about what? He
did not quite know, for he felt that though he was wide-awake he could
not think as he should. It was as if his apparatus was half asleep.

But the owner of the eyes did not say anything, only drew back and
disappeared, and as he did so, Fitz found that he could think, for he
was asking himself how it was that the fellow who had been looking at
him had disappeared.

He came to the conclusion directly afterwards that it was a dream. Then
he knew it was not, for he heard a gruff voice that seemed to come
through the boards say--

"All right, Poole. Tumble up directly. What say?"

"He's awake, father, and looks as if he had come to himself."

"Eh? Oh, that's good news. Come and see him directly."

Now Fitz began to think fast, but still not about himself.

"Father, eh?" he thought. "Whose father is he? He said he was coming
to see some one directly. Now I wonder who that may be."

That was as much as Fitz Burnett could get through upon this occasion,
for thinking had made his eyelids heavy, and the bright flashing water
at which he gazed seemed to grow dull and play upon the boards of his
berth just over his head and close at hand.

From growing dull, this rippling water grew very dark indeed, and then
for some time there was nothing more but sleep--beautiful sleep,
Nature's great remedy and cure for a heavy blow upon the head that has
been very close upon fracturing the bone, but which in this case fell so
far short that Fitz Burnett had only had severe concussion of the brain.

CHAPTER FOUR.

ANOTHER BOY.

It was either sunrise or sunset, for the cabin was full of a rich warm
glow, and Fitz lay upon his back listening to a peculiar sound which
sounded to him like _fuzz, whuzz, thrum_.

He did not attempt to turn his head for some moments, though he wanted
to know what made those sounds, for during some little time he felt too
lazy to stir, and at last he turned his head gently and remembered the
eyes that had looked at him once, and recalled the face now bent down
over something before him from which came those peculiar sounds.

Fitz felt interested, and watched the busy ringers, the passing and
re-passing needle, and the manipulation of a mesh, for some time before
he spoke.

"How quick and clever he is!" he thought, and then almost unconsciously
a word slipped out.

"Netting?" he said.

Needle, string and mesh were thrown down, and Fitz's fellow-occupier of
the cabin