wanted to
take the cuss off. Honest to gran'ma--"

"If you know anything at all about such things, you must know what fever
means in such a case. And, recollect, it's going to be quite a while
before a doctor can get here."

"Oh, I'll be careful. Maybe I did throw it purty strong; I won't, no
more." Big Medicine s meekness was not the least amazing incident of
the day. He was a big-hearted soul under his bellow and bluff, and his
sympathy for Happy Jack struck deep. He went back walking on his toes,
and he stood so that his sturdy body shaded Happy Jack's face from the
sun, and he did not open his mouth for another word until Irish and Jack
Bates came rattling up with the spring wagon hurriedly transformed with
mattress, pillows and blankets into an ambulance.

They had been thoughtful to a degree. They brought with them a jug of
water and a tin cup, and they gave Happy Jack a long, cooling drink of
it and bathed his face before they lifted him into the wagon. And of all
the hands that ministered to his needs, the hands of Big Medicine were
the eagerest and gentlest, and his voice was the most vibrant with
sympathy; which was saying a good deal.

CHAPTER XVI. The End of the Dots

Slim may not have been more curious than his fellows, but he was perhaps
more single-hearted in his loyalty to the outfit. To him the shooting
of Happy Jack, once he felt assured that the wound was not necessarily
fatal, became of secondary importance. It was all in behalf of the
Flying U; and if the bullet which laid Happy Jack upon the ground was
also the means of driving the hated Dots from that neighborhood, he
felt, in his slow, phlegmatic way, that it wasn't such a catastrophe as
some of the others seemed to think. Of course, he wouldn't want Happy
to die; but he didn't believe, after all, that Happy was going to do
anything like that. Old Patsy knew a lot about sickness and wounds. (Who
can cook for a cattle outfit, for twenty years and more, and not know a
good deal of hurts?) Old Patsy had looked Happy over carefully, and had
given a grin and a snort.

"Py cosh, dot vos lucky for you, alreatty," he had pronounced. "So you
don't git plood-poisonings, mit fever, you be all right pretty soon.
You go to shleep, yet. If fix you oop till der dochtor he cooms. I seen
fellers shot plumb through der middle off dem, und git yell. You ain't
shot so bad. You go to shleep."

So, his immediate fears relieved, Slim's slow mind had swung b