She began to wipe a plaintive eye on her small handkerchief.

“The day I married my dear George—­the father of my darlings—­we had champagne.  It always brings it all back to me.”

“But—­tea makes headaches better.”

“Not mine.”  Mrs. Hetherington knitted her white brows and looked immensely interested.

“I think if you were to see dear Mistah Petahs and ask him to come along the alley-way and speak to me.  He is so gentle, so sympathetic, he might suggest something, dear.”

“Um,” said Marcella, thinking of Jimmy.  But she fetched Mistah Petahs who came with voluble and pleased sympathy.

He stood at the door of the cabin smiling fatuously.  Mrs. Hetherington gave a little horrified shriek as she saw the tip of his toe over the threshold.

“No, no, naughty boy!  You mustn’t come in here!  I’m shocked.”

“Are you ill?” he asked in a deeply pained voice.

“My poor, poor head, Mistah Petahs!  That champagne last night brought everything back—­dear George and all our happiness.”

“Oh, I say,” murmured Mr. Peters.

“I feel so ill, so terribly ill.  What could I have?  If this head doesn’t get better I shall jump overboard, really I shall.  And then the fishes will eat me!”

Mr. Peters contemplated the prospect hopefully.

“And—­I keep thinking of my darlings,” she whispered, reduced to tears.

“What you want, little lady, is a hair of the dog that bit you,” said Mr. Peters judicially.  She gave a gentle little scream.

“Oh you sound so fierce, Mistah Petahs!  Which dog?  When?” she asked guilelessly.

“I’ll get it—­you lie back, little lady, and rest your pretty head.”

She lay back, with swimming eyes.

He went half a step along the alley-way.

“Mistah Petahs,” she called faintly.

He came back, assiduous.

“On ice,” she murmured.  He nodded and went.

“So kind—­so sympathetic,” murmured Mrs. Hetherington with closed eyes.

Marcella, who had stood frowning and puzzled, was now pressed into the service.

“I think, dear, when Mistah Petahs comes back I could manage a little bread and butter—­only the butter is so nasty.”

“Would you like jam?” said Marcella helpfully, liking jam herself.

The thought of jam made Mrs. Hetherington feel faint.

“No, I’ll have bread and butter.  Get me two slices, dear—­thin.  And—­ask Knollys if he could let you have some cayenne pepper.  Bread and butter sprinkled with cayenne always does me good when my head has one of its naughty fits.”

Twenty minutes later she was sitting up with sparkling eyes eating devilled bread and butter and drinking champagne daintily while Mr. Peters sat beaming and bashful and inexpressibly silly on a camp-stool in the alley-way, and the bedroom steward wondered what on earth he would do when the officers came along for cabin inspection.