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Frank retreated without a word, and on reaching the house found that Johnson had been aft and procured about two ounces of butter from the steward wherewith to lubricate their biscuits, and with this and the coffee they made what breakfast they could.

Having appeased their hunger somewhat, they made an attempt to help the sick boy for their own sakes. They dragged him out of his bunk and wiped him down roughly, although he implored them to let him alone; then they did their best to straighten up the extraordinary confusion of his bunk, unrolled his bedding and laid him on it. It was all they knew how to do, and anyhow their time was precious. Frank made a clearance of his bunk too, and some sort of a bed for himself with a curious angry feeling that he ought not to have been allowed to be so ignorant of the commonest duties of life, and that anyhow some one ought to show him how here.

What to do with his many belongings he did not know, there were no lockers, no shelves, just a few nails driven into the bulkheads, and his chest, from having been tousled over in a wild hurried search for things, was so full that it wouldn’t shut. At last he said despairingly to Johnson, “I wish I only knew where to put my things, there’s no drawers, no cupboards, and I never put anything away at home anyhow.”