"Hadn't the slightest idea. I am the mate of her--" He paused and
corrected himself. "I should say I WAS."

"Aha! Something wrong?"

"Yes. Very wrong indeed. I've killed a man."

"What do you mean? Just now?"

"No, on the passage. Weeks ago. Thirty-nine south. When I say a
man--"

"Fit of temper," I suggested, confidently.

The shadowy, dark head, like mine, seemed to nod imperceptibly
above the ghostly grey of my sleeping-suit. It was, in the night,
as though I had been faced by my own reflection in the depths of a
sombre and immense mirror.

"A pretty thing to have to own up to for a Conway boy," murmured my
double, distinctly.

"You're a Conway boy?"

"I am," he said, as if startled. Then, slowly . . . "Perhaps you
too--"

It was so; but being a couple of years older I had left before he
joined. After a quick interchange of dates a silence fell; and I
thought suddenly of my absurd mate with his terrific whiskers and