Page:Top-Notch Magazine, May 1 1915 (IA tn 1915 05 01).pdf/100

 "If I am," he returned, with a feeble effort to jest, "I don't know it yet."

"But you're hurt. You struck on your head."

"Probably that saved my life. Solid ivory, you know. I will admit that I feel a trifle upset, so to speak. No, don't move—please don't! The mere thought of your moving gives me pain."

"But I must go for help. You're wounded."

"I am," he admitted, gazing up into her blue eyes in a manner that gave her a most peculiar sensation. "Mortally wounded, I fear. I never was hit so hard in my life, and I am afraid I can't recover."

Again she cried out in apprehension and distress. "Oh, I was afraid you were done for when that beast caught you!"

"I am," was his singularly cheerful acknowledgment; "I'm done for. I've got mine. The jig is up with me."

"Is it your arms, your legs? Your ribs—are they smashed? Where do you feel it most?"

"Here," he answered, putting his hand to his heart. "But it isn't my ribs; it's something deeper, Daphne."

"That isn't my name; it's Bessie."

"Bessie! Mine's George. Awfully commonplace, isn't it? Now, if my folks had only called me Reginald"

"You mustn't try to talk. I'm sure it's painful. You must keep still."

"I will if you'll keep on talking yourself. The sound of your voice soothes me like the murmuring of a brook. Your eyes are like springtime violets. The touch of your little hand is as delicious as a draft of pure water to a person dying of thirst. Now I'll leave it to you if a Reginald could beat that speech much."

She stiffened and drew back a bit, the color beginning to return to her pale cheeks. They looked at each other steadily, and the returning flush covered her face.

Beyond the fence the victorious bull pawed the ground; from a vantage of safety the old dog glared through the rails and regarded the bull with disapproval, but the man and girl paid no attention to either of them. The girl had turned her gaze toward the distant road that wound down into the village.

"I don't believe you are hurt much," she said, in a low voice, which, however, was made unsteady by a queer little throbbing in her throat. "If you were, you couldn't talk like that."

"It's because I am that I can talk like that," he declared. "It's the first time I ever talked that way to any one."

"Your friends who have to get to Albion," she murmured; "I'm afraid they'll lose their train."

"By Jove!" he cried, sitting up suddenly. "I'd clean forgotten them!"

"You were fooling me!" she exclaimed, as she started to rise.

With a groan he fell back. The crimson, oozing from his wound, ran down across his temple, and in another moment she was again checking the flow with her handkerchief. His eyes were closed, and she imagined he had fainted.

"Oh, dear!" She seemed distraught. "I don't know what to do! I've got to get help, but if I leave you, you may bleed to death."

"Don't let me bleed to death," he begged faintly. "Don't leave me—Bessie. You mustn't leave me—as long as I live."

It seemed a great effort for him to lift his eyelids, but he looked at her again, and the appeal in his eyes filled her with a feeling of desperation.

"You must have a doctor."

"You're the only doctor I want. You're the only doctor who can cure me. If you throw up the case and turn me over to a common pill slinger, I'll never get over it."

"But I've simply got to get help for you somehow. I'll hurry."