shoulder went back.

"That's going to be a bit sore for a while," he said, "but you ought to
be mighty thankful you put it out of joint."

"Why?"

"You'd have broken something instead, if it hadn't slipped," was the
reply; "you must have hit that door an awful welt, for you're bruised on
that side from the shoulder down. Just black and blue with a few touches
of reddish purple. You're an impressionist sketch on the bruise line, I
tell you! But there's nothing serious there. Using your carcass for a
battering ram is apt to make a few contusions, and you've done well to
get off so easily."

"I had to get into that deck-house. I wanted to be sure no one was
there."

"It took more than wanting," the surgeon said, "you must have been just
about crazy. A man's got to be nearly in the state of a maniac before
he'll hurl himself against an iron door like that without thinking of
the consequences to himself. You were out of your head with pain, Swift,
the way it looks to me, you'd never have tried it in your sober senses."

"Glad I got crazy, then, Doctor," said Eric, gingerly moving himself a
fraction of an inch, but wincing as he did so; "if I hadn't, I'd have
failed."

"Well," the surgeon said, rising to go, "I think the fates have been
mighty good to you, Swift, if you ask me. There's many a man has the
daring and the pluck to do what you've done, but never has the chance.
You had your chance. And you made good!"

As a matter of course, Eric's bunk became a center round which the other
cadets gravitated, and his classmates did everything they could to make
things as pleasant for him as possible. He was glad, none the less, when
two or three days later, he was told that he might go up on deck.

The boy was scarcely aware of it, but with his shoulder and arm bandaged
and both feet heavily swathed, he made rather a pathetic sight, which
his white and drawn face accentuated. A hammock had been rigged up on
the sunny side of the deck and to this he was carried.

Just as soon as he appeared on deck, for an instant there was a
cessation of all work that was going on. Then, suddenly, started by no
one knew whom, from the throat of every man on deck came a burst of
cheers. It was the tribute of gallant men to a gallant lad.

Weakly, and with a lump in his throat, Eric saluted with his left hand,
in reply.

It was an infraction of discipline, no doubt, but the officer in charge
of the deck ignored it. Indeed, he was af