There is a door left, and at right of big sliding door is
a slanting wall. Door in this is ajar at rise of curtain, and through
this door_ BRADFORD _and_ TONY, _life-savers, are seen bending over a
man's body, attempting to restore respiration. The captain of the
life-savers comes into view outside the big open door, at left; he
appears to have been hurrying, peers in, sees the men, goes quickly to
them._
CAPTAIN: I'll take this now, boys.
BRADFORD: No need for anybody to take it, Capt'n. He was dead when we
picked him up.
CAPTAIN: Dannie Sears was dead when we picked him up. But we brought him
back. I'll go on awhile.
(_The two men who have been bending over the body rise, stretch to
relax, and come into the room._)
BRADFORD: (_pushing back his arms and putting his hands on his chest_)
Work,--tryin to put life in the dead.
CAPTAIN: Where'd you find him, Joe?
BRADFORD: In front of this house. Not forty feet out.
CAPTAIN: What'd you bring him up here for?
(_He speaks in an abstracted way, as if the working part of his mind is
on something else, and in the muffled voice of one bending over._)
BRADFORD: (_with a sheepish little laugh_) Force of habit, I guess. We
brought so many of 'em back up here, (_looks around the room_) And then
it was kind of unfriendly down where he was--the wind spittin' the sea
onto you till he'd have no way of knowin' he was ashore.
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