The boat was no sooner beached than the man who had been rescued leaped ashore, still carrying in his hand the small physician's bag. He raced toward the cabin, as if he felt that life or death depended on his haste.
Captain Ichabod suddenly felt very old and worn. He had used too much energy in this work of rescue, and now the reaction set in. He dawdled over the securing of the skiff. Then he made his way with lagging steps toward the cabin. He pushed open the door, and was startled to behold the man he had rescued kneeling beside the couch of the girl. At the noise of the opening door, the man sprang to his feet.... Ichabod wondered as he glimpsed an object that shone like silver, and then was slipped cautiously into the man's coat pocket.
Captain Ichabod approached the bed upon which the girl lay motionless. He noticed on the forearm a tiny drop of blood. He wondered also over this, then solved the puzzle to his satisfaction by thinking that a mosquito had left this trace of its attack. He was confirmed in the opinion by the fact that there was a white blotch beneath the touch of crimson.
Captain Ichabod tried to question the man he had saved, but found every answer baffling and unsatisfactory. The yachtsman refused any sort of information. His reticence angered the old man, and he at last spoke his mind freely, with something of suspicion engendered by a new thought concerning that curious drop of blood on the girl's arm.
"She acts ter me like a woman chuck-er-block with Bateman Drops or opium. A heap o' that kind o' truck is used by the women about these-here islands o' the Sound, an' I've seed a heap o' the effects o' it in the years past, but the good Lord knows it's a spell since Captain Icky has seed a woman a-hitten dope, as new-fangled folks calls it."
The man who had been rescued by Ichabod started violently as he heard the word "dope." He cast a probing glance on the old man, but spoke never a word.
"Thar is one thing fer sartin," continued the fisherman, "if it hain't dope that is a'lin' o' her, it's somethin' that calls fer an M.D., an' if she hain't come to her senses in an hour, I'll put the rag on the skiff an' run up to Beaufort an' bring back Dr. Hudson to pass on the case. Thar has never been a death o' a human in Ichabod Jones' shack, an' Lord have mercy, the first passin' sha'n't be a woman!"
The condition of the girl continued such that Ichabod felt it necessary to summon the physician. He must make the trip in his sailboat to Beaufort, the nearest town along the coast. The yachtsman now approved the idea.
When Captain Ichabod went to make ready his boat for the trip to town, the yachtsman followed him, and then presently, walking down to where the wreckage had come ashore, proceeded to right and clear of débris a little cedar motor boat, which had come ashore from the wrecked yacht, practically unharmed, except that the batteries were wet.
In the absence of Captain Ichabod, the stranger removed all the wire connections in this small boat, and placed the batteries over the stove to dry. When they were in fact thoroughly dried, he waited patiently for the departure of Captain Ichabod in search of a physician. Presently, the old man set out on his errand of mercy. The stranger yachtsman grinned derisively as he saw the boat slip into the smother of storm-tossed waters.