Page:Peak and Prairie (1894).pdf/108

 On the table where she had placed the lamp was a tiny bottle marked "chloral." There was also a glass of water upset upon the table. Stanwood's clothing and other belongings lay scattered upon the floor. She had never before seen his room disordered. Well! he was ill, and here she was to take care of him.

He was not talking so fast now, but what he said was even more incoherent. The light and the presence of another person in the room seemed to confuse and trouble him. She took his hand and felt the pulse. The hand was hot, and grasped hers convulsively. She put his coat over his shoulders, and then she sat with her arm about him, and gradually he stopped talking, and turned his face to hers with a questioning look.

"What can I do for you, papa? Tell me if there is anything I can do for you."

"Do for me?" he repeated.

"Yes, dear. Is there nothing I can do, nothing I can get for you?"

"Get for me?"

He drew off from her a little, and a crafty look, utterly foreign to the man's nature, came into the tense face.

"I don't suppose you've got a drop of whisky!" he said insinuatingly.