"Have you any broken bones?" asked Lucy.
"I don't know. I can't feel much."
"Are you in pain?"
"Hardly. I feel sort of thick."
Lucy, being an intelligent girl, born in the desert and used to its needs, had not often encountered a situation with which she was unable to cope.
"Let me feel if you have any broken bones.... THAT arm isn't broken, I'm positive."
The rider smiled faintly again. How he stared with his strained, dark eyes! His face showed ghastly through the thin, soft beard and the tan. Lucy found his right arm badly bruised, but not broken. She made sure his collar-bones and shoulder-blades were intact. Broken ribs were harder to locate; still, as he did not feel pain from pressure, she concluded there were no fractures there. With her assistance he moved his legs, proving no broken bones there.
"I'm afraid it's my—spine," he said.
"But you raised your head once," she replied. "If your back was—was broken or injured you couldn't raise your head."
"So I couldn't. I guess I'm just knocked out. I was—pretty weak before Wildfire knocked me—off Nagger."