she said, leading the way into
another room. "Tom will tell you of what has happened. I will return as
soon as I can."

"How is Captain Marston?" asked Raymond, as she stood for a moment with
her hand on the handle of the door.

"Still unconscious. Mrs. Marston is with him." She paused, and then
turned her dark and beautiful tear-dimmed eyes to Frewen: "Tom, perhaps
this gentleman might be able to do something. Will he come in and see?"

Raymond drew him aside. "Go in and see the poor fellow. He can't last
long--his skull is fractured."

Frewen followed Mrs. Raymond into the large room, and saw lying on her
own bed the figure of a man whose features were of the pallor of death.
His head was bound up, and kneeling by his side, with her eyes bent
upon his closed lids, was a woman, or rather a girl of twenty-two or
twenty-three years of age. As, at the sound of footsteps, she raised her
pale, agonised face, something like a gleam of hope came into it.

"Are you a doctor?" she asked in a trembling whisper.

The seaman shook his head respectfully. "No, madam; I would I were."

He leant over the bed, and looked at the still, quiet face of the man,
whom he could see was in the prime of life, and whose regular, clear-cut
features showed both refinement and strength of character.

"He still breathes," whispered the poor wife.

"Yes, so I see," said Frewen, as he rose. Then he asked Mrs. Raymond
a few questions as to the nature of the wound, and learned that in
addition to a fractured skull a pistol bullet had entered at the back of
the neck.

"There is no hope, you think. I can see that by your face," said Mrs.
Marston, suppressing a sob.

"I cannot tell, madam. But I do think that his condition is very, very
serious."

She bent her head, and then sank on her knees again beside the bed, but
suddenly she rose again, and placed her hand on Frewen's sleeve.

"I know that my husband must die, no human aid can save him. But will
you, sir, go and see poor Mr. Villari. Mr. Raymond has hopes for him at
least. And he fought very bravely for my husband."

Villari was the first mate of the ship, and was lying in another room,
together with three wounded seamen. He was a small, wiry Italian, and
when Frewen entered with Raymond and Mrs. Raymond, he waved his right
hand politely to them, and a smile lit up his swarthy features. He had
two bullet wounds, one a clean hole through the right shoulder, the
other in the thigh. He