Page:Ralph Connor - The Sky Pilot.djvu/102

98 Bruce fell asleep. Then The Duke lifted himself up, and facing the doctor, said in his coolest tone:

"Your words are more true than opportune, doctor. Your patient will need all your attention. As for my morals, Mr. Moore kindly entrusts himself with the care of them." This with a bow toward The Pilot.

"I wish him joy of his charge," snorted the doctor, turning again to the bed, where Bruce had already passed into delirium.

The memory of that vigil was like a horrible nightmare for months. Moore lay on the floor and slept. The Duke rode off somewhither. The old doctor and I kept watch. All night poor Bruce raved in the wildest delirium, singing, now psalms, now songs, swearing at the cattle or his poker partners, and now and then, in quieter moments, he was back in his old home, a boy, with a boy's friends and sports. Nothing could check the fever. It baffled the doctor, who often, during the night, declared that there was "no sense in a wound like that working up such a fever," adding curses upon the folly of The Duke and his Company.

"You don't think he will not get better, doctor?" I asked, in answer to one of his outbreaks.