I moved a bit and put a leg over the hammock's edge, meaning to get up, but at that, Van Dyck materialized from somewhere and put the leg back again.
"No hurry about turning out, old man," he said gently. "How are you feeling by now?"
I took stock of myself and answered accordingly.
"Head feeling as big as a bushel basket, but I'm otherwise normal, I guess. What happened to me?"
He told me about the crack on the head from the falling tree-top. "You were knocked out by the blow, and when you came to, you were wandering a bit in your mind and talked too much. It was making it rather awkward for Conetta—the things you were saying—so I took the liberty of giving you a small sleeping-shot with the emergency needle."
"Thanks," I yawned. "The next thing to being able to do a good turn for yourself is to have a kind friend at your elbow to do it for you. I feel as though I had slept the clock around. What makes it so quiet?"
"Nobody at home," he answered evasively. "Professor Sanford has formed a class in natural science, and it is out doing field stunts."
"Otherwise?" I queried.
"Otherwise foraging for breakfast. It has come, Dick. We didn't get action swiftly enough last night to save the few provisions there were left in the commissary, and the seas made a clean sweep. Tell me a few of the natural-history things that you and the other survivors of the Mary Jane must have learned while you were trying to keep from starving to death after your shipwreck."
I closed my eyes and took the needful plunge into the dismal memories.