The Greatest Adventure Books - MacLeod Raine Edition. William MacLeod Raine

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СКАЧАТЬ thing for her. Her nerves are overwrought and unstrung. She’ll be all right, once she has her cry out. I’ll drift around, and jolly her along.”

      The doctor presently came up and took a seat beside her.

      “Wha—what do you think, doctor?” she sobbed.

      “Well, I think it’s tarnation hot operating with a big kerosene lamp six inches from your haid,” he said, as he mopped his forehead.

      “I mean—will he—get well?”

      Lee snorted. “Well, I’d be ashamed of him if he didn’t. If he lets a nice, clean, flesh wound put him out of business he don’t deserve to live. Don’t worry any about him, young lady. Say, I wish I had zwei beer right now, Arlie.”

      “You mean it? You’re not just saying it to please me?”

      “Of course, I mean it,” he protested indignantly. “I wish I had three.”

      “I mean, are you sure he’ll get well?” she explained, a faint smile touching her wan face.

      “Yes, I mean that, too, but right now I mean the beer most. Now, honest, haven’t I earned a beer?”

      “You’ve earned a hundred thousand, doc. You’re the kindest and dearest man that ever lived,” she cried.

      “Ain’t that rather a large order, my dear?” he protested mildly. “I couldn’t really use a hundred thousand. And I’d hate to be better than Job and Moses and Pharaoh and them Bible characters. Wouldn’t I have to give up chewing? Somehow, a halo don’t seem to fit my haid. It’s most too bald to carry one graceful.... You may do that again if you want to.” This last, apropos of the promised reward which had just been paid in full.

      Arlie found she could manage a little laugh by this time.

      “Well, if you ain’t going to, we might as well go in and have a look at that false-alarm patient of ours,” he continued. “We’ll have to sit up all night with him. I was sixty-three yesterday. I’m going to quit this doctor game. I’m too old to go racing round the country nights just because you young folks enjoy shooting each other up. Yes, ma’am, I’m going to quit. I serve notice right here. What’s the use of having a good ranch and some cattle if you can’t enjoy them?”

      As the doctor had been serving notice of his intention to quit doctoring for over ten years, Arlie did not take him too seriously. She knew him for what he was—a whimsical old fellow, who would drop in the saddle before he would let a patient suffer; one of the old school, who loved his work but liked to grumble over it.

      “Maybe you’ll be able to take a rest soon. You know that young doctor from Denver, who was talking about settling here——”

      This, as she knew, was a sore point with him. “So you’re tired of me, are you? Want a new-fangled appendix cutter from Denver, do you? Time to shove old Doc Lee aside, eh?”

      “I didn’t say that, doc,” she repented.

      “Huh! You meant it. Wonder how many times he’d get up at midnight and plow through three-foot snow for six miles to see the most ungrateful, squalling little brat——”

      “Was it me, doc?” she ungrammatically demanded.

      “It was you, Miss Impudence.”

      They had reached the door, but she held him there a moment, while she laughed delightedly and hugged him. “I knew it was me. As if we’d let our old doc go, or have anything to do with a young ignoramus from Denver! Didn’t you know I was joking? Of course you did.”

      He still pretended severity. “Oh, I know you. When it comes to wheedling an old fool, you’ve got the rest of the girls in this valley beat to a fare-you-well.”

      “Is that why you always loved me?” she asked, with a sparkle of mischief in her eye.

      “I didn’t love you. I never did. The idea!” he snorted. “I don’t know what you young giddy pates are coming to. Huh! Love you!”

      “I’ll forgive you, even if you did,” she told him sweetly.

      “That’s it! That’s it!” he barked. “You forgive all the young idiots when they do. And they all do—every last one of them. But I’m too old for you, young lady. Sixty-three yesterday. Huh!”

      “I like you better than the younger ones.”

      “Want us all, do you? Young and old alike. Well, count me out.”

      He broke away, and went into the house. But there was an unconquerably youthful smile dancing in his eyes. This young lady and he had made love to each other in some such fashion ever since she had been a year old. He was a mellow and confirmed old bachelor, but he proposed to continue their innocent coquetry until he was laid away, no matter which of the young bucks of the valley had the good fortune to win her for a wife.

      Chapter XI.

       The Fat in the Fire

       Table of Contents

      For two days Fraser remained in the cabin of the stockman Howard, France making it his business to see that the place was never left unguarded for a moment. At the end of that time the fever had greatly abated, and he was doing so well that Doctor Lee decided it would be better to move him to the Dillon ranch for the convenience of all parties.

      This was done, and the patient continued steadily to improve. His vigorous constitution, helped by the healthy, clean, outdoor life he had led, stood him in good stead. Day by day he renewed the blood he had lost. Soon he was eating prodigious dinners, and between meals was drinking milk with an egg beaten in it.

      On a sunny forenoon, when he lay in the big window of the living room, reading a magazine, Arlie entered, a newspaper in her hand. Her eyes were strangely bright, even for her, and she had a manner of repressed excitement, Her face was almost colorless.

      “Here’s some more in the Avalanche about our adventure near Gimlet Butte,” she told him, waving the paper.

      “Nothing like keeping in the public eye,” said Steve, grinning. “I don’t reckon our little picnic at Bald Knob is likely to get in the Avalanche, though. It probably hasn’t any correspondent at Lost Valley. Anyhow, I’m hoping not.”

      “Mr. Fraser, there is something in this paper I want you to explain. But tell me first when it was you shot this man Faulkner. I mean at just what time in the fight.”

      “Why, I reckon it must have been just before I ducked.”

      “That’s funny, too.” She fixed her direct, fearless gaze on him. “The evidence at the coroner’s jury shows that it was in the early part of the fight he was shot, before father and I left you.”

      “No, that couldn’t have been, Miss Arlie, because——”

      “Because——” she prompted, smiling at him in a peculiar manner.

      He СКАЧАТЬ