“There was the sick man I told you about, little miss. He was a wonder, that feller! Cheerful—brave—Don’t often see a feller like him. Jokin’ to the last, he was. He didn’t want to go in the purser’s boat, if there was more women or children to go.
“We told him all the women folk had left the ship. So, then, he let me lower him down into the purser’s boat after his wife. And that boat had as good a chance as we had, I tell you,” repeated the seaman in quite an excited manner.
“Oh, dear me!” exclaimed Carolyn May. “My papa and mamma might have been just like that,” she added. “Of course, we don’t know whether they got off the steamship at all.”
“Aye, aye!” the sailor said. “Pretty tough on you, little miss.”
Miss Amanda had come back into the room, and she stood listening to the old man’s talk. She said:
“Carolyn May, I think you had better go downstairs now. We mustn’t let our patient talk too much. It won’t be good for him.”
So Carolyn May shook hands with the old sailor and started downstairs ahead of Miss Amanda. The latter lingered a moment to ask a question.
“What was the name of the steamship you were wrecked on?” she asked. “The one you were just telling about.”
“She was the Dunraven—the Dunraven, of the Cross and Crescent Line,” replied the mariner. “Didn’t I tell you that before, ma’am?”