Page:Barbour--For the freedom from the seas.djvu/153

 it only I was in my bunk, and it's a top one, and the knocks were right alongside my head."

"Yes, and he fell out in a hurry, sir!" chuckled the man called Terry. "He did it in the quickest time I ever saw!"

"So would you have if you'd heard it," growled Clancy. "I thought sure we were making friends with a floating mine and I didn't want to be so close to it."

"Don't blame you!" laughed the lieutenant. "Lucky for this man we're a single-huller and that you heard it, though. What's your name?"

"Troy, sir; seaman, second class, Reserve."

"Reserve, eh? Well, there's hope for the Reserves if they're all like you, Troy. You have luck, my boy, and that's better than being born rich. Mix him up some gruel in an hour or so, Cook, and make him take it. We'll put you aboard your ship the first chance there is, Troy, but you'll have to make the best of as for awhile."

"Thank you, sir. I—I'd like to—that is, I mean I'm awfully grateful to you for taking care of me, sir. I guess I'd have been a goner by this time if you hadn't pulled me aboard."

"I guess you would have," rejoined the lieutenant dryly. "Don't see how you stuck it out as long as you did. You'll never die by drowning, 128