Her hands were big and red, but no professional nurse could have handled a patient with more gentle deftness. The linen was unwound, and Mike for the first time inspected the wound inflicted by Gerald Buxton with his shotgun. Little as the lad knew of such things, he saw the hurt was not serious. With the removal of the leaden pellets went the cause of irritation. The stumble in the woods had aggravated the wound temporarily, but a rest for even a day would render it safe for the young man to use the leg.

When the bandage had been repinned in place, Noxon felt that he was being coddled more than was necessary. Dropping his foot to the floor, he asked impatiently:

"What's the sense of my playing baby? I can walk as well as ever. All I need is an ordinary cane. I think I'll stay with you till after dinner, Aunt Maggie--I suppose I may call you that--and then I'll vamose the ranch."

The woman stared wonderingly at Mike.

"Do ye know what he maanes by thim words? His mind I fear is afther wandering."

"He wishes to say that ye and Tam have used him so well that he will take delight in spinding siveral days wid ye."

"Ah, now his mind isn't afther wandering when he do spake that way. All roight, me cherub, ye'll stay where you be till I give you liberty to lave. Do ye mind that?"

And she shook her stubby finger in his face.

"Ah, what a tyrant you are, Aunt Maggie!"

"Phwat's that?" she demanded, straightening up. "Are ye calling me out of me name?"

"You are the sweetest, kindest, most motherly woman and best wife in the State of Maine."

She sprang to her feet and lumbered to the door.

"I haven't finished hanging me duds; whin I have I'll come back and wipe out the insoolt ye have put upon me."

Noxon looked at Mike, who for the first time heard him laugh with real jollity in his voice.

"What a big heart! How unutterably ashamed she makes me feel! What can I weigh in the balance against her? She is pure gold and I am base dross."

"Don't forgit to include mesilf wid the dross, me bye. Ye won't be able to get away from this here place for a few days, I guess."

"Glad should I be if I could believe it safe to stay here."

"And why not?"

"Her husband has already heard all about last night's business."

"He promised ye to say nothing."

"When he did that, he had no suspicion of who I am. He will know that I was one of the gang and his disposition will be far different when he comes home to-night. In fact, he is likely to feel freed of any promise he made me."

"Ye don't know a real Irishman. I can't say how he will be disposed, but I know he'll kaap that pledge. Have no fear of that."

Noxon sitting back in his chair and apparently without any thought of his injured leg, pondered earnestly over the situation.

"I am disposed to believe as you do, but that isn't my only danger."

"Phwat have ye in mind now?"

"There will be lots of people scouring the country for the three persons who were in this business. We are so near Beartown that some of them are likely to call here before the day is over."

"This house stands well back from the road wid only a path betwaan the two. Why should anyone sarch here fur ye?"

"And why should they not? I shouldn't dare to stay here while this is going on. However, you have shown such goodwill toward me, I am willing to compromise. I'll stay till to-night and then must make a change of base."

"Whither will ye go?"

"I haven't thought of that. My aim will be simply to get out of the zone of danger, and what follows must depend upon circ.u.mstances."

"Noxy, will ye answer me one question?"

"I will."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "GIVE ME YOUR HAND ON THAT."]

"When ye lave here will ye be going back to Kit Woodford and Graff Miller?"

The eyes of the young man flashed and, with an earnestness that seemed deadly in its intensity, he said hoa.r.s.ely:

"No! never! I'll die first!"

"Give me yer hand on that!"

It seemed as if the grip would crush the clasping fingers. The pressure continued for nearly a minute, while the two looked fixedly into each other's eyes. The pledge had been made and into each heart stole the warm, irradiating glow that G.o.d gives to all the children of men when they break loose from evil and cling to that which is good.

And then the young man gave Mike his confidence. Aunt Maggie, with a tact that was creditable to her, left them together most of the forenoon and their talk was comparatively free from interruption.

As Noxon had hinted, he was the eldest son of parents who were in prosperous circ.u.mstances. He did not give their name nor place of residence, for it was unnecessary, but he admitted he had been wayward from early boyhood. He longed for wild adventure, and caused his family grief and anguish by his persistent wrongdoing. Finally, when he had matriculated at Yale, he ran away from home, taking what funds he could steal and fully resolved upon a life of sin.

"If there were pirates to-day, as there used to be, I should have striven to become the chief of a crew that flew the black flag, but I had to give that up. Some humorist has said that when a man starts to go to the devil he finds everything greased. So it proved with me. I fell in with Graff Miller, who, though he is about my age, has been a burglar for several years. I never suspected it until he found I was hunting for such a companion, when he told me of his partnership with Kit Woodford. In my vanity, I had shown how easy it was for me to open one of the old-fashioned combination safes, by detecting the working of the mechanism inside. This made me invaluable to them, and they proposed that I should become the third member of the gang. I jumped at the chance.

Since Miller told me they used aliases instead of their right names, I took the one by which you know me.

"Their plan was to visit different points in the south of Maine, where there had been a number of post office robberies, and use me to open the safes. I was delighted with the scheme, and we started in a few weeks ago. The Beartown post office was the third visited----"

Just then a knock sounded on the door. Both were startled and Mike called:

"Come in!"

The door was pushed inward and Stockham Calvert entered the room.

"Holy smoke!" exclaimed Mike, "as Father Malone said when he saw his church burning."

CHAPTER XXVIII

PLUCKING A BRAND FROM THE BURNING