im that----"

There the sentence broke off.

I was thrilled. It was as if a door suddenly flew open in front of a
dull house in a slummy street, to show for an instant a scene of
splendour, and then slammed shut on your prying nose.

Of course I _knew_ the paper was Storm's, and the handwriting his (a
strong, educated hand) because there simply wasn't anybody else in that
crowd capable of it. But, as I told you, several of the steerage
passengers were taking advantage of the smooth weather to write letters;
and, as it happened, our Mystery was no longer engaged in writing. He'd
stuffed his pad and pencil into a pocket of his awful coat when the good
ship Shuster first bore down on him under full sail. Now, on our return,
he was standing at some distance pointing out porpoises to passengers
and rather conspicuously not seeing us. I couldn't yell, "Mr. Storm,
you've lost part of a letter you were writing!" But I thought it was the
sort of letter he wouldn't want knocking about, so I said in a loud
voice to our attendant officer, "Oh, somebody has dropped a sheet of
paper with writing on it!"

I expected Storm to start dramatically, feel in his pocket, and perhaps
claim his property with a keen glance at my face to see whether I had
read anything. I intended of course to put on what Jack calls my "rag
doll expression," one which I find most useful in social intercourse.
But the man didn't start. He could not have helped hearing my siren
hoot, but he never turned a hair or anything else. He went on pointing
out perfectly irrelevant porpoises. I had to admire his nerve! For
instantly I seemed to read the inner workings of his mind, and
understood that he'd deliberately decided not to claim the paper. He
guessed that I'd read the exciting words, and his mental message to me
was: "Do what you like, my dear madam, and be d----."

I called out again for whom it might concern, "Somebody's lost part of a
letter!" but no one took any interest in the announcement, so I added,
with an eye on the back of the Mystery's neck, "Well, I suppose there's
no use keeping it." I crumpled the paper into a ball, and tossed it over
the rail where it couldn't be missed by the eye of Mr. Storm.

"He'll be glad to know I'm not showing it about, or brooding over it
like a bit of a jigsaw puzzle," I thought. But the eye I wished to catch
remained glued to the porpoises, and only they could tell whether it
darkened with dread or twinkled with sup