"Oh, please, no!"

At a loss, Lanyard shrugged eloquently.

"Not yet, at all events," she hastened to amend. "Let Lionel judge what is
best to be done when he comes to."

"But, mademoiselle, who can say when that will be?" He pointed out the
ugly, ragged abrasion in the young Englishman's scalp exposed by the
cleansing away of the clotted blood. "No ordinary blow," he commented;
"something very like a slung-shot or a loaded cane did that work. If I may
venture again to advise--unless mademoiselle is herself a surgeon--"

Her colour faded and she caught her breath sharply. "You think it as
serious as all that?"

"I do not know. Such a blow might easily fracture the skull, possibly bring
about a concussion of the brain. Regard, likewise, his laborious breathing.
I most assuredly advise consulting competent authority."

She did not immediately answer, turning back undivided attention to her
task; but he noticed that her hands were tremulous, however, dextrously
they finished dressing and bandaging the hurt; and deep distress troubled
the handsome eyes she turned to his when she rose.

"You are right," she murmured--"unquestionably right, monsieur. We must
have the surgeon in...."

But when Lanyard advanced a hand toward the bell-push, to call the steward,