King o' the Beach: A Tropic Tale. George Manville Fenn

move.”

      He hurried out, leaving Bostock standing with the glass and tin of water, breathing hard and staring down at the injured boy.

      “Here, Bob,” said Carey, faintly. “What’s the matter?”

      “You lie still and wait till the doctor comes back, my lad,” said the old fellow, gruffly.

      “I am lying still,” said Carey, peevishly. “Tell me directly; what’s the matter?”

      “Why, you said you knowed. I heard yer. You said you fell from up aloft.”

      “Yes, yes,” cried Carey; “but the doctor asked you if the ship was much broken up.”

      “Did he, sir?”

      “You know he did, and you said she had got some holes in her bottom.”

      “Did I, sir?”

      “Yes, yes, of course you did,” cried Carey, impatiently.

      “Well, it’s a rum un, then, sir.”

      “Now, no nonsense; tell me, surely. Oh, I don’t understand!” sighed the boy, wearily.

      “Here we are, my boy,” said the doctor, entering with a piece of glass tube bent at right angles. “Give me the glass, Bostock.”

      “Glass it is, sir,” growled the man, and the doctor inserted one end of the glass syphon in the water and the other between his patient’s lips, so that he could drink without being raised.

      Carey half, closed his eyes, and his countenance bespoke his intense enjoyment, as the cool, pleasant water trickled slowly down his dry throat till the glass was emptied, and the old sailor raised the tin he held.

      “ ’Nother go, sir?” he asked.

      “Yes,” said Carey.

      “No,” said the doctor; “not yet.”

      “Ha!” sighed Carey; “but that was good. I say, doctor, I am broken somewhere, am I not?”

      “Yes.”

      “ ’Tisn’t my neck, is it?”

      “Hor! hor! hor!” chuckled the old sailor.

      “Well, it feels like it,” said Carey, pettishly.

      “Perhaps I hardly ought to tell you now,” said the doctor, gravely.

      “Then it is,” cried Carey, excitedly.

      “No, no, no. Nonsense. You have fractured a bone, but it is not a serious matter, my dear fellow. It is the collar-bone, but if you are quiet it will soon knit together again.”

      “How queer. But I’ve hurt my head too.”

      “Yes, a good deal; but that will soon come right.”

      “Not cracked it, have I, doctor?”

      “Decidedly not.”

      “Ha!” sighed the boy. “That’s a good job. That comes of having a good thick head, Bob. I remember slipping, but no more. I say, didn’t I come down an awful whop?”

      “You lie still and don’t talk, my boy,” said the doctor, quietly.

      “Yes, directly; but tell me about the ship. Why aren’t we going on? I can’t hear the throbbing of the engine.”

      “Nay, my lad,” said the old sailor, shaking his head; “never no more.”

      “What do you mean?”

      “Well, you must know, Carey, my lad,” said the doctor; “but I don’t want you to become excited about it. If I tell you, will you lie still then and be patient?”

      “Of course I will, doctor, if I must.”

      “The fact is, then, since your fall we have been in a terrible hurricane.”

      “A hurricane? Why, it was only this morning I tumbled.”

      The doctor shook his head.

      “Never mind when it was,” he said. “You have been lying here some time, and I grieve to tell you that while you were insensible we had a great mishap. The main shaft broke, and we have been driven on a reef.”

      “Wrecked?”

      “Yes.”

      “But we’re all saved?”

      “I hope so,” said the doctor. “Now I shall tell you no more to-day. Will you have a little more water?”

      “Yes, please,” said the boy, eagerly, and he drank the half-glassful more given to him with the greatest of avidity, closed his eyes directly after, and dropped off into a calm sleep.

      “That’s bad, aren’t it, sir?” whispered the old sailor, as the doctor bent over his patient.

      “Bad? No. Look at the soft dewy perspiration on his temples.”

      “I see, sir. Oughtn’t it to be wiped dry?”

      “No, no; let him sleep. It is a sign that he will not be troubled with fever, and its following weakness.”

      “But he aren’t had no brackfuss, sir.”

      “He has had all that he requires, and he will sleep for hours now.”

      “Bless the lad! That’s good news, sir. It’s a fine thing to be a doctor, and know all these things. Can he be left, sir?”

      “Yes; he will be better undisturbed.”

      “Then don’t you think, sir, as you and me’d better go on deck and overhaul things a bit; see how things are and look round?”

      “Yes, certainly.”

      “Then you lead on, sir, for there’s a deal I’m wanting to see.”

      The door was softly closed upon the sleeping lad, and doctor and able seaman stepped into the saloon to try and make out how they stood.