"Put him on my bunk," Dr. Gordon told them; and, very frightened, they laid him there.
The China Doll's eyes opened, and he looked round not knowing what had happened. "Don't play ass tricks; get out of it; leave him here!" Dr. Gordon ordered gently; and they trooped away, dragging the stretcher along after them—rather sobered for the moment—to get a lecture from the Sub and Uncle Podger when they crowded into the gun-room and told what had happened.
In half an hour the China Doll was back again—none the worse, except that the pink had not all come back in his doll's face—rather pleased with himself than otherwise.
That happened on a Wednesday afternoon. On the Thursday, orders came by wireless for the Achates to rendezvous off the Gulf of Smyrna; and as dawn broke on Friday, the 5th March, she found herself half-way between the islands of Mytilene and Chios.
No one knew what was going to happen except, perhaps, Captain Macfarlane. "And he's probably forgotten," the irrepressible Orphan said.
This young gentleman was on watch with his guns, under the fore bridge, when the rendezvous was reached, and spotted some puffs of smoke rising above the horizon to the north'ard. Presently he saw through his glasses the masts of two battleships.
"What are they?" he asked excitedly of one of his petty officers, who was training a gun in their direction and looking through the telescopic sight.
"I know them, sir!" he cried. "The Swiftsure and Triumph. Look at their cranes—boat cranes—amidships, sir; there can't be any mistaking them, sir."
As the Orphan had never seen them before, he had to take his word for it.
"Trawlers behind 'em, sir—half a dozen or more," the petty officer called out.