"Let me help," pleaded Mrs. Porter, speaking for the first time.

"We'll carry him, Misses--he's just stunned," repeated Mike, in a dreary monotone, as feeling each step carefully with his toe he and Carter bore the still senseless form into the house. The wife had got one of the battered hands between her own, and was walking with wide, dry, staring eyes close to her husband.

"O John, John! Speak to me. Open your eyes and look at me. You're not dead; O G.o.d! you're not dead!" she cried, pa.s.sionately, breaking down, and a pent-up flood of tears coming to the hot, dry eyes as the two men laid Porter on the bed that Cynthia had made ready.

"There, Misses, don't take on now," pleaded Mike. "The boss is jest stunned; that's all. I've been that way a dozen toimes meself," he added, by way of a.s.surance. "Where's the brandy? Lift his head, Ned; not so much. See!" he cried, exultantly, as the strong liquor caused the eyelids to quiver; "see, Misses, he's all roight; he's jest stunned; that's all. There's the dochtor now. G.o.d bless the little woman! She wasn't long!"

The sound of wheels crunching the gravel, with a sudden stop at the porch, had come to their ears.

"Come out av the room, Ma'am," Mike besought Mrs. Porter; "come out av the room an' lave the docthor bring the boss 'round." He signaled to Cynthia with his eyes for help in this argument.

"Yes, Mrs. Porter," seconded Cynthia, "go out to the porch; Miss Allis and I will remain here with the doctor to get what's needed."

"Ah, a fall, eh," commented Dr. Rathbone, cheerily, coming briskly into the room. Then he caught Mike's eye; it closed deliberately, and the Irishman's head tipped never so slightly toward Mrs. Porter.

"Now 'clear the room,' as they say in court," continued the doctor, with a smile, understanding Mike's signal. "We mustn't have people about to agitate Porter when he comes to his senses. I'll need Cynthia, and perhaps you'd better wait, too, Gaynor. Just take care of your mother, Miss Allis. I'll have your father about in a jiffy."

"He's jest stunned; that's all!" added Mike, with his kindly, parrotlike repet.i.tion.

It seemed a million years to the wife that she waited for the doctor's outcoming. Twice she cried in anguish to Allis that she must go in; must see her husband.

"He may die," she pleaded, "and I may never see his eyes again. Oh, let me go, Allis, I'll come back, I will."

"Wait here, mother," commanded the girl. "Doctor Rathbone will tell us if--if--" she could not finish the sentence--could not utter the dread words, but clasping her mother's hands firmly in her own, kept her in the chair. Once Mike came out and said, "He's jest stunned, Ma'am. The docthor says he'll be all roight by an' by."

"He won't die--"

"He's worth a dozen dead men, Ma'am; he's jest stunned; that's all!"

There was another long wait, then Dr. Rathbone appeared.

"Porter will be all right, Madame; it'll take time; it'll take time--and nursing. But you're getting used to that," he added, with a smile, "but,"

and he looked fixedly at Allis, "he must have quiet; excitement will do more harm than the fall."

"Tell me the truth, doctor," pleaded Mrs. Porter, struggling to her feet, and placing both hands on his shoulders, "I can stand it--see, I'm brave."

"I've told you the truth, Mrs. Porter," the doctor answered. "There's no fear for your husband's recovery if he has quiet for a few days."

She looked into his eyes. Then crying, "I believe you, doctor; thank G.o.d for his mercy!" swayed, and would have fallen heavily but for Mike's ready arm.

"She'll be better after that," said the doctor, addressing Allis. "It has been a hard pull on her nerves. Just bathe her temples, and get her to sleep, if you can. I'll come back soon. Your father is not conscious, or will he be, I'm thinking, for a day or two. He has heavy concussion.

Cynthia has full directions what to do."

XVI

After Dr. Rathbone had left Mike and Carter went down to the stables.

"I'll jest have a look at that broke rein," said Gaynor; "that sthrap was strong enough to hang Diablo. If there's not some dirty business in this, I'll eat me hat. T'umbs up! but it was a gallop, though. The Black kin move whin he wants to."

"But what do you think of old Lauzanne?" exclaimed Carter. "He just wore Diablo down, hung to him like a bulldog, an' beat him out."

"It was the girl's ridin'; an' Lauzanne was feared, too. He's chicken-hearted; that's what he is. Some day in a race he'll get away in front av his horses, an' beat 'em by the length av a street. He'll be a hun'red to wan, an' n.o.body'll have a penny on."

When they arrived at the stable Mike headed straight for the harness room. The light was dim, coming from a small, high, two-paned window; but Mike knew where every bridle and saddle should be. He put his hand on Diablo's headgear, and bringing it down carried it through the pa.s.sage to a stable door where he examined it minutely.

"Jest what I tought. Look at that," and he handed it to Carter for inspection. "How do ye size that up, Ned?"

"The rein's been cut near through," replied Carter. "I wonder it held as long as it did."

"A dirty, low-down trick," commented Mike. "I'll hang it back on the peg just now, but don't use it again fer a bit."

As he reentered the saddle room briskly his heel slipped on the plank floor, bringing him down. "I'd take me oath that was a banana peel, if it was on the sidewalk," he exclaimed, after a gymnastic twist that nearly dislocated his neck. "Some of ye fellows is pretty careless wit'

hoof grease, I'm thinkin'."

More out of curiosity than anything else he peered down at the cause of his sudden slip. "What the divil is it, onyway?" he muttered, kneeling and lighting a match, which he held close to the spot. "Bot' t'umbs!" he exclaimed, "it's candle grease. Have aither of ye b'ys been in here wit'

a candle? It's agin the rules."

"There isn't a candle about the barn, an' you know it, Mike," cried Carter, indignantly.

Mike was prospecting the floor with another light.

"Here's two burnt matches," he continued, picking them up. "An' they were loighted last night, too. See that, they're long, an' that means that they wasn't used for lightin' a pipe or a cigar--jes' fer touchin'

off a candle, that's all. I know they was loighted last night," he said, as though to convince himself, "fer they're fresh, an' ain't been tramped on. If they'd been here fer two or three days, roight in front of the door, they'd have the black knocked off 'em wid ye boys' feet.

This wan didn't light at all hardly, an' there's a little wool fuzz stickin' to it. Gee! that manes some wan sthruck it on his wool pants.

Git the lantern, Ned, p'raps we'll fin' out somethin' more. The light from that high up winder ain't good enough fer trackin' a bear."

When the lantern was brought, Mike continued his detective operations, nose and eyes close to the floor, like a black tracker.

"What's that, Ned?" he asked, pointing his finger at a dark brown spot on the boards.

Carter crouched and scrutinized Mike's find. "Tobacco spit," and he gave a little laugh.

"Roight you are; that's what it is. Now who chaws tobaccie in this stable?" he demanded of Carter, with the air of a cross-examining counsel.

"I don't."

"Does Finn?"

"No; I don't think so."

"Didn't Shandy always have a gob of it in his cheek--the dirty pig?"

"Yes, he did, Mike."