"You have slept well," the burgomaster's wife said with a smile; "and no wonder, after your fatigues. The surgeon has just gone, and I was about to send up to wake you, for he told me to tell you that your father had passed a good night, and that you can now see him."
Ned ran upstairs, and turning the handle of the door very quietly entered his father's room. Captain Martin was looking very pale, but Ned thought that his face had not the drawn look that had marked it the evening before.
"How are you, my dear father?"
"I am going on well, Ned; at least so the doctors say. I feel I shall be but a battered old hulk when I get about again; but your mother will not mind that, I know."
"And do the doctors still think that they must take the leg off?" Ned asked hesitatingly.
"That was their opinion last night, Ned, and it was my opinion too; and so the matter was done off hand, and there is an end of it."
"Done offhand?" Ned repeated. "Do you mean"--and he hesitated.
"Do I mean that they have taken it off? Certainly I do, Ned. They took it off last night while you were downstairs in the burgomaster's parlour; but I thought it would be much better for you not to know anything about it until this morning. Yes, my boy, thank God, it is all over! I don't say that it wasn't pretty hard to bear; but it had to be done, you know, and the sooner it was over the better. There is nothing worse than lying thinking about a thing."
Ned was too affected to speak; but with tears streaming down his cheeks, leant over and kissed his father. The news had come as a shock to him, but it seemed to have lifted a weight from his mind. The worst was over now; and although it was terrible to think that his father had lost his leg, still this seemed a minor evil after the fear that perhaps his life might be sacrificed. Knowing that his father should not be excited, or even talk more than was absolutely necessary, Ned stayed but a few minutes with him, and then hurried off to the ship, where, however, he found that the news that the captain's leg had been amputated, and that the doctors hoped that he would go on well, had been known some hours before; as Peters had come on shore with the first dawn of daylight for news, and heard from the burgomaster's servant that the amputation had taken place the evening before, and an hour later had learned from the lips of the doctor who had been watching by the captain's bedside, that he had passed a fairly good night, and might so far be considered to be doing well.
"What do you think we had better do, Master Ned? Of course it will be for the captain to decide; but in these matters it is always best to take counsel beforehand. For although it is, of course, what he thinks in the matter will be done, still it may be that we might direct his thoughts; and the less thinking he does in his present state the better."