king me.
I'm not used to breathing air which has been used up by four million
lungs all sucking away on every side of you." He flapped his crooked
hands before his face, like a man who really struggles for his breath.

"A touch of the sea will soon set you right."

"Yes, I'm of one mind with you there. That's the thing for me. I want no
other doctor. If I don't get to sea to-morrow I'll have an illness.
There are no two ways about it." He drank off the tumbler of lime-juice,
and clapped his two hands with his knuckles doubled up into the small of
his back.

"That seems to ease me," said he, looking at me with a filmy eye. "Now
I want your help, Atkinson, for I am rather awkwardly placed."

"As how?"

"This way. My wife's mother got ill and wired for her. I couldn't
go--you know best yourself how tied I have been--so she had to go alone.
Now I've had another wire to say that she can't come to-morrow, but that
she will pick up the ship at Falmouth on Wednesday. We put in there, you
know, though I count it hard, Atkinson, that a man should be asked to
believe in a mystery, and cursed if he can't do it. Cursed, mind you, no
less." He leaned forward and began to draw a catchy breath like a man
who is poised on the very edge of a sob.

Then first it came into my mind that I had heard much of the
hard-drinking life of the island, and that from brandy came these wild
words and fevered hands. The flushed cheek and the glazing eye were
those of one whose drink is strong upon him. Sad it was to see so noble
a young man in the grip of that most bestial of all the devils.

"You should lie down," I said, with some severity.

He screwed up his eyes like a man who is striving to wake himself, and
looked up with an air of surprise.

"So I shall presently," said he, quite rationally. "I felt quite swimmy
just now, but I am my own man again now. Let me see, what was I talking
about? Oh, ah, of course, about the wife. She joins the ship at
Falmouth. Now I want to go round by water. I believe my health depends
upon it. I just want a little clean first-lung air to set me on my feet
again. I ask you, like a good fellow, to go to Falmouth by rail, so that
in case we should be late you may be there to look after the wife. Put
up at the Royal Hotel, and I will wire her that you are there. Her
sister will bring her down, so that it will be all plain sailing."

"I'll do it with pleasure," said I. "In fact, I would rather go by rail,
fo