"But you are not going to die," said the surgeon, kindly, cutting away the clothes from his neck.
Mr. Sinjin assisted, while Frank anxiously awaited the result of the examination. The surgeon looked puzzled. There was blood, but not any fresh blood—and no wound! Not so much as a scratch of the skin.
Jack in the mean time was groaning dismally.
"What are you making that noise for?" exclaimed the surgeon, sharply. "There isn't a hurt about you!"
"Ain't I shot?" cried Jack, starting up, as much astonished as any body; for he had really believed he was a dead man. "I was hit, I know! and I swooned away."
"You swooned from fright, then," declared the indignant surgeon. "Take the fellow away!"
Jack, however, gratified as he was to learn he was not killed, testily insisted that a bullet had passed through him, adducing the blood on his face as a proof.
Thereupon Ellis broke into a laugh.
"It takes Jack to make capital out of a little borrowed blood. I know something about that. When my hand was ploughed through, I slapped it against his face; and down he went, fainting dead away." And, notwithstanding the ache of his wound and his weakness, and the scenes of horror thickening around, Ned leaned back against the tree, and laughed merrily at what he called Jack's "awful big scare."
Frank felt immensely relieved, at first, on learning that Jack was not killed; then immensely amused; and, lastly, immensely disgusted. He remembered the severe struggle it cost to bring him out of the swamp, the rolled-up eyes, the lugubrious groans, and the faintly murmured dying request to be forgiven. And in the revulsion of his feelings he could not help saying, "Yes, Jack, I forgive ye! and if you die, you shan't be buried on this miserable island."