“We are ten days out,” Frank said.  “We have touched at Tarifa, Ceuta, and Tangier, but that is all.  The crew are all in good health.  Here is the list of them if you wish to examine them.”

“As a matter of formality it is better that it should be done,” the health officer said.

“I will order them to muster,” Frank said, “and while they are doing so, will you come below and take a glass of wine?

“Can you tell me if a craft about this size, a schooner or brigantine, has put in here during the last fortnight?  I don’t know whether she is still flying yacht colours, or has gone into trade, but at any rate you could see at once that she had been a yacht.”

“Certainly no such craft has put in here, Major Mallett.  Yours is the first yacht that has come round this season, and as I board every vessel that anchors here, I should certainly have noticed any trader that had formerly been a yacht.  The decks and fittings would tell their story at once.  Do you know her name?”

“I don’t know much about her,” Frank said, “but a craft of that kind sailed from Cowes a day or two before I started, and, as I believe, for the Mediterranean.  Being about our own size, and heavily sparred for a schooner, I was rather curious to know if I had beaten her.  We did not make her out as we came along.”

“You must have passed her in the night, I should say, unless, as is likely enough, she did not put in, but kept eastward.”

As Frank had touched at Gibraltar three times before, the place had no novelty for him.  He, however, went ashore at once to make arrangements for filling up again with water.  The steward and George Lechmere accompanied him into the town to purchase fresh meat, fruit and vegetables.

Frank then made his way to the post office.  He was scarcely disappointed at finding that there was nothing for him as yet.

The next three days he spent in wandering restlessly over the Rock.  As long as the Osprey was under weigh, and doing her best, he was able to curb his anxiety and impatience; but now that she was at anchor he felt absolutely unable to remain quietly on board.  Several officers of his acquaintance came off to the Osprey, and he was invited to dine at their mess dinner every night.  He, however, declined.

“The fact is, my dear fellow,” he said to each, “I am at present waiting with extreme anxiety for news of a most important nature, and until I get it I am so restless and so confoundedly irritable that I am not fit to associate with anyone.  When I look in here again I hope that it will be all right, and then I shall be delighted to come to you, and have a chat over our Indian days; but at present I really am not up to it.”

His appearance was sufficient to testify that his plea was not a fictitious excuse.

On the fourth day he found a letter awaiting him at the post office.  He tore it open, and read: