"Then you came aboard with the identical bandbox and your funny story about how you happened to have it. I smelt a rat: Miss Landis hadn't sent you that bandbox anonymously for no purpose. Then one afternoon--long toward six o'clock--I see Miss Landis's maid come out on deck and jerk a little package overboard--package just about big enough to hold a razor. That night I'm dragged up on the carpet before the captain; I hear a pretty fairy tale about the collar disappearing while Jane was taking the bandbox back to your steward. The handbag is on the table, in plain sight; it isn't locked--a blind man can see that; and the slit in its side has been made by a razor. I add up the bandbox and the razor and multiply the sum by the fact that the average woman will smuggle as quick as the average man will take a drink; and I'm Jeremiah Wise, Esquire." "That's the best yet," Staff applauded. "But--see here--why didn't you tell what you knew, if you knew so much, when you were accused?" Iff grimaced sourly. "Get ready to laugh. This is one you won't fall for--not in a thousand years." "Shoot," said Staff. "I like you," said Iff simply. "You're foolish in the head sometimes, but in the main you mean well." "That's nice of you--but what has it to do with my question?" "Everything. You're sweet on the girl, and I don't wish to put a crimp in your young romance by showing her up in her true colours. Furthermore, you may be hep to her little scheme; I don't believe it, but I know that, if you are, you won't let me suffer for it. And finally, in the senility of my dotage I conned myself into believing I could bluff it out; at the worst, I could prove my innocence easily enough. But what I didn't take into consideration was that I was laying myself open to arrest for impersonating an agent of the Government. When I woke up to that fact, the only thing I could see to do was to duck in out of the blizzard." Staff said sententiously: "_Hmmm._..." "Pretty thin--what?" "In spots," Staff agreed. "Still, I've got to admit you've managed to cover the canvas, even if your supply of paint was a bit stingy. One thing still bothers me: how did you find out I knew about the smuggling game?" Iff nodded toward the bedroom. "I happened in--casually, as the saying runs--just as Miss Landis was telling on herself." Staff frowned. "How," he pursued presently, "can I feel sure you're not Ismay, and, having guessed as accurately as you did, that you didn't get at that bandbox aboard the ship and take the necklace?" "If I were, and had, would I be here?" "But I can't understand why you are here!"