The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1886-07-31 00:00:00

Dr. Twist scrambled down, and hastened to the as-
sistance of the unfortunate stewardess, who was, as
the captain had said, "flat on her back." She had
emerged from the saloon at an untoward moment,
just as the sharpest gust of the squall struck the
Psyche, and over she went. She was not hurt, but she
presented a most woeful appearance, as, gasping and
draggled, she shook the wet off her petticoats, and
thanked the doctor.
earth did out just

want comil

"What on . you trig
then ?" he asked, smiling, involuntarily, at her rueful
appearance.
"I wanted you, sir. I couldn't keep 'em quiet any-
how. They all think they are going to the bottom.
Bark at them !"
" Ah, sounds like a wild beast show," said Dr. Twist,
as shrieks and moans greeted his ears from all
quarters. "I'll see to them, Braham. You go and
get into something dry. You're like a drowned rat.
How's Miss Atherstone?"
"Fast asleep, sir."
"The only thing to do her good. I'll go the round
of the ladies. There won't be any more tossing this
time—the wind has changed—to tell them this will
do more good than any physic. When you are dry,
and can spare a minute, I want to speak to you."
But it was quite late in the evening before Mrs.
Braham could find time to wait upon the doctor.
Though the Psyche had steamed out of the track of
the storm, and the sun had set upon a calm sea and
cloudless sky, some of the ladies persisted in their
fright and sickness, and kept her running about, till
she was fairly" off her legs," as she declared to her
colleague the steward.
When she did go up to find the doctor, he was sit-
ting on the poop, enjoying a cigar.
"Sit down here a minute, Braham," he said. I
don't want to take you down into my cabin, and
make a mystery of what I have to ask you. It might
be noticed in the very quarter where it would do
mischief."
"Just so, sir," said Braham, wondering what on
earth the doctor was driving at. "What did you
want to know ?"
"I want to know all about that scar on Miss
Atherstone's temple."
"I don't know anything about it, sir, but what the
young lady told me herself."
"When did she do it ?"
"She burst it open afresh the day before yester-
day. But she says it is a very old one."
"The day before yesterday is about the age of it,
Braham. How did she manage to scratch an old place
open in that strange way ?"
"She fell in her own state room, sir, and tore the
skin against a broken nail that was sticking out of
the corner of her shelf. She told me about it, and
showed me where the blood had gone on the shelf.
She said I was busy at the time, or she should have
sent to you for some plaister."
"What did she do to it?"
"Put some eau-de-cologne on it, she says. It must
have smarted terribly."
"Miss Atherstone is a courageous young lady," was
Dr. Twist's rather curious remark in reply to Mrs.
Brahana's story. "What else has she told you about
this scar? Tell me everything that you can re-

member if you please."
"There isn't much to tell, sir," replied Mrs.
Braham. "It was a cut got in a theatre when the
young lady was a little girl. She was an actress, it
seems, till this great fortune eame to her."
"Yes, I know. That is public property enough.
So she got that cut in a theatre, and remembers when
and where, does she, Braham
"Oh, yes, sir. She must have been about eight or
nine years old from what she says. Something fell
down on her from above, and she was nearly killed.
She says now she is glad there was a scar left, for
that it will serve to show people who she is when she
meets anyone that knew her when she was a child.
It's a forlorn thing for her going to a strange home
alone, isn't it r
I think Miss Atherstone will be able to bear it,"
replied Dr. Twist. "Thank you, Mrs. Braham. I
will get Miss Atherstone to let me look at that cut the
next time I see her."
But Beryl made up her mind that the doctor should
do no such thing, when the stewardess told her of the
questions he had asked.
" It's quite well now, and I am not going to have
it doctored," she said, and dressed her hair so as to
cover it completely.
She was very much better, and the services of the
woman from the fore-cabin were dispensed with when ;
she got up.
Dr. Twist was strangely silent indeed for two or ;
three days after the burial of Ursula Rhodes, and th
storm which followed it. Hesmoked with the gravity°
and pertinAcity of a German, and was particularly
silent. Something was the matter, evidently, but it
was hard to guess what, and he was not communica-
five on the subject.
"I'm trying to think out something," he said, "to
solve a problem in my own mind, that is all," he said,
when Captain Bolton rallied him on his gloom and
abstraction.
" Anent what?"
"That dead girl."
"I wish she had stayed in Melbourne and died,
there with all my heart. She seems to haunt you
Twist."
"She does. Did you ever see her face properly,
Bolton? I mean to mark it thoroughly."
"No, not till she was dead, poor thing!"
"Then you can't help me. Well, well, time will
show."
Whatever the doctor's perplexity was concerning
Ursula Rhodes, it did not seem likely to be solved
now; but, as there sometimes flashes into the mind
like a lightning dart, a knowledge that we have been
striving after for a long time in vain, so the solution
of the 'doctor's puzzle flashed into his mind as he
at watching the setting sun one bright, balmy even
ing, as they were nearing th ezd c. eir voyage. "
(2i s continiod.)