Part 11 (1/2)
”What's been the matter--gen'ly speaking?”
”You were hurt, don't you remember? Something like wound fever set in.
The alt.i.tude is bad for fevers. You have had a pretty close call.”
”Been here all the time?”
”Have I been here?--yes.”
”'Lone?”
”With you. How is your chest? Does it hurt you still when you breathe?”
The sick man filled his lungs experimentally. ”Something busted inside, I guess,” he panted. ”'Tain't no killing matter, though.”
Nourishment, in a tin cup, warm from the fire was offered him, refused with a gesture, and firmly urged upon him. This necessitated another rest. It was long before he spoke again--out of some remoter train of thought apparently.
”Family all in New York?”
”My family? They were at Bisuka when I left them.”
”You don't _live_ West!”
”No. I was born in the West, though. Idaho is my native state.”
The patient fell to whimpering suddenly like a hurt child. He drew up the blanket to cover his face. Paul, interpreting this as a signal for more nourishment, brought the sad decoction,--rinds of dried beef cooked with rice in snow water.
”Guess that'll do, thank ye. My tongue feels like an old buckskin glove.”
”When I was a little fellow,” said the nurse, beguiling the patient while he tucked the spoonfuls down, ”I was like you: I wouldn't take what the doctor ordered, and they used to pretend I must take it for the others of the family,--a kind of vicarious milk diet, or gruel, or whatever it was. 'Here's a spoonful for mother, poor mother,' they would say; and of course it couldn't be refused when mother needed it so much.
'And now one for Chrissy'”--
”Who?”
”My sister, Christine. And then I'd take one for 'uncle' and one for each of the servants; and the cupful would go down to the health of the household, and I the dupe of my sympathies! Now you are taking this for me, because it's nicer to be shut up here with a live man than a dead one; and we haven't the conveniences for a first-cla.s.s funeral.”
”You never took a spoonful for 'father,'--eh?”
Paul answered the question with gravity. ”No. We never used that name in common.”
”Dead was he?”
”I will tell you some time. Better try to sleep now.”
Paul returned the saucepan to the fire, after piecing out its contents with water, and retired out of his patient's sight.
Again came a murmur, chiefly unintelligible, from the bunk.
”Did you ask for anything?”
The sick man heaved a worried sigh. ”See what a mis'rable presumptuous piece of work!” he muttered, addressing the logs overhead. ”But that Clauson--he wa'n't no more fit to guide ye than to go to heaven!