with his book and
lamp. He seemed to be shivering a little, and I saw him cast a longing
eye at his couch. But the Virginian followed him even as he blew out the
now quite superfluous light. They made a noticeable couple in their
underclothes; the Virginian with his lean racehorse shanks running to a
point at his ankle, and the Doctor with his stomach and his fat
sedentary calves.

"You'll be going to breakfast and the ladies, seh, pretty soon," said
the Virginian, with a chastened voice. "But I'll worry through the day
somehow without y'u. And to-night you can turn your wolf loose on me
again."

Once more it was no use. My face was deep in the pillow, but I made
sounds as of a hen who has laid an egg. It broke on the Doctor with a
total instantaneous smash, quite like an egg.

He tried to speak calmly. "This is a disgrace. An infamous disgrace.
Never in my life have I--" Words forsook him, and his face grew redder.
"Never in my life--" He stopped again, because, at the sight of him
being dignified in his red drawers, I was making the noise of a dozen
hens. It was suddenly too much for the Virginian. He hastened into his
room, and there sank on the floor with his head in his hands. The Doctor
immediately slammed the door upon him, and this rendered me easily fit
for a lunatic asylum. I cried into my pillow, and wondered if the Doctor
would come and kill me. But he took no notice of me whatever. I could
hear the Virginian's convulsions through the door, and also the Doctor
furiously making his toilet within three feet of my head; and I lay
quite still with my face the other way, for I was really afraid to look
at him. When I heard him walk to the door in his boots, I ventured to
peep; and there he was, going out with his bag in his hand. As I still
continued to lie, weak and sore, and with a mind that had ceased all
operation, the Virginian's door opened. He was clean and dressed and
decent, but the devil still sported in his eye. I have never seen a
creature more irresistibly handsome.

Then my mind worked again. "You've gone and done it," said I. "He's
packed his valise. He'll not sleep here."

The Virginian looked quickly out of the door. "Why, he's leavin' us!" he
exclaimed. "Drivin' away right now in his little old buggy!" He turned
to me, and our eyes met solemnly over this large fact. I thought that I
perceived the faintest tincture of dismay in the features of Judge
Henry's new, responsible, trusty foreman