s. Nettlepoint--I would know
her--that she was sometimes with, but the stewardess had been with _her_
and she knew Miss Mavis had not come near her that morning. She had
spoken to _him_ and they had taken a quiet look--they had hunted
everywhere. A ship's a big place, but you do come to the end of it, and
if a person ain't there why they ain't. In short an hour had passed and
the young lady was not accounted for: from which I might judge if she
ever would be. The watch couldn't account for her, but no doubt the
fishes in the sea could--poor miserable lady! The stewardess and he,
they had of course thought it their duty very soon to speak to the
doctor, and the doctor had spoken immediately to the captain. The
captain didn't like it--they never did. But he would try to keep it
quiet--they always did.

By the time I succeeded in pulling myself together and getting on, after
a fashion, the rest of my clothes I had learned that Mrs. Nettlepoint
had not yet been informed, unless the stewardess had broken it to her
within the previous few minutes. Her son knew, the young gentleman on
the other side of the ship (he had the other steward); my man had seen
him come out of his cabin and rush above, just before he came in to me.
He _had_ gone above, my man was sure; he had not gone to the old lady's
cabin. I remember a queer vision when the steward told me this--the wild
flash of a picture of Jasper Nettlepoint leaping with a mad compunction
in his young agility over the side of the ship. I hasten to add that no
such incident was destined to contribute its horror to poor Grace
Mavis's mysterious tragic act. What followed was miserable enough, but I
can only glance at it. When I got to Mrs. Nettlepoint's door she was
there in her dressing-gown; the stewardess had just told her and she was
rushing out to come to me. I made her go back--I said I would go for
Jasper. I went for him but I missed him, partly no doubt because it was
really, at first, the captain I was after. I found this personage and
found him highly scandalised, but he gave me no hope that we were in
error, and his displeasure, expressed with seamanlike plainness, was a
definite settlement of the question. From the deck, where I merely
turned round and looked, I saw the light of another summer day, the
coast of Ireland green and near and the sea a more charming colour than
it had been at all. When I came below again Jasper had passed back; he
had gone to his cabin and