certain documents to attend to, and going down again locked himself into
his room.

CHAPTER II
AN OVERHEATED JOURNAL
The *Estremedura* lay rolling gently off the quaint old Spanish city of
Santa Cruz, Teneriffe, most of the following day. It was, indeed, late
in the afternoon when she went to sea, and while the jumble of white
walls and red-tiled roofs faded astern Austin sat in a deck-chair under
a lifeboat, while Jacinta, Mrs. Hatherly, and Miss Muriel Gascoyne, to
whom he had been duly presented, occupied a seat close by. He was not
particularly charmed with the latter's company, and decided that she was
certainly as unlike Jacinta as she very well could be.

Miss Gascoyne was a clear-complexioned, blue-eyed young Englishwoman,
solidly put together, and endued with a certain attractiveness; but she
was quiet, and had a disconcerting way of looking at him in a fashion
which vaguely suggested disapproval. There was also what he felt to be a
slightly irritating air of authority about her, which seemed to suggest
that she recognised the responsibility of her station, as one who was
looked up to in a remote corner of rural England. Mrs. Hatherly, her
aunt, was a little, withered old lady, with ruddy cheeks and the stamp
of vigorous health upon her, though she had apparently been ordered
south for the winter. She became visibly interested when Jacinta
contrived to mention that Austin was in charge of the *Estremedura*'s
medicine chest.

"It really isn't my fault, and I don't do more harm with it than I can
help," he said.

"Then you have a knowledge of medicine?" asked the red-cheeked lady.

"No," said Austin, "not in the least. I had to get a sixpenny book from
England to tell me the difference between a scruple and a drachm, and
I'm not sure about some of the measures yet. You see, I entered the
profession quite by accident. The manual in the drug chest was,
naturally, in English, as it was sent on board a Spanish ship, and the
skipper, who couldn't read it, passed it on to me. My first case was a
great success, unfortunately. We were loading pine, and one of the men
contrived to get a splinter into the inner side of his eyelid. I suppose

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