"Good morning, darling, so glad you've come," said Myra, and tilted up her face for a kiss. She seldom greeted her betrothed with a kiss if there were others present, but she guessed the display of affection might annoy Don Carlos. "This dreadful man has been trying to make my blood run cold," she added smilingly, with a challenging glance at Don Carlos. "I think he must have spent most of his time in Paris at the Grand Guignol, and it has turned his brain. I'm afraid he is suffering from some sort of homicidal mania, poor fellow."
"I warn you, good people, and you, mine host in particular, that I am in a murderous mood," said Don Carlos gaily. "Miss Rostrevor has driven me insane, and I may go Berserker at any moment."
"Splendid, old chap!" laughed Tony. "What about attacking the breakfast with savage fury? There goes the gong…."
It was a beautifully calm day, and after breakfast most of the company assembled on the promenade deck, some to lounge and smoke and chat or read, others to play quoits or deck billiards.
For once in a way Myra did not feel particularly energetic, and she sat down on a comfortable deck chair beside her aunt and several other women and girls seated in a group gossiping and exchanging badinage with two or three men of the party standing by their chairs or lounging against the rail.
Tony Standish and Don Carlos were standing together, both leaning against the rail, and Myra lay back in her chair with her hands clasped behind her head, studying and comparing them through half-closed but keenly-observant eyes.
She noticed that as Don Carlos talked and laughed he was fingering a bolt under the rail behind him, saw him slide the bolt back, and she was in the act of sitting up and calling out to him to be careful, to point out that the part of the rail against which he and Tony were leaning was that which is swung open to make way for a gangway, when Don Carlos straightened himself and took a pace forward.
The rail swung loose at the same instant, and Tony, who had been leaning heavily against it with his arms folded, was precipitated backwards into the sea!
Screams of horror and consternation broke from all the women, and Myra sprang to her feet and made a dash towards the side of the yacht. Whether or not she intended to fling herself into the sea in the hope of rescuing Tony, she could not afterwards have told. As it was, Don Carlos seized her, hurled her aside, and flung off his coat.
"Man overboard!" he yelled at the top of his powerful voice, and as he did so he dived overside.