“What!” cried the lads together, as half laughingly they stared at the speaker in surprise.
“Well, what are you both looking at? I don’t mean that I personally like cuts; but they’re pleasant to get healed up—not like bullet wounds or ragged holes through a fellow.”
“No,” said Murray; “not like holes.”
“Not that I mind a clean bullet hole through the flesh so long as it does not encounter a bone.”
“Exactly, doctor; so long as it does not encounter a bone,” said Murray drily.
“That’s where the trouble begins, sir,” said the doctor, smacking his lips and making the two middies exchange glances. “You see, you get a complicated fracture of the bone with tiny fragments that refuse to show where they are commencing irritation and that sort of thing.”
“Yes, doctor,” said Murray drily; “but aren’t we getting into an uncomfortable discussion?”
“No, sir, a most interesting one; but when I spoke it was not all about injured bones or ordinary shot-holes or cuts; I was saying how glad I was to be out of that river and mangrove swamp where your West Coast fever haunts the low lands, and miasmatic emanations are always ready to pounce upon people and set up tasks for the hardest-worked man in the ship.”
“To do what, doctor?” said Roberts.
“I thought I spoke very plainly, young gentleman; I said set up tasks for the hardest-worked man in the ship.”