"I can't help what they're due to," sniffed Mrs. King. "The point is that Bob might get knocked out and die."
"Nonsense, Mother. You would not worry if you understood more about it. Besides, should a man get a shock, if you go promptly to work over him and keep at it long enough, you can almost always bring him back to consciousness. They do just about the same things to restore him that they do for a person that's been drowned. The aim is to make him breathe. If you can get him to, he will probably live. Of course, though, you have to break the circuit first."
"The circuit?"
"Stop the current that is going through his body," explained Walter.
"But how can you?"
"Bob told me how. He saw a chap knocked out once and helped fix him up. You had to be awfully careful about moving him away from the apparatus, Bob said, or you might get a shock yourself. They took a dry stick because it was a nonconductor of electricity, you know, and rolled the man over to one side, so he was out of reach of the wires. Had you covered your hands with dry cloth you could have moved him, too; rubber gloves are best but Bob did not happen to have any handy at the minute. So they poked the fellow out of the way with the stick, turned him over on his back, loosened his collar and clothing, and went to work on him. You know how they always roll up a coat or something and stuff it under drowned persons' shoulders to throw their head backward? Well, they did that; and afterward they began to move his arms up and down to make him breathe. The idea is to depress and expand the chest. We learned it in our 'first aid' class. Of course there are lots of things you have to do besides, and if you can get a doctor he will know of others that are better still. But Bob said the chief point was not to get discouraged and give up. Sometimes people die just because the folks fussing over them do not keep at it long enough. They get tired and when they see no results they decide it is no use and stop trying. You ought to work an hour anyhow, repeating the exercises at the rate of sixteen times a minute, Bob said. Then, if the poor chap does not come to, you can at least feel you have done all you can."
"Ugh! It makes me shiver to think of it!"
"You didn't shiver when Minnie Carlton fell off the float and almost got drowned," remarked Walter significantly.
"I had too much to think of," was Mrs. King's laconic reply.
"It was the fussing you did over her that saved her life."