his
fellow tourist.

"If it would not overtax you."

"No, no--I'm strong enough, now. The voyage has put me on my feet
again. Come--let us go."

Jim Grimm took them ashore in the punt; guided them along the winding,
rocky path; led them into the room where Jimmie sat at the window. The
doctor felt of Jimmie's knee, and asked him many questions. Then he
held a whispered consultation with his companion and the schoolmaster;
and of their conversation Jimmie caught such words and phrases as
"slight operation" and "chloroform" and "that table" and "poor light,
but light enough" and "rough and ready sort of work" and "no danger."
Then Jim Grimm was dispatched to the steamer with the doctor's friend;
and when they came back the man carried a bag in his hand. The doctor
asked Jimmie a question, and Jimmie nodded his head. Whereupon, the
doctor called him a brave lad, and sent Jim Grimm out to the kitchen
to keep his wife company for a time, first requiring him to bring a
pail of water and another lamp.

When they called Jim Grimm in again--he knew what they were about, and
it seemed a long, long time before the call came--little Jimmie was
lying on the couch, sick and pale, with his knee tightly bandaged, but
with his eyes glowing.

"Mama! Father!" the boy whispered, exultantly. "They says I'm cured."

"Yes," said the doctor; "he'll be all right, now. His trouble was not
rheumatism. It was caused by a fragment of the bone, broken off at the
knee-joint. At least, that's as plain as I can make it to you. He was
bitten by a dog, was he not? So he says. And he remembers that he felt
a stab of pain in his knee at the time. That or the fall probably
accounts for it. At any rate, I have removed that fragment. He'll be
all right, after a bit. I've told the schoolmaster how to take care of
him, and I'll leave some medicine, and--well--he'll soon be all
right."

When the doctor was about to step from the punt to the steamer's
ladder, half an hour later, Jim Grimm held up a letter to him.

"'Tis for you, sir," he said.

"What's this?" the doctor demanded.

"'Tis for you to keep, sir," Jim answered, with dignity. "'Tis the
money for the work you done."

"Money!" cried the doctor. "Why, really," he stammered, "I--you see,
this is my vacation--and I----"

"I 'low, sir," said Jim, quietly, "that you'll 'blige me."

"Well, well!" exclaimed the doctor, being wise, "that I will!"

Jimmie Grimm got well long before it occurred