“No, no, no. Baal mumkull. Big Dan shoot. Doctor broke.”
“Where, his head?” said the boy, with a sigh of relief, as he touched his own.
“Baal head. Leggum,” said the black, touching his thigh; and then from out of one tightly clasped hand he took a roughly doubled-up piece of paper, holding it out to the boy with a peculiar look of awe in his countenance.
“Ah!” cried Carey, joyfully, as he snatched at the paper, a leaf evidently torn out of a little pocket-book. “Here, Bob,” he said, with his voice trembling, as he opened out the scrap to display a few words hastily pencilled in straggling characters, and he read:
“Thank Heaven you are alive. That ruffian fired at me, and the shot divided an artery. I am too weak to stir. Take care. He is somehow injured and lying at the bottom of the cabin stairs groaning. I am dreadfully weak and faint, but I managed to stop the bleeding.”
“Three cheers for that,” said Bostock, softly. “This is bad noos, Master Carey, but there’s a deal o’ good in it, though; now, aren’t there?”
“Good?” cried Carey, with a look of horror.
“Yes, sir, good,” said the old sailor, stolidly. “You see, he says he’s stopped the bleeding.”
“Yes, yes, that is good, certainly,” said Carey, with his hand pressed to his aching breast.
“Then there’s something better, sir; he says Old King Cole’s somehow injured, and lying at the bottom o’ the cabin stairs groaning, and if that aren’t a blessing in disguise I should like to know what is.”