It was no easy task to get her on board, but they managed it somehow, and laid her gently among the blankets in Wulfrey's bunk.
"Now.... Bags of hot sand, as quick as you can and as many.... Then mix some hot rum and water—not too strong,"—and Macro found himself springing to his orders with an alacrity which would have surprised him if he had had time to think about it.
Wulfrey, his professional instincts at highest pressure, drew off the clinging garment, muffled the sea-bitten white body in the blankets, and through them set to gentle vigorous rubbing, to start the chilled blood flowing again.
Macro came hurrying in with hot sand from the hearth, wrapped in linen and tied with strands of untwisted rope.
"Good! ... As many more as you can," said the Doctor, and placed them against the cold, blue-white feet, and rubbed away for dear life.
By degrees he packed her all round with hot sand-bags, Macro heating them as fast as they cooled, in a frying-pan over the fire. He placed them under her arms and between her shoulders, and never ceased his vigorous friction except to renew the bags.
Each time the mate came in, his face asked news, and each time Wulfrey shook his head and said, "Not yet," and went on with his rubbing. His own blood was at fever-heat with his exertions in that confined space. But that was all the better. His superfluous warmth might transmit itself in time to the chill white body of his patient.
Macro came in with hot rum and water, and Wulfrey poured a few careful drops between the still-livid lips, watched the result anxiously, and followed them up with more, and then resumed his patient rubbing.
For over an hour they worked incessantly, and then Macro was for giving it up as hopeless.
"'S no good. She's gone, sure," he said.