“You bet I did,” said Mr. Heatherbloom with the least evidence of incoherency.  Her words had been verbal champagne to him.  “I gave him the dandiest best licking—­” He stopped.  Perhaps he realized that his explanation was beginning to seem slightly tinged with too great evidence of personal satisfaction if not boastfulness.  “You see I had a gun,” he murmured rather apologetically.

“But,” said the girl, coming nearer, “I don’t understand.”

He started to meet that advance, then backed away a little.  “I’ve got him safe, where he can’t move, or bother you any more.”  Mr. Heatherbloom glanced over his shoulder; but he did not tell her where he “had him”.  “And the yacht’s going back to the nearest American port,” he couldn’t help adding, impetuously, to reassure her.

“Going back?  Impossible!” Wonder, incredulity were in her voice.

“It’s true as shooting, Bet—­”

She was too bewildered to notice that slight slip of the tongue.  “It’s a fact, miss,” he added more gruffly.

“But how?” Her tones betrayed reticence in crediting the miracle.  Yet this blackened figure must have prevailed over the prince or the latter would not have so mysteriously disappeared.  “How did it happen?”

“Well, you see I just happened around.”

“You, a stoker?”

Stokers, he was reminded by her tone, did not usually “happen around” on decks of palatial private yachts.  He must seek a different, more definite explanation.  He thought he saw a way; he could let her know part of the truth.  “The fact is, I was looking for this boat at the last port she stopped at.  I had cause to think you would be on her.  Couldn’t stop the yacht from going to sea, for reasons too numerous to mention, so I just slipped out and came aboard in a kind of disguise—­”

“A disguise?  Then you are a detective?”

“I think I may truthfully say I am, but in a sort of private capacity.  When a really important case occurs, it interests me.  Now this was an important case, and—­and it interested me.”  He hardly knew what he was saying, her eyes were so insistent.  Betty Dalrymple had always had the most disconcerting eyes.  “Because, you see, your—­your aunt was so anxious—­and”—­with a flash of inspiration—­“the reward was a big one.”

“The reward?  Of course.”  Her voice died away.  “You hoped to get it.  That is the reason—­”

He let his silence answer in the affirmative; he felt relieved now.  She had not recognized him—­yet.  In the recess behind the draperies the chair in which his excellency was bound, creaked.  Was he struggling to release himself?  Mr. Heatherbloom had faith in the knots and the silken cords.  The girl turned her head.

“Don’t you think it would be better”—­he spoke quickly—­“for you to return to your cabin?  I’ll let you know when I want you and—­”

“But if I prefer to stay here?  May I not turn on the lights?”