"That's just like you!" burst out Kent. "You never tell when you get
hurt, for fear other folks'll be bothered."

The little woman crept back into the kitchen and went quietly about her
work.

The doctor soon came, and in a brief time the artery was taken up and
the hand deftly bandaged.

"Which of you fellows made that tourniquet with the fork?" the doctor
asked brusquely.

Kent pointed proudly to Jot.

"Oh, it was you, was it? Well, you did a mighty good thing for your
brother there. He'd have lost plenty of blood before I got here if you
hadn't."

The whole of that day and the next night the boys remained at "Jim's."
The doctor had positively objected to Old Tilly's going on without a
day's quiet.

And the little woman--the little woman would not hear of anything else
but their staying! She had been out to the barn with Jim and seen the
blackened corner. After that she hovered over the three boys like a hen
over her chickens.

"For--to think, Jim!--it was saving our home he got hurt!" she cried.

The boys talked things over together, and Kent and Jot were for turning