he knew we were here. He would have telegraphed."

"Ah, yes, so he would. Well, then, he might have run for it, and if he
did that he won't be very far from Madeira by now. That'll be it, marm,
you may depend."

"Or else? You said there was a third chance."

"Did I, marm? No, only two, I think. I don't think I said anything of a
third. Your ship's out there, depend upon it, away out in the Atlantic,
and you'll hear of it time enough, for the weather is breaking. Now
don't you fret, marm, and wait quiet, and you'll find a real blue
Cornish sky to-morrow."

The old seaman was right in his surmise, for the next day broke calm and
bright, with only a low dwindling cloud in the west to mark the last
trailing wreaths of the storm-wrack. But still there came no word from
the sea, and no sign of the ship. Three more weary days had passed, the
weariest that I have ever spent, when there came a seafaring man to the
hotel with a letter. I gave a shout of joy. It was from the captain of
the _Eastern Star_. As I read the first lines of it I whisked my hand
over it, but she laid her own upon it and drew it away. "I have seen
it," said she, in a cold, quiet voice. "I may as well see the rest,
too."

"DEAR SIR," said the letter,

"Mr. Vansittart is down with the smallpox, and we are blown so far
on our course that we don't know what to do, he being off his head
and unfit to tell us. By dead reckoning we are but three hundred
miles from Funchal, so I take it that it is best that we should
push on there, get Mr. V. into hospital, and wait in the Bay until
you come. There's a sailing-ship due from Falmouth to Funchal in a
few days' time, as I understand. This goes by the brig _Marian_ of
Falmouth, and five pounds is due to the master,

"Yours respectfully,

"JNO. HINES."

She was a wonderful woman that, only a chit of a girl fresh from school,
but as quiet and strong as a man. She said nothing--only pressed her
lips together tight, and put on her bonnet.

"You are going out?" I asked.

"Yes."

"Can I be of use?"

"No; I am going to the doctor's."

"To the doctor's?"

"Yes. To learn how to nurse a small-pox case."

She was busy at that all the evening, and next morning we were off with
a fine ten-knot breeze in the barque _Rose of Sharon_ for Madeira. For
five days we made good time, and were no great way from the island; but
on the sixth there fell a calm, and w