“Awfully,” I murmured.
The doctor came, followed by François, with a basin of hot water and sponges, and a nasty-looking little case of instruments. Mrs. Jimmie held my hand. They turned on the electric lights and opened the windows. Jimmie had my salts. The doctor carefully wet a sponge and tenderly bathed my cheek, and I held my breath ready to shriek if he hurt me. Commodore Strossi stood at the door with an anxious face. Suddenly the doctor reached for a broken bottle half hidden under my pillow.
“Oh, what is it, doctor?” asked Mrs. Jimmie. “What makes you look so queer?”
“This is iodine on her face. Her bottle has emptied itself. That is all.”
We gazed at each other for a moment or two, then I nearly went into hysterics. Jimmie’s face was a study.
“You said it was blood, Jimmie,” I said.
“Well, you said it hurt,” he retorted.
“Well, it did. When you said I was covered with blood it hurt awfully.”
The doctor went out much chagrined that he had not been called upon to sew up a wound. I had a relapse, brought on by young Bashforth’s jeering remarks as he frantically clung to the handles of the locker which formed the back of the settee where he lay prostrate.
I was too utterly done up to reply, for two days’ violent seasickness rather takes the mental ginger out of one’s make-up. But Fate avenged me in this wise. The door of my state-room opened into the dining-room, and my bed faced the door. Opposite to me was the settee on which Bashforth was coiled, and back of him was the locker for the tinned mushrooms, sardines, lobster, shrimp, caviar, deviled ham, and all the things which well people can eat. This locker had brass handles let into the mahogany, and to these handles the poor fellow clung when the yacht lurched.