The Girl on the Boat - Penn State University

Mr. Bennett had no pistol, but he dropped the candle.
It would have been a nice point to say whether he was
more perturbed by the discovery that he had got into
the wrong room, and that room a lady’s, or by the fact
that the lady whose wrong room it was had pointed
what appeared to be a small cannon at him over the
foot of the bed. It was not, as a matter of fact, a cannon
but the elephant gun, which Miss Hubbard carried with
her everywhere—a girl’s best friend.
“My dear young lady!” he gasped.
On the five occasions during recent years on which men
had entered her tent with the object of murdering her, Jane
Hubbard had shot without making inquiries. What strange
feminine weakness it was that had caused her to utter a
challenge on this occasion, she could not have said. Probably
it was due to the enervating effects of civilisation. She
was glad now that she had done so, for, being awake and
in full possession of her faculties, she perceived that the
intruder, whoever he was, had no evil intentions.
“Who is it?” she asked.
“I don’t know how to apologise!”
P. G. Wodehouse
123
“That’s all right! Let’s have a light.” A match flared
in the darkness. Miss Hubbard lit her candle, and gazed
at Mr. Bennett with quiet curiosity. “Walking in your
sleep?” she inquired.
“No, no!”
“Not so loud! You’ll wake Mr. Hignett. He’s next door.
That’s why I took this room, in case he was restless in
the night.”
“I want to see Bream Mortimer,” said Mr. Bennett.
“He’s in my old room, two doors along the passage.
What do you want to see him about?”
“I wish to inform him that he may still consider himself
engaged to my daughter.”
“Oh, well, I don’t suppose he’ll mind being woken
up to hear that. But what’s the idea?”
“It’s a long story.”
“That’s all right. Let’s make a night of it.”
“I am a dying man. I awoke an hour ago with a feeling
of acute pain ….”
Miss Hubbard listened to the story of his symptoms
with interest but without excitement.