“Glad! Why, you looked sorry. There, then, if you promise to be very quiet, you may stay. Vandean, he must not talk to you, and you must hardly say a word. I’ll go and get you a little draught.”
The doctor left the midshipman’s quarters, and as he departed Bob made a gesture suggestive of kicking him before returning to his seat beside his messmate.
“Tell me, Bob,” whispered Mark.
“No; mustn’t speak.”
“Only this. Did everyone—was everyone—”
Mark stopped short.
“You’re not to talk while you’re so weak. Now then, what do you want to know? Did any one die?”
“Yes.”
Bob nodded his head, and a pang shot through Mark as he thought of the handsome young lieutenant, and the frank, manly fellows who had formed their crew.
He closed his eyes, and a feeling of weak misery choked his utterance. He would have given anything for the power to question his companion, and learn for certain who were living of the party; for the idea had in his weakness become now a certainty, that though he had seemed to hear that Mr Russell was recovering, he it was who had died.