “It was back in the days of the good Queen Victoria before people drove around in gasoline buggies.” She stopped as though she had finished, but Nan saw a twinkle in her eye.
“Please go on,” she begged. “Please tell us all about it.”
“Now, Grandmother,” Hetty laughed, “you know you want to.”
The old lady ruffled her grand-daughter’s hair playfully, as she continued, “We were sitting in the kitchen, my mother and I. She, like the model housewife she was, God bless her soul, was scouring pots and pans and giving me a few instructions on the proper behavior of a young lady.
“‘Mind what I say about your curiosity,’ she was telling me, when a crash outside interrupted. She dropped everything, making such a clatter as I’ve never heard since and nearly fell over me in her anxiety to get to the window.
“‘Glory be!’ I heard her exclaim and ran after her. There, in front of the house a big coach had broken down. Two coachmen had climbed down from their high seats and were helping three ladies out the door and up the path to our house.
“My mother whisked off her blue checked apron, smoothed down her hair and opened the door. I stood back—afrighted, as the three grand ladies came into the front parlor. Then I disappeared back into the kitchen. Mother made tea and gave them shortbread and was so a-flutter herself that she broke one of her company dishes.
“They wanted to pay for it, but she wouldn’tlet them. She said it was nothing at all. After they went, I saw her wiping a tear out of her eye and she scoured the pans harder than she ever scoured them before. That night she told my father that she was never going to pay any attention to any big coaches again.
“But weeks later when another big coach stopped in front of the house, she was at the door again. This time a man came and left a big box. Mother said it wasn’t for her, but he insisted it was. Finally, she accepted it, and he had hardly driven away, before she and I were opening it.” The old lady paused here to enjoy the eager faces of the young girls around her. Then she cleared her throat and went on.
“Inside we found a dozen dainty cups and saucers and a card. Our visitors had been two princesses and Her Majesty, Queen Victoria!”
“And great-grandmother always said,” Hetty added, “that the great Queen herself painted the cups. So, Maureen,” she ended triumphantly, “you don’t know, really, what there is for the likes of us.”
“No, you don’t,” her grandmother agreed, “so make the most of today. Now, begone with you all, and gather up the news of the ship and bring it all back to me. There are many strange people aboard,” she ended, closing her eyes and so dismissing the girls.
“How strange the sky looks!” Nan exclaimed. She and her Lakeview Hall companions were standing on deck watching the sun drop below the horizon.
“How cold!” Grace added, as she pulled her coat around her, held it in place with her hand, and then huddled closer to Nan as if for protection.
“A-a-and the wind!” Rhoda supplied, with difficulty. “It’s l-l-lashing at me so that I can’t—get—my breath.”
“Nor—me——either.” Amelia gasped. “I—I—I guess the Captain was right after all. He said, there was going to be a heavy gale tonight. Come, let’s go in.”
“Oh, stay just a minute longer,” Nan pleaded. “I like to see it roll. Look, see how the fish are jumping the waves! They are coming in higher and higher all the time. I wonder how this boat behaves when there is a real storm at sea.”
“One of the sailors told me this morning,” Laura volunteered, “that ‘she’s a trusty old tub’, if that will comfort you any.”
“Oh, I don’t need comforting,” Nan replied. “I’m not afraid.”
“You mean to say you wouldn’t be afraid in a storm?” Grace asked incredulously.
“Of course not.” Nan answered. “Would you?”
“I’ll tell you the answer to that later,” Grace threw over her shoulder as she made for the doors to go in. “Just now I’d rather watch this from the windows in the lounge where it’s warm.”
“We’ll be in, in a second,” Amelia called after her, “Save a place for us. Have you people seen the ship’s log?” She went on, turning to Nan. “It’s posted inside, near the elevators. There is a map of the United States, the Atlantic Ocean, and Europe with the course of our voyage marked in little lines on it. Each day the purser sticks a flag, representing our ship on this line, so that it shows where we are and how far we have traveled during the day. Underneath, there is a little weather chart telling how fast the wind is going, what the temperature is, whether or not the sea is rolling, and what might be expected for the next twenty-four hours.”
“What does it say for today,” Nan asked.
“The temperature is dropping—”
“We know that,” Laura interrupted. “What else does it say?”
“That the sea is slightly rolling.”
“We can feel that,” Laura put in again, for the ship was rolling with the waves.
“That we are headed into a storm. There, Miss Smarty, you didn’t know that,” Amelia laughed.
“Did too,” Laura retorted. “My creaking bones told me. Now, I’m going in before I get rheumatism.” So saying, she followed Grace. The others, except Nan, whom not even Bess could persuade to come in as yet, followed her.
Alone on the dark deck, Nan stood for a while at the rail, watching the white foam of the waves, listening to the roar of the wind, and glancing now and then at the clouds, swiftly gathering overhead. Save for a pale moon, the only light was the ship’s beacon which every few seconds, passed in its circle, over Nan’s head.
Once, Nan was tempted to follow her friends. She could hear voices, singing and laughter, and the sound of a piano inside. She even started toward the door, but then a dark passageway at her right tempted her and she went exploring.
Hugging the side of the boat closely, she followed around through the passageway between the ship’s riggings, and then on down the deck until she came to the barrier between first and second class that Laura had taunted Bess about. She examined it carefully. It was impossible to get by. There was no moving it. She tried sliding itand pushing it. It wouldn’t budge.
She turned and retraced her steps, going back to some narrow iron stairs that went up. The “Keep Off” sign, which she couldn’t read in the dark, she shoved aside. She was determined now to make a complete circle of the boat. She went up the stairs, around another deck, and down some steps again.
This was becoming a real adventure and Nan was enjoying every minute of it. If her conscience troubled her at all, she paid no heed. Others on the boat had told her of going out of bounds, and she could see no real harm in it.
She walked around deckchairs piled high against the side of the boat, caught a glimpse of some phosphorescent fish in the ocean, and walked over to the rail. How pretty they looked in the deep black of the water! She stood for a while watching the colors at play and then went on. It was almost as though she was motivated by some force outside herself.
She heard no sounds from people in the boat now, for she had passed the lounges and the recreation rooms. She felt almost alone on the boat, and laughed a little to herself as she thought how timid Grace would be in such a situation. However, Nan liked it.
It brought back to her mind nights at PineCamp. How far away all that seemed now! How far away it was! Northern Michigan was in another world. The people there, Aunt Kate, Injun Pete, Toby Vanderwiller, and Gedney Raffer, all of them, were like people she had dreamed about. She shook herself impatiently, driving away some eerie thoughts, and then went on until she came to the very back of the vessel, the stern.
Here she stopped, and looked back over the ocean which the boat was putting behind it. The wake, the white foamy path of the boat stretched out as far as she could see. The waters, which made it, rolled aside in big white waves leaving the center black and deep.
How much colder it was getting! And how much rougher! Nan clung to the rail, and held her head high as the wind whipped her hair back so that it stung the sides of her cheeks. She watched the waves coming, each one higher than the last and angrier. She counted them, “One, two, three,” someone had told her once that the seventh was always the highest, “four, five.” She could feel the spray on her face and the air was full of mist. “Six, seven—why the seventh wasn’t any bigger than any of the rest! And—eight.” It was the eighth that was the biggest of all! It climbed up the boat, over the rail, and across the deck, taking Nan off her feet!
She lost her balance completely, wrenched her arm as she fell, and was afraid for a second that she would go over with the wash of the wave. But she held on, and as the boat righted itself after the inundation, Nan rose to her feet, half dazed.
She rubbed her hair out of her eyes, winced with the pain in her arm, and being very careful now, started toward the door. She stopped short.
Was that a cry she had heard? She raised her head, listening attentively for some sound other than the roaring of the waves. There wasn’t any. She must have imagined it. She went on across the deck, now shiny after its bath with sea water. There was something white at her feet. She stooped to pick it up—a handkerchief. Again, she thought she heard a low moan and stopped dead still.
Yes, there it was again. Nan hesitated, deciding whether to investigate herself or call for help. The crash of the waves drowned out everything and decided Nan. She could hear them coming, one, two—what direction had the sound come from?—three, four, five. There it was again, over at her right. She started toward it and lost her balance, grabbed hold of a flagpole, and then crept forward. Six—seven—it was the seventh that was the biggest this time, but before it had struck with its full force Nan’s hand reached outand grabbed the coat of someone lying on the deck. With her other, as the wave struck, she held fast to the pole.
There it was, the wave! It came up and over the two, tugged at them, first their hips, and then their feet, and finally reluctantly, went on over the side without them.
Nan screamed, again and again. The form at her hand seemed to have no life. There was no answer to her call. She, herself, was weaker, much weaker than she thought.
She got up slowly and painfully and tried to pull her burden after her. She couldn’t budge it. She could hear, as from some far off land, the waves coming again. She shook her head, aware now that her senses had been dulled. Now, she could count them again, one, two—the second one splashed lightly over the deck. They were getting higher all the time. Three, four—Nan reached down with her strained arm, put it under the limp form, and half dragged, half carried it to the door, a partial shelter, as the fifth wave swept like a fury over the deck.
Nan reached up to open the door. It was locked. In a frenzy, she beat upon it. It was double locked against the storm! She knocked it again, screamed, and then, for the first time in her life, fainted dead away.
“I hope she dies of pneumonia!” Bess was frankly crying as she walked down the corridor toward the ship’s hospital. “I’d like nothing better than to witness a funeral at sea, if it was Linda Riggs’,” she stated most emphatically, and then wiped her eyes.
“She’s a cat, that’s what she is or she would have died long ago. Remember,” she recalled, “when we planned that surprise party on Nan back in Lakeview and that black cat came into the room. That was the soul of Linda Riggs,” Bess vowed. “She’s a cat and a witch.”
Grace looked impressed, but Laura snickered.
“See here, Bess,” Rhoda stopped and put a restraining hand on Bess’s arm. “You’re not going into that hospital room and talk like that before Nan. She needs rest and quiet. The doctor said so. Now, are you going to curb your anger, or aren’t you?”
“Oh, I will,” Bess answered. “Just give me a couple of seconds to cool off. Every time I think of Nan risking her life to save that good-for-nothing,it riles me clear through. Nan’s so good to everyone, and Linda, well, she tramps all over everybody.”
“There, Bess, take it easy,” Laura for once tried to placate the girl. “We won’t have any more trouble from her this trip. The nurse told me Linda has to stay in bed until the boat docks. If Nan is careful, she’ll be down in her own cabin tomorrow.”
“So remember, Bess,” Amelia implored, “not to say anything about Linda or about that other either.”
“What other?” Bess asked, and then remembered. “Oh, you mean the cabin?” she supplied the answer herself.
“Yes, just keep still about everything unpleasant,” Rhoda warned. “We want Nan out of here as soon as possible.” With this, she pushed open the white door of the ship’s hospital and a nurse came forward.
“You’ve came to see Miss Sherwood,” she smiled.
“Yes,” Rhoda was spokesman for the group. “Is it all right for us all to go in together?”
The nurse looked doubtful a moment, noting the marks of tears that were still on Bess’s cheeks. Bess felt her glance and blushed. “Oh, I’m all right now,” she reassured the nurse. “I promiseto be good,” and she smiled so winningly that the nurse gave in.
“Well, you may go in,” she said, as she looked professionally at her watch, “for half an hour. But remember, you are not to disturb the patient.” With this she opened the door to a private room, and the girls went in.
There, lying in a white hospital bed, looking pale and very wan, was Nan. She smiled at their entrance. “I’m all right,” she said. “Don’t look so scared. Come in and sit down.”
They did, and it was a few seconds, a few awkward seconds, before anyone could think of anything to say. Twice Bess opened her mouth to speak, but when her friends looked at her warningly, she closed it again.
Finally, Rhoda found her voice. “Why, Nan,” she asked, and her glance, like that of the other girls was riveted on a big bouquet of red roses, “where in the world did you get those flowers?”
The color came back into Nan’s cheeks. “Can’t you guess?” She grinned rather defiantly at them. “They aren’t from anyone on the boat.”
“But how could anyone on shore know?” Bess already had her suspicions as to the person.
“And if he did,” Grace was very positive about the “He,” “How could He send them?”
“Come, Nan, spill it,” Laura was as curious asthe rest. “Heroines can’t have secrets, you know. Their lives are public property.”
“That’s just what I am afraid of.” Nan nodded from her place among the pillows. “However, I couldn’t keep it to myself if I wanted to. They’re from Walter!”
“But how—” Bess just couldn’t wait.
“He sent them from shore when the boat was in dock and asked the steward to keep them until we were in mid-ocean. They brought them up here this morning and when I opened my eyes—there they were.” Nan’s eyes were shining and her cheeks were almost as red as the roses.
“They are just gorgeous,” Rhoda stooped over to smell them, “so red, and fragrant, and fresh.”
“Aren’t they though?” Nan reached out and touched them softly. “But tell me now,” she looked up. “What’s new?”
“You should know,” Laura answered. “You are the news around here. Everyone’s talking about you. There are at least a dozen different versions of what happened last night making the rounds of this ship. One has it that Linda actually went over the side of the boat and that you leaped in and saved her from drowning. Then you caught hold of a rope, and a sailor, out to see that everythingwas shipshape, heard your cries, and hauled the two of you in.”
“Another,” Amelia said further, as Nan laughed, “has you in a fight with Linda. Oh, I mean,” she corrected herself when Nan looked worried, “that Linda is supposed to have become so frightened that she didn’t know what she was doing. She tore at your hair and scratched you. (Here Nan ran her hand over her face. It was perfectly whole.) Finally, when you realized that she was beyond reason, you are supposed to have hit her over the head so hard that you knocked her out!”
“And another—” Laura began.
“Oh, don’t tell me any more,” Nan shook her head. “I don’t know how I’m ever going to go out of here and face all those people. It scares me to think of it.”
“You needn’t worry, Nan,” Rhoda took her friend’s hand in hers. “We’ll all rally round. Everybody, really, is just being grand. I didn’t know there were so many nice people in the world.”
“Isn’t it so?” Nan forgot her embarrassment. “Look at that pile of cards and notes and books and magazines. Why, I believe all the passengers on the ship have stopped in to ask about me and one little boy”—she stopped and giggled beforeshe went on—“wanted my autograph! Can you imagine anything so silly? But tell me, what did happen? I fainted, didn’t I? I don’t remember a thing after I found those doors were locked.”
“Oh, Nan,” Bess couldn’t restrain herself any longer. “Maybe you were there for hours, we don’t know. We only know this: after we left you out there on deck we all went into the lounge and talked and played games for a long time.”
“We wondered where you were, didn’t we?” She looked at the others for confirmation. They nodded their heads as Bess went on, “but we thought that you were probably off somewheres with that English girl, what is her name?”
“You mean Hetty Warren?” Nan supplied.
“Yes, that’s it. Well, we thought you were with her and her grandmother until about ten o’clock when we went down to the cabin and met Hetty. She was bringing a travel book about England to you. She said she hadn’t seen you all evening.
“We were worried then, and she went with us to see whether you were with either Jeanie or Maureen. They said they hadn’t seen you, either. We didn’t know what to do then, so finally we went to Dr. Beulah. She had been in her cabin all evening, because she wasn’t feeling very well. She called a steward and he said he would hunt youup. He was gone for hours, while we sat in her cabin and talked and wondered and worried.
“When he finally came back, he didn’t have any news! Dr. Beulah got up and dressed then and called the Captain. He told us all to come up to his office. We went at once, and he asked a million questions about you. Then he got busy on the phone and started a boat-wide search.
“It wasn’t any time at all after that when they called Dr. Beulah and told her to come to the hospital right away.” Here Bess started to cry again, for she remembered so vividly how frightened they had all been at that call.
“Oh, Bess,” It was Nan speaking. “Come here, I’m so sorry I caused you all that trouble.”
“Anyway,” Bess grinned through her tears. “Dr. Beulah went up and the first person she saw there was Linda Riggs. I guess she was pretty disgusted herself for once, though she would never say it. Then the nurse took her in to see you.”
“Oh, I remember from then on,” Nan continued. “I came to when they were carrying me here, so that when Dr. Beulah came up I knew what it was all about. I was only scared for fear she would give me the scolding I deserved for going off that way by myself. But she didn’t. She just took me in her arms and kissed me and thenwent off and talked to the nurse and doctor. I don’t know what she said or did to them, but they have been fluttering around me all the time as though I was a Royal Princess.”
“Wait until you get up!” Laura exclaimed. “Then you’ll find out who you are.” She looked both merry and mysterious as she said this last. Nan looked questioningly at her.
But there was no opportunity for any more talk. The nurse came in, felt Nan’s pulse and smiled at the girls.
“I’m sorry,” she said, nodding toward the door. So they got up and left, leaving Nan looking wistfully after them.
“But this isn’t where our cabin is!” Nan exclaimed the next morning as Bess and Rhoda, one on each side of her, walked her slowly from the hospital back to the stateroom.
“Yes, it is, Nan,” Rhoda maintained.
“But ours was number 648. It was an outside cabin.” Nan continued to protest. “Or have I gone completely batty?”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Rhoda teased, “though you do do some pretty strange things sometimes. However, this is your cabin now and it’s not an outside one. There just wasn’t another outside one free.”
“But why did I need another? What was wrong with the one I had? What happened? Please tell me,” she pleaded. The questions tumbled one after another out of Nan’s mouth, for she was impatient, still somewhat shaken after her frightening experience during the storm.
“Oh, Nan, it’s nothing at all,” Bess comforted. “That is, I hope it isn’t, because it’s all my fault,” she added very contritely. “It was so warm here the night of the storm that I opened the portholewhen I came down to leave my heavy coat. Amelia called me and told me to hurry and, rattle-brained as I am, I ran after her completely forgetting about the storm and the porthole. You can guess what happened. One of those big waves that nearly did away with you plopped in and made a miniature lake.”
“Was anything ruined?” Nan asked.
“Nothing, except my own silk dress. Remember, I threw it down in disgust that afternoon because the snaps had been pulled off the sleeves. Well, you should see it now. It’s a complete wreck. Serves me right to have to get along without it. I only hope you don’t feel too disappointed in the new cabin.” Bess looked genuinely troubled.
“Don’t worry,” Nan reassured her friend. “I don’t care what kind of a cabin I have,” she said lightly, for such things really didn’t matter to her.
But the words were hardly out of her mouth when Bess pushed the door open and revealed to Nan a big stateroom with twin beds, a chaise longue, two big easy chairs, dainty dressing tables, a large wardrobe, and a little private sitting room!
Nan gasped. “This isn’t ours,” she exclaimed incredulously.
Rhoda and Bess looked from Nan to the stateroomand back again to Nan. “It is,” they cried. “It’s yours.”
Nan stepped into the room and looked around. The sitting room had big windows overlooking the deck and the sea. There were books and magazines, a victrola, comfortable chairs and a rug. Over it all the morning sun was streaming.
“But why?” Nan’s eyes were wide open in amazement.
“Captain’s orders,” Rhoda answered.
“Why?” Nan persisted.
“I told you why,” Bess smiled. “It’s because our cabin was inundated by the recent flood.”
“I still don’t believe that’s the truth,” Nan asserted. “But I love this place just the same.”
“Do we walk right in?” It was Laura at the door. “Or do we have to send cards first?”
“Oh, Laura!” Nan exclaimed. “Come here. Have you seen this?” She moved the dial of a small radio.
“Have I seen that? Why, darling, I moved your things in,” Laura laughed. “And what’s more, I was here when the Captain came.”
“The Captain!” They all exclaimed at once.
“Yes, he came down in all his glory. He has a stern looking face complete with a Vandyke beard, and he wore a uniform with epaulettes and much fancy braid. He carried a cap in his hand. Hecame ‘to see if Miss Sherwood’s stateroom was satisfactory.’” Laura tried to clip the sentence off as the Captain had.
“You should hear his accent!” she exclaimed. “It’s Oxford or Cambridge or something equally as exclusive, I’m sure. I’m quite in love with the man! He’s perfectly darling!” she finished.
“I beg your pardon.” The girls jumped and looked up, startled, for it was a man’s voice. They recognized at once the uniform, the cap, and the Vandyke beard. It was the Captain! He must have heard them!
He looked sternly down on their confusion. “Miss Sherwood?”
“Yes, Captain.” Nan answered meekly and started to get up.
“No, no,” he motioned her to remain seated.
Nan sat down again. The voice was one that was accustomed to being obeyed.
“I merely wanted to make certain that everything was satisfactory.” He looked critically about the room.
“Oh, it is! It is!” Nan exclaimed. “It’s just perfect!” Not even her confusion could keep the note of sincerity out of her voice.
The Captain seemed preoccupied with his inspection of the stateroom. “Your baggage hasbeen moved.” It was more a statement than a question. “You are feeling—well.”
“Yes, thank you, sir,” Nan hastened to reply. Had she felt otherwise she wouldn’t have dared to admit it in the face of his assurance.
“You want for nothing?”
“No—no, sir. Nothing at all.” Nan was annoyed at her own inability to be at ease. If only he had come at another time!
Then his glance seemed to take in Laura for the first time.
“And Miss Polk, I trust that you are comfortable too.” Again, it was a statement and Laura gulped, not knowing whether she was supposed to answer or not.
“I thank you, ladies.” With this he turned and went out.
Even before his measured tread was entirely out of earshot, Laura was lamenting. “If only I had kept my mouth shut!” she exclaimed. “‘Oxford or Cambridge accent.’” She sounded completely disgusted. “‘I’m in love with the man! He’s perfectly darling.’ And then he walks in on me! What can I do? You can’t walk up to a man and apologize for anything like that.” She looked hopelessly at her friends.
Nan was laughing so hard she was holding both her sides and so was Bess. Rhoda was stuffing ahandkerchief into her mouth. “Oh, I never saw anything so funny in my life,” she said.
“Funny!” Laura was indignant. “I’d like to know what was funny about that! Funny!” she muttered.
“Oh, Laura,” Nan was wiping the tears out of her eyes. “If you could have seen the expression on your face when he asked whether you were comfortable, you would laugh too.”
Laura grinned with them at this. “The old meany,” she said. “He heard every word of what I said, and he was just rubbing it in. And I thought he was a chivalrous old duck! I wish he would come back now. I’d tell him what was what.”
“Don’t, don’t say that.” Rhoda raised a protesting hand. “You’ll meet him soon enough as it is.”
“Oh, no, I won’t,” Laura denied. “I’m not going to stir out of my cabin from now until the time the boat docks. I just couldn’t face that man again.” She turned as though to leave, but stopped as Grace came into the room.
“What man?” Grace asked. “Did you see him too?” Her face was pale and scared looking.
“What are you talking about?” Rhoda rushed over and closed the door behind Grace.
“That man, that red-headed hunchback. Oh,the one that went through Nan’s bags. Surely, you haven’t forgotten him. Did you see him, too?” She directed the question at Laura again.
“Why, Gracie, no, I haven’t seen him.” Laura was very serious now. “Have you?”
“Oh, yes.” Grace was pale and frightened. “He’s out there. I think he followed me down the hall.” She was almost hysterical.
Laura moved toward the door and reached out as if to open it.
“Don’t do that!” Grace’s voice was a command. “He followed me. I tell you he followed me!” She almost shrieked the last.
Nan got up, went over to the girl, and put a reassuring arm around her. “Grace, please,” she begged. “Get hold of yourself. You’ll be making us all panicky. There, now, calm down.” She wiped the girl’s eyes.
“Oh, you’re treating me like a baby!” Grace shook herself out of Nan’s arms. “I tell you—” She paused and, for a second, the room was in complete silence.
Through it came the sound of a knock at the door. The girls looked questioningly at one another, but no one moved. Then, they heard it again, faintly.
Laura stirred. “I’m going to open it,” she whispered. Nan nodded her head. But before Lauracould, they heard Amelia’s voice. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
Nan herself walked to the door and threw it wide open. “Come in, Amelia,” she said, and then closed the door after her friend.
“What’s up?” Amelia sensed the tenseness in the room right away.
“Did you see anyone at all in the corridor?”
Nan answered the question with another.
“Why, no.” Amelia looked puzzled. “No one, that is, except the stewardess. She’s sitting out there on a stool, knitting.”
“You didn’t see the red-headed hunchback?” Grace couldn’t believe it. “You didn’t see him standing right out there watching this room?”
“Are you sure, Amelia,” Nan asked the question, “that you didn’t see anyone besides the stewardess?”
“Positive,” she answered. “I know, because as I came down the corridor I looked for people.”
“Why?” Nan questioned her again.
“Say, what is this?” Amelia asked. “The third degree or something? I looked simply because I’ve been wondering what kind of people lived down in this end of heaven. Evidently they are all queer.” She looked significantly at the people around her.
“Well, you’d be queer, too,” Grace asserted, “if you’d seen and heard what I did. I was comingdown the corridor alone thinking of Nan and the new cabin when I heard someone say in a mean rasping voice, ‘Well, you find out the answer pretty soon, or you’ll never live to see Scotland again.’
“I was scared and would have run, but the cabin door opened. As it did, I ducked into another and waited. Oh, it seemed as though I was there for hours in some strange person’s cabin, afraid to stay and afraid to go. Finally, I couldn’t stand it any longer, so I opened the door quietly and looked out. There was no one in sight. I tiptoed down the corridor, and was just about to come in here, when I saw that awful looking hunchback standing out there.
“I’m sure he was watching this cabin. I would have turned and run or gone right past him, but I saw his eyes.” Grace shuddered.
“They’re terrible eyes. I couldn’t go on. I had to come in here.” Grace looked up at Nan as though asking for approval for what she had done.
“Of course you did, Grace,” Nan said quietly and soothingly. “Of course, you had to come in. But tell me,” she questioned further. “Why did you say he followed you?”
“Did I say that?” Grace looked puzzled.
They all nodded.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Grace shook herself as though she had difficulty in remembering clearly. “I guess I was just afraid he was, and I knew that his eyes were on me. Why should he watch this cabin?” She looked up at Nan. The others followed her glance. They too felt, somehow, that Nan knew the answer.
Nan sat silently considering.
Should she tell them what she knew or shouldn’t she? Could she trust them? She looked around at their faces, at Rhoda’s and Amelia’s, and was tempted to tell. Both of these girls seemed to be calm in all the excitement. “They might be able to offer some help if needed,” Nan thought. Then she heard Grace stifle a sob and saw again how frightened and worried the girl looked. She hesitated. She looked up at Bess, her closest friend, and was tempted again.
There was a noise outside. Bess jumped nervously. She was scared, too. Then Laura spoke, and Nan gave up all thought of revealing, at the present at least, what little she knew about the things that were happening.