t, after all, it was not necessary. The key was to be found, and
very soon.

CHAPTER X

"THAT'S MUTINY"

Exactly what occurred during Elsa Lee's visit to her brother-in-law's
cabin I have never learned. He was sober, I know, and somewhat dazed,
with no recollection whatever of the previous night, except a hazy idea
that he had quarreled with Richardson.

Jones and I waited outside. He suggested that we have prayers over the
bodies when we placed them in the boat, and I agreed to read the burial
service from the Episcopal Prayer Book. The voices from Turner's cabin
came steadily, Miss Lee's low tones, Turner's heavy bass only now and
then. Once I heard her give a startled exclamation, and both Jones and
I leaped to the door. But the next moment she was talking again
quietly.

Ten minutes--fifteen--passed. I grew restless and took to wandering
about the cabin. Mrs. Johns came to the door opposite, and asked to
have tea sent down to the stewardess. I called the request up the
companionway, unwilling to leave the cabin for a moment. When I came
back, Jones was standing at the door of Vail's cabin, looking in. His
face was pale.

"Look there!" he said hoarsely. "Look at the bell. He must have tried
to push the button!"

I stared in. Williams had put the cabin to rights, as nearly as he
could. The soaked mattress was gone, and a clean linen sheet was
spread over the bunk. Poor Vail's clothing, as he had taken it off the
night before, hung on a mahogany stand beside the bed, and above,
almost concealed by his coat, was the bell. Jones's eyes were fixed on
the darkish smear, over and around the bell, on the white paint.

I measured the height of the bell from the bed. It was well above, and
to one side--a smear rather than a print, too indeterminate to be of
any value, sinister, cruel.

"He didn't do that, Charlie," I said. "He couldn't have got up to it
after--That is the murderer's mark. He leaned there, one hand against
the wall, to look down at his work. And, without knowing it, he pressed
the button that roused the two women."

He had not heard the story of Henrietta Sloane, and, as we waited, I
told him. Some of the tension was relaxing. He tried, in his
argumentative German way, to drag me into a discussion as to the
foreordination of a death that resulted from an accidental ringing of a
bell. But my ears were alert for the voices near by, and soon Miss Lee
opened the door.