"Thanks," gasped Tony faintly and painfully. "I—I'll be all right presently. Think I must have hit my head on something. Give me a drink, will you?"
The doctor gave him brandy, had him carried to his cabin, where he examined him carefully and discovered that he was not injured. He surmised that Tony had probably been partly stunned by falling flat on the water when he toppled overboard, and "knocked silly"—to use Tony's own expression—and he was able to tell the passengers that their host would probably be all right again within an hour or two.
"Thank heaven for that!" exclaimed Lady Fermanagh fervently. "Myra, darling, you look ghastly. Doctor, please give Miss Rostrevor something to pull her together."
"I'm quite all right, thanks," said Myra—and promptly disproved her own statement by dropping limply into a deck-chair, covering her face with her hands, and bursting into tears.
She speedily recovered herself, however, after she had been helped to her state-room and persuaded to swallow some sal volatile, but she still felt shaken and unnerved.
"Better lie down and rest for a little while until you have quite recovered from the shock, Myra dear," advised Lady Fermanagh. "Don't worry. You heard the doctor say that Tony will be quite all right and isn't hurt."
"I don't understand it," said Myra, more to herself than to her aunt. "Don Carlos meant to kill Tony, and yet he saved him. Does he want to make himself out to be a hero simply to flatter still further his own vanity, or is he trying to frighten me?"
"My dear Myra, what on earth are you talking about?" inquired Lady
Fermanagh in concern.
"Don Carlos undid the bolt of the rail against which Tony was leaning," explained Myra. "I saw him do it, but had no time to warn Tony. He threatened this morning that he would murder Tony rather than let me marry him. What can I do, Aunt?"
Lady Fermanagh shook her grey head, looking greatly concerned.