Miss Lee got up and came to the door where I was standing.

“Surely we need not be prisoners any longer!” she said in an undertone.  “It is daylight.  If I stay here I shall go crazy.”

“The murderer is still on the ship,” I protested.  “And just now the deck is—­hardly a place for women.  Wait until this afternoon, Miss Lee.  By that time I shall have arranged for a guard for you.  Although God knows, with every man under suspicion, where we will find any to trust.”

“You will arrange a guard!”

“The men have asked me to take charge.”

“But—­I don’t understand.  The first mate—­”

“—­is a prisoner of the crew.”

“They accuse him!”

“They have to accuse some one.  There’s a sort of hysteria among the men, and they’ve fixed on Singleton.  They won’t hurt him, I’ll see to that,—­and it makes for order.”

She considered for a moment.  I had time then to see the havoc the night had wrought in her.  She was pale, with deep hollows around her eyes.  Her hands shook and her mouth drooped wearily.  But, although her face was lined with grief, it was not the passionate sorrow of a loving girl.  She had not loved Vail, I said to myself.  She had not loved Vail!  My heart beat faster.

“Will you allow me to leave this room for five minutes?”

“If I may go with you, and if you will come back without protest.”

“You are arbitrary!” she said resentfully.  “I only wish to speak to Mr. Turner.”

“Then—­if I may wait at the door.”

“I shall not go, under those conditions.”

“Miss Lee,” I said desperately, “surely you must realize the state of affairs.  We must trust no one—­no one.  Every shadowy corner, every closed door, may hold death in its most terrible form.”

“You are right, of course.  Will you wait outside?  I can dress and be ready in five minutes.”

I went into the main cabin, now bright with the morning sun, which streamed down the forward companionway.  The door to Vail’s room across was open, and Williams, working in nervous haste, was putting it in order.  Walking up and down, his shrewd eyes keenly alert, Charlie Jones was on guard, revolver in hand.  He came over to me at once.

“Turner is moving, in there,” he said, jerking his thumb toward the forward cabin.  “What are you going to do?  Let a drunken sot like that give us orders, and bang us with a belaying pin when we don’t please him?”

“He is the owner.  But one thing we can do, Jones.  We can keep him from more liquor.  Williams!”

He came out, more dead than alive.

“Williams,” I said sternly, “I give you an hour to get rid of every ounce of liquor on the Ella.  Remember, not a bottle is to be saved.”

“But Mistah Turner—­”

“I’ll answer to Mr. Turner.  Get it overboard before he gets around.  And, Williams!”