“Nonsense! your head is all right!” Uncle Dick said sharply.
But now Will struck another note, groaned “Oh, my knee!” and fell down in a swoon. Foolish fellow, he had danced till his knee slipped out of joint.
(N.B.—O youth, let this be a warning against dancing.)
Mr. Lawrence and George anxiously bent over him; and, for the first time, Charles and Stephen looked at each other.
“Your face!” shrieked Steve.
“Your fingers!” gasped Charles.
Then poor Steve perceived that his thumb and first and second fingers were shattered. It was a sickening sight, and he now felt a severe pain in them.
From his fingers Stephen again looked at Charles. Several small pieces of the metal had pierced the flesh around the eyes, making painful, but very slight, wounds.
At that instant Jim set up his peculiar cry of terror. Poor wretch, his terror and his mode of expressing it still clung to him; but it was a hundred times more ridiculous in the man than in the boy. The explosion (if it may be called so) and Will’s amusing performance, cut short by his sad accident, had kept him quiet up to this time, but now he broke out into loud and plaintive cries. This time, however, he was not a prey to “the chills.”