There is a touch of the “boy upon the burning deck” about Pagett.
“My dear fellow,” I said testily, “I mentioned no. 17 because I happened to observe that it was vacant. But I didn’t mean you to make a stand to the death about it—13 or 28 would have done us equally well.”
He looked hurt.
“There’s something more, though,” he insisted. “Miss Beddingfeld got the cabin, but this morning I saw Chichester coming out of it in a furtive sort of way.”
I looked at him severely.
“If you’re trying to get up a nasty scandal about Chichester, who is a missionary—though a perfectly poisonous person—and that attractive child, Anne Beddingfeld, I don’t believe a word of it,” I said coldly. “Anne Beddingfeld is an extremely nice girl—with particularly good legs. I should say she had far and away the best legs on board.”
Pagett did not like my reference to Anne Beddingfeld’s legs. He is the sort of man who never notices legs himself—or, if he does, would die sooner than say so. Also he thinks my appreciation of such things frivolous. I like annoying Pagett, so I continued maliciously:
“As you’ve made her acquaintance, you might ask her to dine at our table tomorrow night. It’s the fancy-dress dance. By the way, you’d better go down to the barber and select a fancy costume for me.”
“Surely you will not go in fancy dress?” said Pagett, in tones of horror.
I could see that it was quite incompatible with his idea of my dignity. He looked shocked and pained. I had really had no intention of donning fancy dress, but the complete discomfiture of Pagett was too tempting to be forborne.
“What do you mean?” I said. “Of course I shall wear fancy dress. So will you.”
Pagett shuddered.
“So go down to the barber’s and see about it,” I finished.
“I don’t think he’ll have any out sizes,” murmured Pagett, measuring my figure with his eye.
Without meaning it, Pagett can occasionally be extremely offensive.
“And order a table for six in the saloon,” I said. “We’ll have the captain, the girl with the nice legs, Mrs. Blair—”
“You won’t get Mrs. Blair without Colonel Race,” Pagett interposed. “He’s asked her to dine with him, I know.”
Pagett always knows everything. I was justifiably annoyed.
“Who is Race?” I demanded, exasperated.
As I said before, Pagett always knows everything—or thinks he does. He looked mysterious again.
“They say he’s a secret service chap, Sir Eustace. Rather a great gun too. But of course I don’t know for certain.”
“Isn’t that like the government?” I exclaimed. “Here’s a man on board whose business it is to carry about secret documents, and they go giving them to a peaceful outsider, who only asks to be let alone.”
Pagett looked even more mysterious. He came a pace nearer and dropped his voice.
“If you ask me, the whole thing is very queer, Sir Eustace. Look at that illness of mine before we started—”
“My dear fellow,” I interrupted brutally, “that was a bilious attack. You’re always having bilious attacks.”
Pagett winced slightly. “It wasn’t the usual sort of bilious attack. This time—”
“For God’s sake, don’t go into the details of your condition, Pagett. I don’t want to hear them.”
“Very well, Sir Eustace. But my belief is that I was deliberately poisoned!”
“Ah!” I said. “You’ve been talking to Rayburn.”
He did not deny it.
“At any rate, Sir Eustace, he thinks so—and he should be in a position to know.”
“By the way, where is the chap?” I asked. “I’ve not set eyes on him since we came on board.”
“He gives out that he’s ill, and stays in his cabin, Sir Eustace.” Pagett’s voice dropped again. “But that’s camouflage, I’m sure. So that he can watch better.”
“Watch?”
“Over your safety, Sir Eustace. In case an attack should be made upon you.”
“You’re such a cheerful fellow, Pagett,” I said. “I trust that your imagination runs away with you. If I were you I should go to the dance as a death’s head or an executioner. It will suit your mournful style of beauty.”
That shut him up for the time being. I went on deck. The Beddingfeld girl was deep in conversation with the missionary parson, Chichester. Women always flutter round parsons.
A man of my figure hates stooping, but I had the courtesy to pick up a bit of paper that was fluttering round the parson’s feet.
I got no word of thanks for my pains. As a matter of fact, I couldn’t help seeing what was written on the sheet of paper. There was just one sentence:
“Don’t try to play a lone hand or it will be the worse for you.”
That’s a nice thing for a parson to have. Who is this fellow Chichester, I wonder? He looks mild as milk. But looks are deceptive. I shall ask Pagett about him. Pagett always knows everything.
I sank gracefully into my deck chair by the side of Mrs. Blair, thereby interrupting her tète-à-tête with Race, and remarked that I didn’t know what the clergy were coming to nowadays.
Then I asked her to dine with me on the night of the fancy-dress dance. Somehow or other Race managed to get included in the invitation.
After lunch the Beddingfeld girl came and sat with us for coffee. I was right about her legs. They are the best on the ship. I shall certainly ask her to dinner as well.
I would very much like to know what mischief Pagett was up to in Florence. Whenever Italy is mentioned, he goes to pieces. If I did not know how intensely respectable he is—I should suspect him of some disreputable amour …
I wonder now! Even the most respectable men—It would cheer me up enormously if it was so.
Pagett—with a guilty secret! Splendid!
XIII
It has been a curious evening.
The only costume that fitted me in the barber’s emporium was that of a teddy bear. I don’t mind playing bears with some nice young girls on a winter’s evening in England—but it’s hardly an ideal costume for the equator. However, I created a good deal of
