"Put a ladder over the side! Lash it to the rail and give the man a line with which to steady himself!" commanded the captain. "Come, come! Have you all lost your senses?"
His orders were carried out with a snap, and a moment later the dripping figure of Smith appeared above the level of the deck.
"You're a fine lot of lubbers," growled the stoker. "You let a man go overboard and then forget he's there. I ought to throw the bunch of you overboard."
"Take those boys to their cabins as soon as you get the water out of them," ordered Captain Simms.
"No, no; I'm all right," protested Steve, pulling himself together and staggering away from the men who were thumping him with their closed fists, hoping in that way to bring him back to himself.
The stoker had betaken himself to the fire room to dry off. His face had once more regained its surly, hang-dog expression, and he made rough answers to the few questions that were put to him by his fellow-workers in the stoke-hole.
At last the workers succeeded in shaking most of the water out of Bob Jarvis. He had swallowed a lot of it and was so weak that he could not stand.
At Steve's suggestion they carried Bob around on the lee side of the after deck-house. The steward came running out with a bottle of brandy, some of which he sought to pour down between the boy's blue lips. Jarvis thrust the bottle aside, half angrily.
"None—none of that horrible stuff for me! I—I'd rather be full of Lake Superior water and—and that's the limit——"