She put her hand to her forehead and rubbed it gently, and then clasped it tightly, with her thumb at one temple and her fingers at the other. "I think my head is swimming yet," she said simply. "I cannot follow what you say." "You'll understand as soon as you get on deck. This ship is bottled up inside a lake on an island. It has been here for probably thirty or forty years----" "And you--have you been here all that time?" "No, we were wrecked as you were, I suppose, on the banks out there. We managed to get ashore and found this ship to live on." "Who are 'we'?" "The mate of the ship and myself. We were the only ones saved. It was he saw you in the water and went in after you and brought you ashore." "It was good of him. I will thank him. Where is he?" "He's out at the wreckage trying to find you some clothes." "He is a good man.... How long have you been here?" "About three months." "And no one has come to you in all that time?" "You are the first. Now"--as she finished the soup--"take a good drink of this,"--some weak rum and water warmed up in another pannikin, over which she choked and coughed and wrinkled up her pretty nose distastefully. "Then you will go to sleep again, and in the morning I hope you will be all right." "But there is so much I would like to know----" "When you have had another long sleep. Are you quite warm?" "Quite. That horrid stuff was like fire." "You were cold enough when we found you. In fact we believed you were dead." She shivered and nestled down among the blankets with a wave of colour in her face. "I will sleep," she said quietly, and the Doctor left her to herself. XXVI It was almost dark before the mate pitched his cargo up on to the deck and came groping up the side after it. "What luck?" asked Wulfrey, as he came up to help him. "Brought all I could lay hands on, but I wouldn't like to say they're right kind of things." "She'll be glad of them whatever they are." "Has she come round?" "I wakened her to take some soup and biscuit. Now I hope she will sleep till morning." "And you told her it was me brought her ashore?" "Yes, I told her that. She will thank you herself." "Did you find out who she is and where she hails from?" "Not yet. There'll be time enough to learn all that. My only desire was to get some nourishment inside her. She'll be building up now all the time she's sleeping." "An' she's a good-looking bit of goods, eh?" asked the mate, as they sat eating. "Very good-looking, I should say, and pulling round quickly. A gentlewoman without doubt." "And how can ye tell that now? There's many a good-looking hussy that's not gentle-born." "Undoubtedly," said Wulfrey, looking across the fire at him. "But this isn't one of that kind. She's a lady to the finger-tips."