Mrs. Elmer Spiker was standing by him; the young doctor was moving
about the room, apparently very busy; Mrs. Tip Pulsifer was peeping in
at the door.

"Didn't you know," said Weston, "how I'd shot myself all to pieces, and
how there's a live fox in the hollows across the ridge?"

"Mark told me of it," answered the innocent Tim, "and I'm glad to find
it is not serious. They were worried at the store. Mr. Mills was for
coming right away, but we got word you were better, and he thought I
should run up anyway for a day to see if we could do anything. I'm to
go back to-morrow."

"It was good of you to come," Weston said, "but there is nothing to be
done. Just tell Mills the whole valley is nursing me; tell him that
I've one nurse alone who is worth a score." Mrs. Spiker looked very
conscious, but Weston smiled at Mary. Then he quickly added: "Tell him
that Mrs. Bolum and Mrs. Spiker and Mrs. Pulsifer--" he paused to make
sure that none was missed--"and Mark here are a hospital corps, taken
singly or in a body."

"I've told him that already," said Tim. "He knows everybody in Six
Stars, I guess, and he says as soon as you get well and come back to
the office, he will take a holiday himself, fox hunting."

"Poor little Colonel!" murmured Weston. "He'll have a melancholy
career. And Mary, too, she'll----"

"But it was when I told him about Mary that he made up his mind to
come," Tim said.