"He isn't wuss, is he?" said Mary Jane, with an injured air, adding: "I
reckon it wouldn't take a month to git it out, ef he wus." The girl
thought she had been left out in the cold, and resented her dismissal
from the patient's chamber.

But without according her the slightest possible attention, Mrs.
Parkenson addressed herself to the men. "What do you all think?" she
asked, at last, without expecting or awaiting a reply. "When the boys
were sent out of the room the doctor jest kept starin' at Joe, till I
thought he was goin' to let the poor feller die 'thout doin' the fust
thing for him; so I spoke up, and gave my opinion of the case. Then he
roused himself, for he seemed most as much dazed as Joe was, and began
doin' things to bring the boy to. At last I ses, 'Let's put his feet in
hot water;' and away I started for the bucket; well, it was a long time
before I could git the water to bile, and when I went back to Joe's
room--of course I didn't stop to knock--what do you think I saw? You'll
never guess, not if you tried a hundred years. There sot the doctor on
the bed a huggin' and kissin' Joe, a-cryin' and callin' him his darlin',
his long-lost pet, his angel, and all such nonsense. I thought he was
crazy; the bucket fell out of my hand, and the bilin' water went
streaming over the floor. If Joe hadn't er spoke to me, I dunno what I
wouldn't er done to that doctor. He wouldn't let Joe say much, but he
turned to me and explained that Joe ain't a he at all; he's a
simon-pure, flesh-and-blood woman." She almost screamed the last words
in her eagerness to make the climax effective.

For an instant the air was filled with ejaculations, so varied, so
original, so potent, that Fulton, who was a stranger to the local
phrases, was as much astonished at them as he could have been at the
news of Joe's sex. His head reeled as he turned from one to another.

"No woman could er druv them 'orses over sech roads," at last exclaimed
Captain Cullen, with a highly indignant air; "you'll hexcuse me ef I
refuse to believe such 'umbug."

"Well, ef Joe's a woman, who is she, anyhow?" asked Dick Bowles, with a
triumphant glance at Mary Jane.

"It's a dirty, mean shame, that's wot it is," said that young woman,
angry tears welling up to her eyes.

"Joe's real name is Josephine Marsh," continued Mrs. Parkenson, anxious
to keep the floor as long as possible, "and ef you'll jest listen to me
a minute longer, I'll tell you the hull st