Nan got up, went over to the girl, and put a rea.s.suring 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 Laura could, 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 a.s.serted, "if you'd seen and heard what I did. I was coming down 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.

CHAPTER XVII

NAN PUZZLES OVER HER SECRET

"I wonder if your hunchback is the mysterious pa.s.senger everyone is talking about," Laura said thoughtfully, when she was convinced that Nan was not going to speak.

"I never thought of that!" This from Rhoda. "But it all fits together perfectly. They say he never appears at the table for his meals and that he has his own servants to take care of him."

"Yes," Bess contributed, "a steward told the stewardess and the stewardess told me that no one of the ship's crew has been in that cabin since the boat left dock."

"It must have been the same stewardess," Laura picked up the story, "who told me that nothing has gone right in this end of the ship since he came in. She says there has been trouble, trouble all the while. She's a superst.i.tious old soul. She thinks he has cast a spell over everything around here." Laura's voice was a half whisper as she imparted her information.

"Well, you'd think so too, if you had seen him," Grace whispered too.

"I don't see why in the world they ever let him get a pa.s.sport and get on the ship."

"Oh, I heard somebody say today," Amelia supplied, as Grace's statement recalled the conversation to her mind, "that he came up the gang-plank in New York behind the queerest looking outfit he'd ever seen in all the times he has crossed the ocean.

"He said the man was all swathed up to the eyes in an overcoat and a heavy scarf of Scotch plaid. His collar was turned up and his cap pulled down so that none of his face was visible. He said nothing to anyone, refused to let a porter take a small black valise he was carrying, and went directly to his cabin.

"The man who was telling the story said his stateroom is close by, but that he has never once met him in the halls. However, he did say, that from time to time he has heard someone in that cabin speak in a strong Scotch burr, ordering a servant around in no uncertain terms."

"Did the man that you heard," she looked at Grace, "speak like that?"

"Amelia, I didn't notice what kind of an accent he used!" Grace sounded almost impatient. "I was too frightened to notice anything like that. I only know what I've told you already."

"Did the man who came looking for me that first day we came on the boat speak like that?" Nan hardly dared to ask the question. She wanted information, but she didn't want to give any.

For a moment the girls sat thinking. Then Laura spoke up. "You would think that we would have noticed that," she said, "but I can't honestly say I did. It was all such a surprise and we were so excited anyway that I only noticed what he looked like."

"Well, he didn't say very much," Rhoda added. "Remember. He spent most of his time looking around the room and at us as though he wanted to be sure to remember us always. Ooh, I don't like to think about it."

"Nor I either," Bess was most emphatic. "I haven't seen him at all, and still I don't like to think about it. It's perfectly horrid to have him bothering us at all, and if he ever follows me, I'm going to scream so loud that everybody on this boat will come running. He has no business at all annoying us this way. We haven't done anything to him.

"Nan didn't want his old baggage. It wasn't her fault that it was brought to our cabin. Why, I'll bet he did it himself or ordered that servant of his to do it. What for, I don't know, but if he's queer, there is no accounting for what he does. I wish they would lock him up or dump him overboard or something. We just get rid of Linda and then he comes here to annoy us. Why can't people leave us alone?" Bess was thoroughly incensed. "We only have a couple of more days on boat--"

"Oh, come let's forget it all," Nan interrupted. She was more than anxious to put the problem aside for the time being. "Let's talk of something else. Or even better than that, let's go upstairs and see the pictures the ship's photographer has been taking."

"What photographer? What pictures?" Amelia looked puzzled.

"You mean to say you haven't seen the photographer at all!" Bess was incredulous. "Why, he's always around with that camera of his. It's almost impossible to sit or stand any place on deck without his taking your picture!"

"Old Procrastination Boggs," Laura teased, "has been so busy trying to figure out the time so as to keep her clocks straight that she hasn't known what was going on around her. Have you decided yet," she asked, "whether you set the clock ahead or back when you are traveling east?