Page:Harry Castlemon - The Steel Horse.djvu/181

 "You and Rowe are as much alike as two peas," began Willis.

"I can easily believe that, for when I walked up to the desk the clerk began asking me questions I couldn't understand; but I can see the drift of some of them now, for those three reporters have been at me since then, and I know Rowe Shelly was here in this hotel last night, and that he went somewhere on a steamer. When I came in all bunged up, the clerk wanted to know if the boat had burst her boiler."

"Which way did Rowe go?" asked Willis, who was deeply interested.

"I don't know, and you wouldn't expect me to tell you if I did, would you? I have seen how nicely he is fixed over there on the island, and I am sure that if there wasn't some good reason for it, he would never leave a home like that and go out among strangers."

"He might if he was crazy," suggested Willis.

"And where's the boy who would not go crazy after years of solitary confinement, no matter if his prison was furnished like a