I should have turned them
over to Mr. Mason, or put them in the ship's safe. I don't see why I
make myself keep them, unless it is that I want to prove to myself that
I have _some_ backbone."

Presently she heard Bess breathing heavily, showing her chum was in the
land of slumber, and then gradually she dozed off.

Nan had been asleep about an hour when she awoke with a start.

She had heard a noise, of that she felt certain--a noise out of the
ordinary and not connected with the running of the ship.

What was it? Was somebody trying the door?

She turned over and, feeling for the push button, turned on the electric
light. This move awakened Bess.

"What's the matter, are you sick?" asked the latter.

"No. I--I heard something--it woke me up," Nan replied and got to her
feet.

"Maybe those men----"

"Hush! If they are outside the door they may hear you, Bess."

With caution the two girls tiptoed to first one door and then the other
and peered out.

In the cabin only a porter sleeping in an armchair was to be seen, while
out on the deck not a soul was in sight.

"You must have been dreaming, Nan," said Bess, yawning. "Come, let us
try to get some more rest before morning."

Nan was not satisfied and looked all around the stateroom, thinking a
mouse might be wandering around. But no mouse was found, and at last
both girls retired again. But Nan did not sleep very well and was glad
when the rising sun proclaimed another day at hand.

Nan, swinging one bare foot experimentally over the edge of her berth,
felt it caught and held tight by an invisible hand. She peered over the
edge of the berth at the imminent risk of falling over herself and
breaking her neck, and found, as she had expected, that Bess was her
captor. The latter was holding on to her foot with one hand and rubbing
her eyes sleepily with the other.

"Say, let go my foot," Nan hailed her inelegantly. "Haven't you got
enough of your own that you have to steal one of mine?"

"You talk as if we were centipedes," said Bess, releasing Nan's foot and
sitting up grumpily in the berth. "I told you I wouldn't sleep a wink
last night, and I didn't."

"You aren't the only one," said Nan, as she swung her other foot over
the edge of the berth and felt gingerly for a footing on the one below.
"I didn't sleep very well myself. But never mind," she added, as she
slipped safely to the floor, unharmed by her perilous descent. "We'll
forget all about such l