‘Rub that off at once,’ said I, ‘and be quick about it too. If Sir Wilfrid arrives I shall have to explain; and he’s a man to shoot you for such an act as this.’ He pulled a pocket handkerchief out of his coat-tail and fell to rubbing the bulkhead with a terrified hand, backing to see if the letters were gone, then applying himself afresh, breathing hard meanwhile and manifesting much fear, for no doubt he believed that my hint that Wilfrid would shoot him was very well founded, seeing that he had a half-crazy man to deal with in his master. He rubbed till nothing was left of the letters. I turned up the lamp and ordered him out of the cabin. He was about to address me. ‘Not a word,’ I cried, subduing my voice, for though my temper was such that I could scarce keep my hands off him, yet I was exceedingly anxious too that Wilfrid should not overhear me nor come to his berth and find me in it with his valet. ‘Get away forward now to your own cabin.’ ‘For God’s sake, Mr. Monson, don’t tell Sir Wilfrid, sir,’ he exclaimed, in a hoarse, broken tone. ‘Away with you! I promise nothing. This is a matter to think over. I shall require to talk with you in the morning.’ I held open the cabin door and he passed out in a sideways fashion as if he feared I should hit him, and then travelled swiftly forwards with such a twinkling of the white socks bulging over his pumps as made me believe he ran. My cousin was still on deck. Miss Jennings gazed at me earnestly; I looked to see if the coast was clear, and exclaimed: ‘It proved as I had supposed. I have interpreted the warning Wilfrid has received.’ She gazed at me in silence. ‘The mysterious handwriting is Muffin’s,’ I continued. ‘The flaming admonition is wrought by a brush dipped in a phosphoric composition for--for--beetles!’ ‘You mean to say, Mr. Monson----’ She paused to take a long breath whilst her eyes shone with astonishment. ‘The long and short of it is, Miss Jennings,’ said I, ‘that our friend Muffin hates the sea; he has been cursing the voyage from the bottom of his soul pretty nearly ever since we started, and has hit upon this device to appeal to Wilfrid’s instincts as a father and to his poor, weak, credulous nerves as--as--well as a man not wholly sound, in the hope, not ill-founded, that provided the warning be repeated often enough, my cousin _would_ return to baby.’ ‘The horrid wretch! You actually found him----?’ ‘Yes, he had got as far as _Return to Ba_--.’ ‘Shall you tell Wilfrid?’