There was a peculiar dreamy look in the injured boy's eyes, as he turned
them from his father to Dean and back.
"Here, let me come," cried the doctor. "Let him sit down on that
stone--feel faint, my lad?"
"No-o," faltered Mark; "only strange and queer. Is it a poisonous
snake?"
"I don't know. I hope not," said the doctor. "I only had a glimpse of
it, and it's gone. Where did you feel the prick?"
"In this finger. No, no--don't touch it!"
"Nonsense! Be a man. I am not going to hurt you. Did either of you
get a good sight of the snake?"
"I did, sir," said Buck, "and it must have been a poisonous one."
"Why must it?" said the doctor sharply.
"Because the niggers run away as soon as they saw it, sir," said Dan.
"Look at them up yonder;" and he pointed to where the two blacks were
perched on the top of the wall. "They know, sir."
"Oh, yes, they know a great deal," said the doctor, shortly, as he
busied himself pressing the sides of a little speck of a wound which
pierced the boy's skin, now with one nail, now with both at the same
time, and making Mark wince.
"You are hurting him a good deal," said Sir James.
"Do him good," said the doctor, shortly, "and take off the faintness.
Now, Buck, I want to make sure," continued the doctor, who from the
smattering of knowledge he had obtained from reading was looked up to by
everyone present as being master of the situation in the emergency.
"What sort of a head had the snake?"
"Nasty-looking head, sir! and it kept sticking out its sting with two
pyntes to it."
"Pooh!" ejaculated the doctor, as he busied himself over the tiny
puncture. "But was it a broad spade-shaped head?"
"Spade-shaped, sir? What, square? Oh, no, it warn't that."
"Bah!" ejaculated the doctor. "I meant spade-shaped--the spade that you
see on a pack of cards."
"I couldn't be sure, sir. It was so quick, you see. But I should say
it was more like a diamond."
"Beg pardon, sir," cried Dan; "I think that the place ought to be
sucked. I'll do it."
"Thanks. Good lad," said the doctor. "You are quite right;" and he
gave the little sailor a quick nod as he took the advice himself, held
Mark's index finger to his lips, and drew hard at the tiny puncture,
trying to draw out any noxious matter that might have been left in the
wound, and removing the finger from his lips from time to time to rid
his mouth of any poison.
"Here, you, Dean," he said, upon one of these occasions, "slip that silk
handkerchief from your neck, twist it a little, and now tie it round his
arm just above the elbow. That's right--no, no, don't play with it--tie
it as tightly as you can--never mind hurting him. I want to stop the
circulation."
He placed his lips to the wound again and drew hard; then speaking once
more--
"Harder. Now, you, Sir James; you are stronger. Tighten the ligature
as much as you can. You, Dean, put your hand in my breast-pocket--
pocket-book. Open it and take out a lancet."
"There isn't one here, sir."
"Bah! No; I remember. Get out your knife, my boy."
"There's a lancet in that, sir, you know, and a corkscrew, and tweezers
too. Here's the lancet, sir;" and the boy drew out the little
tortoiseshell instrument slipped into the handle of the handsome knife
which his uncle had presented him with before the start.
"Now, then, Mark; I am going to operate."
"Very well, sir," said Mark, calmly enough. "You had better take the
finger off close down to the joint, for fear the poison has got as far
as that."
The doctor smiled.
"Is it absolutely necessary?" said Sir James anxiously.
The doctor gave him a peculiar look which Dean looked upon as horribly
grim.
"I see two chaps who were bit by snakes out in 'Stralia, gentlemen,"
said Dan, "and one of them died; and they said that if there had been
someone there who had known how to cut his arm off so as he shouldn't
bleed to death, it would have saved his life."
"Kept the pison from running right through him, mate," growled Buck,
with a look of sympathy at the injured lad.
"That's so, messmate," continued Dan; "but they sucked t'other one where
he was stung for ever so long. He got better."
"Now, then," said the doctor sharply, "no more anecdotes, if you
please;" and as he spoke he made a slight cut across the speck-like
puncture with the keen-pointed lancet, so that the blood started out in
a pretty good-sized bead.
"Hurt you, my lad?" he asked, while Dean looked on in horror.
"Just a little," said Mark. "But hadn't you better do more than that?"
"No," said the doctor coolly. "There is a little poison there, and the
bleeding will relieve it. It has begun to fester."
"What, so soon?" said Sir James.
"Yes," was the calm reply. "Now, Dean, I must come to you for another
of your surgical instruments--the tweezers."
"Yes," cried the boy excitedly; and in his hurry he broke his thumb nail
in drawing the tweezers out of the haft of the knife, for the instrument
was a little rusted in.
"Now," said the doctor, as he pressed the two little spring sides of the
tweezers right down into the cut and got hold of something.
"Oh! hurts!" cried Mark.
"Yes, but it would have hurt more if I had taken your finger off," said
the doctor, laughing. "There we are," he continued, as he drew out a
sharp glistening point and held it up in the sun. "There's your snake
sting, my boy, and the little cut will soon heal up. There, suck the
wound a little yourself, and draw out the poison."
"But, doctor," cried Sir James, "surely a venomous snake injects the
poison through hollow fangs. Are you sure that that is a tooth?"
"No, sir," said the doctor. "That is the point of one of those
exceedingly sharp thorns that we are so infested with here. Look at
it;" and he held out the tweezers for everyone to examine the point.
"It's a false alarm, Mark, my lad. I can see no sign of any snake
bite."
"But I felt it!" cried Mark, as he stared at the thorn.
"I can't see any mark, and if the snake did bite it was only a prick
with one of its tiny sharp teeth. Look, Sir James; you see there's no
sign of any swelling, and no discoloration such as I believe would very
soon appear after the injection of venom."
"But what's that?" said Sir James anxiously, pointing.
"That? That's a thorn prick," said the doctor.
"Well, but that?"
"That's the stain from some crushed leaf."
"Well, that, then?" cried Sir James angrily at finding the doctor so
ready to give explanations to his doubts.
"That's another prick."
"Tut, tut, tut! Well, that?"
"That's a scratch."
"Well, that, then?" cried Sir James, almost fiercely. "There's the
discoloration you said would appear."
"Oh," said the doctor, laughing; "that's dirt!"
Sir James made no answer, but snatching a handkerchief from his pocket
he moistened a corner between his lips, passed it over the clear skin of
his son's wrist, and the dark mark passed away.
"Here, Dean," said the doctor, "hands up! That's right; draw back your
shirt sleeve."
The boy obeyed.
"Look here, Sir James," said the doctor, and he pointed with the thorn
he held between the tweezers. "You see that--and that--and that?"
"Oh, those are only pricks I got in the bushes, sir, the other day,"
said Dean sharply.
"Yes, I see," said the doctor, "and you had better let me operate upon
this one. It has begun to fester a little too."
As he spoke the doctor pressed the little dark spot which showed beneath
the boy's white skin.
"Oh, you hurt!" cried Dean, flinching. "Yes, there's a thorn in there,
and I see there's another half way up your arm, Mark, my lad. You had
better try to pick that out with a needle. It is all a false alarm, Sir
James, I am thankful to say. Snake bites are very horrible, but you
must recollect that the great majority of these creatures are not
furnished with poison fangs. I was in doubt, myself, at first, but the
fact that the puncture was so large, and unaccompanied by another--
venomous snakes being furnished with a pair of fangs that they have the
power to erect--was almost enough to prove to me that what we saw was
only produced by a thorn."
"I beg your pardon, doctor," said Sir James, grasping him by the hand.
"I could not help thinking you were dreadfully callous and cool over
what has been agony to me. I am afraid I was horribly disbelieving and
annoyed."
"Don't apologise, sir," replied the doctor. "I did seem to treat it all
very cavalierly, but I had a reason for so doing. I wanted to put heart
into my patient to counteract the remarks which were being made about
snake bites and treating them by amputation. Now, Mark, do you feel
well enough to handle your gun again?"
"Oh, yes, quite," cried the boy, starting up; and getting possession of
his rifle he raised it up, fired the remaining cartridge, and then
opening the breech held it up, to treat it as a lorgnette, looking
through the barrels.
"There are no snakes in here now," said the boy, speaking quite
cheerfully, "but the night damp has made a lot of little specks of
rust."
"Let me clean it, sir," cried Dan. "I'll wash out the barrels and give
it a good 'iling."
"Yes, do," said Mark, who began to suck his finger.
"Why, I say, Mark," cried Dean, "I never thought of it before: that's
the finger you asked me to get the thorn out of that day after we got
back from my slip into that hole."
"Eh?" exclaimed Mark, looking at him doubtfully.
"Why, of course! Don't you remember?"
"No," said Mark. "I feel quite stupid this morning, after this."
"Try to think, my boy," cried Sir James impatiently. "It would set all
our minds at rest."
"Why, to be sure, Mark," cried his cousin. "Don't you remember? You
said you could not do it yourself because it was in your right finger
and it was such a bungle to handle a pin with your left hand."
Mark stared at his cousin for a few moments, and gazed round at those
who were waiting to hear him speak; and then a gleam of light seemed to
dart from his eyes as he cried excitedly, "Why, of course! I remember
now; and you couldn't get it out with the pin, and you said it was a
good job too, for a brass pin was a bad thing to use, and that we would
leave it till we could get a big needle from Dan, such as he used for
mending his stockings."
"Hear, hear!" cried the little sailor, by way of corroboration as to his
handling of a needle.
"And then we forgot all about it," cried Dean.
"Yes," cried Mark. "Oh, I say, I am sorry! What a fuss I have been
making about nothing!"