“Then you are different from most sailors. They all pull the list on the slightest pretext, some under no pretext at all. Why are you so particular?” questioned the surgeon, his curiosity aroused by the unusual objection on the boy’s part.
“I expect to have duties to perform.”
“What are they?”
“Mine work.”
“You will not be able to work on mines to-day. I shall not permit it,” decided the surgeon firmly.
“I hope to go out as a signal man. I can do that, can I not?”
“You might, but I shall advise against it.”
“Please do not tell the officers that,” pleaded Dan. “I want to go. It is my first chance to prove that I am good for anything at all. I have made a mess of almost everything I have tried so far.”
“I hear differently.”
Somehow the earnest young seaman seemed to appeal to the sympathies of the surgeon. He was different from the others; perhaps that was the reason.