and knotted and decrepit; her teeth were gone, and she was loathesomely unclean, but he worked over her with rigid patience, not ceasing for a moment, for the Demon was already clutching at him. At dawn a boat pulled up and the woman was lowered into it, still alive.
Then the sun rose, blinding hot, and Jerry paced the deck furiously. The groups of sleepers on deck were disentangling beneath the stinging announcement of the new day, and they scattered in awe before the strange Americano, tugging among them with great steps that were almost leaps. At last a little steamer appeared at the mouth of the river; it slid along on the other side of the breakwater, turned at the end, and chugged alongside the lorcha. It was the doctor's launch.
Burke stepped to the bulwarks and looked down at the boat wallowing in the cross-seas. Huntington was standing on the rail, his right hand against the side of the lorcha, his body giving easily to every shock; and Burke gazed hungry-eyed at his cool, alert demeanour.
"Well, how goes it?" asked the surgeon.
"One case," said Burke, calmly.
"That means five days more. What is it?"
"A woman; she's at the hospital now," he answered, in the same rigid, subdued tone.
