"Are you boys injured in any way?"
"No," they replied as if with one breath.
"You look as though you had been struck in the eye pretty badly," said the officer, giving Dick's bruised cheek a close scrutiny, and for a moment the boy blushed as if caught in a misdemeanor.
"I was hit in the eye yesterday," he finally managed to stammer; "it wasn't caused by anything that happened to-day," and then to change the subject if possible, he inquired:
"May we have permission to go down where they have taken Tommy Turner? We are all mighty anxious about him."
"Don't you all want to get on some dry clothes first?" inquired the officer.
The boys preferred, however, to hear first the news as to their friend's condition; consequently they were taken below, where already the ship's surgeon and his assistants were working hard to restore life to the still unconscious Tommy.
Sitting on a mess bench which some men had placed for them, each boy wrapped in blankets furnished by other thoughtful members of the crew, they waited silently and with palpitating hearts while a long half hour slowly ticked away. Though many sailors were continually passing to and fro they were all careful not to disturb the four shipwrecked boys who sat there with eyes fastened in anxious hopefulness on the door to the "sick bay," as the hospital is called on shipboard.
After what seemed an eternity, the door opened and Sergeant Dorlan came out quietly, closing it behind him. Immediately the watchers jumped to their feet.
"Is he all right?" whispered Dick, plucking at Dorlan's wet sleeve. "Is he----"