The Countess counted off "chain 'leven" and began in a constrained tone,
such as some well-meaning people employ against helpless sick folk.

"How're yuh feelin' now? Yuh want a drink, or anything?"

Chip did not want a drink, and he felt all right, he guessed.

The Countess thought to cheer him a little.

"Well, I do think it's too bad yuh got t' lay here all through this
purty spring weather. If it had been in the winter, when it's cold
and stormy outside, a person wouldn't mind it s' much. I know yuh
must feel purty blew over it, fer yuh was always sech a hand t' be
tearin' around the country on the dead run, seems like. I always
told Mary 't you'n Weary always rode like the sheriff wa'nt more'n
a mile b'hind yuh. An' I s'pose you feel it all the more, seein'
the round-up's jest startin' out. Weary said yuh was playin' big
luck, if yuh only knew enough t' cash in yer chips at the right time,
but he's afraid yuh wouldn't be watching the game close enough an' ud
lose yer pile. I don't know what he was drivin' at, an' I guess he
didn't neither. It's too bad, anyway. I guess yuh didn't expect t'
wind up in bed when yuh rode off up the hill. But as the sayin' is:
'Man plans an' God displans,' an' I guess it's so. Here yuh are,
laid up fer the summer, Dell says--the las' thing on earth, I guess,
that yuh was lookin' fer. An' yuh rode buckin' bronks right along,
too. I never looked fer Whizzer t' buck yuh off, I must say--yuh got
the name uh bein' sech a good rider, too. But they say 't the pitcher
't's always goin' t' the well is bound t' git busted sometime, an' I
guess your turn come t' git busted. Anyway--"