“Perhaps you had better have the doctor?”

“Is there a good one handy?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Here in the hotel?”

The steward seemed undecided whether to treat the occupant of Suite A as a humorist or a lunatic, but finally he observed, “This isn’t a hotel, sir.”

“That’s what I though-t-more like a roadhouse,” “This is a ship.”

“A—­what?” Anthony raised himself and stared at the white-clad figure over the foot of his little brass bed.

“This is a ship, sir.”

“You get out of here!” yelled the infuriated young man.  He cast his eyes about for some missile to hurl at this insolent menial, and, spying a heavy glass pitcher upon a stand beside him, reached for it, whereat the steward retreated hastily to the door.

“I beg pardon, sir.  I will send the doctor at once.”

“Must think I’m still drunk,” mumbled Anthony, dazedly, as he once more laid his head upon his pillow with a groan.

When his dizziness had diminished sufficiently to permit him to open his eyes he scanned his surroundings more carefully; but his vision was unreliable.  His head, too, continued to feel as if his skull were being forcibly spread apart by some fiendish instrument concealed within it.  His mouth was parched, his stomach violently rebellious.  In spite of these distractions he began to note certain unfamiliar features about this place.  The wall-paper, for instance, which at first glance he had taken for the work of some cheap decorator, turned out to be tapestry, as he proved by extending a shaky hand.  The low ceiling, the little windows with wooden blinds, the furniture itself, were all out of keeping with hotel usages.  He discovered by rolling his head that there was a mahogany dresser over by the door and a padded couch covered with chintz.  There were folding brass clothes-hooks on the wall, moreover, and an electric fan, while a narrow door gave him a glimpse of a tiny, white-enamelled bath-room.

He took in these details laboriously, deciding finally that he was too intoxicated to see aright, for, while the place was quite unlike an ordinary hotel room, neither did it resemble any steamship stateroom he had ever seen; it was more like a lady’s boudoir.  To be sure, he felt a sickening surge and roll now and then, but at other times the whole room made a complete revolution, which was manifestly contrary to the law of gravitation and therefore not to be trusted as evidence.  There were plenty of reasons, moreover, why this could not be a ship.  The mere supposition was absurd.  No, this must be a room in some up-town club, or perhaps a bachelor hotel.  Kirk had many friends with quarters decorated to suit their own peculiar fancies, and he decided that in all probability one of these had met him on the street and taken him home for safe-keeping.  He had barely settled this in his mind when the door opened for a second time and a man in uniform entered.