"Lower ten, car seven," was my berth-the one I had bought and found
preempted.



CHAPTER III

ACROSS THE AISLE


No solution offering itself, I went back to my berth. The snorer
across had apparently strangled, or turned over, and so after a
time I dropped asleep, to be awakened by the morning sunlight across
my face.

I felt for my watch, yawning prodigiously. I reached under the
pillow and failed to find it, but something scratched the back of
my hand. I sat up irritably and nursed the wound, which was bleeding
a little. Still drowsy, I felt more cautiously for what I supposed
had been my scarf pin, but there was nothing there. Wide awake now,
I reached for my traveling-bag, on the chance that I had put my watch
in there. I had drawn the satchel to me and had my hand on the lock
before I realized that it was not my own!

Mine was of alligator hide. I had killed the beast in Florida, after
the expenditure of enough money to have bought a house and enough
energy to have built one. The bag I held in my hand was a black one,
sealskin, I think. The staggering thought of what the loss of my bag
meant to me put my finger on the bell and kept it there until the