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Updated: June 8, 2025
"Mr. and Mrs. Turner, Miss Lee, Mrs. Johns, and Mr. Vail. The stewardess, Mrs. Sloane, and Karen Hansen, a maid, also slept there; but their room opened from the chartroom." A diagram of the after house was here submitted to the jury. For the benefit of the reader, I reproduce it roughly. I have made no attempt to do more than to indicate the relative positions of rooms and companionways.
The Captain of the Spanish ship was now relieved of his duties and also of his cabin, which the German Captain had annexed, leaving the owner thereof the chartroom to sleep in and was naturally very chagrined at the course events had taken, especially as he said he had been informed by the Consul at Lourenço Marques that the course between there and Colombo was quite clear, and had not even been informed of the disappearance of the Hitachi, though she had been overdue at Delagoa Bay about a month.
There are boxes with hydrant and valve in each room and a system of break glass fire alarms with a drop indicator box in the chartroom and also one in the engine-room to notify in case of any outbreak. The sanitation is all that could be desired. There are flush lavatories on all decks in marble and onyx and with all the sanitary contrivances in apparatus of the best design.
Somehow or other I got back there and found it. I made an attempt to find the switch for the cabin lights, and, failing, revolver in hand, I ran into the chart-room and up the after companionway. Charlie Jones was at the wheel, and by the light of a lantern I saw that he was bending to the right, peering in at the chartroom window. He turned when he heard me. "What's wrong?" he asked.
He said he was sorry he had nothing better but that the whole boat was at our disposal and we could arrange ourselves wherever we wished. So after looking everything over, we finally decided to sleep on top of the chartroom. We climbed up there with a couple of blankets and settled for the night under the stars.
She dropped into a chair in the chart-room and cried softly, helplessly, while I stood by, unable to think of anything to do or say. I think now that it was the best thing she could have done, though at the time I was alarmed. I ventured, finally, to put my hand on her shoulder. "Please!" I said. Charlie Jones came to the door of the chartroom, and retreated with instinctive good taste.
During this examination the prosecution for the first time made clear their position: that the captain was murdered first; that Vail interfered, and, pursued by Singleton, took refuge in his bunk, where he was slaughtered; that the murderer, bending to inspect his horrid work, had unwittingly touched the bell that roused Karen Hansen, and, crouching in the chartroom with the axe, had struck her as she opened the door.
"He had quarreled with the captain last night, and he was on duty at the time of the when the thing happened. The man at the wheel claims to have seen him in the chartroom just before, and there was other evidence, I believe. The lookout saw him forward, with something possibly the axe. Not decisive, of course, but enough to justify putting him in irons.
It was rather a sight: the sea running high, the ship a wreck to look at, these Chinamen staggering up on the bridge one by one for their share, and the old man still booted, and in his shirt-sleeves, busy paying out at the chartroom door, perspiring like anything, and now and then coming down sharp on myself or Father Rout about one thing or another not quite to his mind.
While he was loading his revolver there, he heard the sound of heavy blows struck upon the bridge. The locks of the chartroom doors were slight, they flew open, and the carpenter, possessing himself of the captain's revolver, fired a shot of defiance.
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