nd tin plate of the soup, and he could feel life
and strength flowing into every vein.

"How did I get here, Al?" he asked.

"That's a pretty hard question to answer," replied Albert,
smiling and still filling the room with his big voice. "You were
partly brought, partly led, partly pushed, you partly walked,
partly jumped, and partly crawled, and there were even little
stretches of the march when you were carried on somebody's
shoulder, big and heavy as you are. Dick, I don't know any name
for such a mixed gait. Words fail me."

Dick smiled, too.

"Well, no matter how I got here, it's certain that I'm here," he
said, looking around contentedly.

"Absolutely sure, and it's equally as sure that you've been here
five days. I, the nurse, I, the doctor, and I, the spectator,
can vouch for that. There were times when I had to hold you in
your bed, there were times when you were so hot with fever that I
expected to see you burst into a mass of red and yellow flames,
and most all the while you talked with a vividness and
imagination that I've never known before outside of the Arabian
Nights. Dick, where did you get the idea about a Sioux Indian
following you all the way from the Atlantic to the Pacific, with
stops every half hour for you and him to fight?"

"It's true," said Dick, and then he told the eager boy the story of
his escape from the Sioux band, the terrible pursuit, the
storm, and his dreadful wandering.

"It was wonderful luck that I met you, Al, old fellow," he said
devoutly.

"Not luck exactly," said Albert. "You were coming back to the
valley on our old trail, and, as I had grown very anxious about
you, I was out on the same path to see if I could see any sign of
you. It was natural that we should meet, but I think that, after
all, Dick, Providence had the biggest hand in it."

"No doubt," said Dick, and after a moment's pause he added, "Did
it snow much up here?"

"But lightly. The clouds seem to have avoided these mountains.
It was only from your delirium that I gathered the news of the
great storm on the plains. Now, I think you've talked enough for
an invalid. Drop you head back on that buffalo robe and go to
sleep again."

It seemed so amazing to Dick ever to receive orders from Albert
that he obeyed promptly, closed his eyes, and in five minutes was
in sound slumber.

Albert hovered about the room, until he saw that Dick was asleep
and breathing strongly and regularly. Then h