re.

"The doctor will want to know how you stood your first outing," she
said, smiling.

Pete wriggled the little glass thermometer round in his mouth until it
stuck up at an assertive angle, as some men hold a cigar, and glanced
mischievously at his nurse. "Why don't you light it?" he mumbled.

Doris tried not to laugh as she took the thermometer, glanced at it,
and charted a slight rise in the patient's temperature.

"Puttin' it in that glass of water to cool it off?" queried Pete.

She smiled as she carefully charted the temperature line.

"Kin I look at it?" queried Pete.

She gave the chart to him and he studied it frowningly. "What's this
here that looks like a range of mountains ?" he asked.

"Your temperature." And she explained the meaning of the wavering line.

"Gee! Back here I sure was climbin' the high hills! That's a
interestin' tally-sheet."

Pete saw a peculiar expression in her gray eyes. It was as though she
were searching for something beneath the surface of his superficial
humor; for she knew that there was something that he wanted to
say--something entirely alien to these chance pleasantries. She all
but anticipated his question.

"Would you mind tellin' me somethin'?" he queried abruptly.

"No. If there is anything that I can tell you."

"I was wonderin' who was payin' for this here private room--and reg'lar
nurse. I been sizin' up things--and folks like me don't get such fancy
trimmin's without payin'."

"Why--it was your--your father."

Pete sat up quickly. "My father! I ain't got no father. I--I reckon
somebody got things twisted."

"Why, the papers"--and Doris bit her lip--"I mean Miss Howard, the
nurse who was here that night . . ."

"When The Spider cashed in?"

Doris nodded.

"The Spider wasn't my father. But I guess mebby that nurse thought he
was, and got things mixed."

"The house-doctor would not have had him brought up here if he had
thought he was any one else."

"So The Spider said he was my father--so he could git to see me!" Pete
seemed to be talking to himself. "Was he the friend you was tellin' me
called regular?"

"Yes. I don't know, but I think he paid for your room and the
operation."

"Don't they make those operations on folks, anyhow, if they ain't got
money?"

"Yes, but in your case it was a very difficult and dangerous operation.
I saw that Dr. Andover hardly wanted to take the risk."

"So The Spider pays for everything!" P