To The West Part 74

"Yes, sir, here," cried Esau; and then in a low voice, "Oh, poor chap!

poor chap!--what have I done!"

I lay very still then, listening to a hacking noise as if some one were chopping with a knife, and I listened again for what seemed a long time to a good deal of rustling and panting, and what sounded like the tearing up of handkerchiefs.

"There," said Mr Raydon, "if we are careful that will bear him. Now then--no, wait a moment. I must tie the rifle to this pole. I want something else."

"Here's my other boot-string, sir," I heard Esau say.

"Yes, capital. That will do. Now, are you ready? Get hold of his legs quietly; don't hesitate, and when I say _now_, both lift together."

I had some faint, wondering thought as to whom they were talking about, when a terrible pang shot through me, and I felt myself lifted up and laid down again on what felt like a bed of fir-branches. The sickness did not increase, and I lay there listening to some one moaning as if in pain, while I became conscious of a curious, swinging motion as I was being gently borne up and down and carried through the air.

Then I seemed to fall into an uneasy sleep, and to lie and dream about Mr Raydon burning my chest with red-hot irons, and these changed to little nuggets of gold which burnt me every time they touched my chest or back. At times the pain ceased, and then it began again, always with the swaying motion, while now and then, when the movement ceased, I began to dream of cool fresh water moistening my brow, and being trickled between my burning lips.

That was a long, wearisome, painful dream, which lasted for what felt like an indefinite time, to be succeeded by other dreams in which the terrible bear's head from Mr Raydon's office was always pursuing me, and the great moose's head looking on in a melancholy, pitiful way.

And it did not appear strange to me that as I tried to escape and started on up and up a ravine where the sun scorched my brains, that the heads should be following without, any bodies. There they always were, the bear's head with the huge teeth waiting to seize me if I only halted for a minute, and the moose's head hurrying on to be there and pity me when I was caught.

How I seemed to toil in terrible agony to get away, the sun burning, and the way up which I climbed growing more and more stony with precipices, down which I was always about to fall! Then great rows of the heads of the mountain sheep came in my way with their large curled horns threatening to drive me back into the jaws of the grizzly bear, which was always close behind. It seemed hidden sometimes behind heaps of skins, but I always knew it was there, and its great muzzle came out again.

I tried to run--to climb further, but something held me back, and the burning on my head grew terrible. I was thirsty too, and I thought that the moose pitied me, and would show me the way to water; but it only looked at me mournfully till I awoke in the darkness, and lay wondering for a few minutes before I stretched out my hand and felt that I was in my bed, and as I lay there, I suddenly saw in the darkness the shape of my door formed by four faint streaks of light which grew brighter, and directly after there was the sharp point of light where the keyhole was, near one side.

It seemed very strange, and more so that the door should open directly after, and Mr Raydon be standing there in his shirt and trousers carrying a candle.

"What does he want?" I thought to myself in a confused way, as I saw him come into our room, and the light fell on Esau, who was not undressed, but lying on his bed with his mouth wide open.

Suddenly he started up, and Mr Raydon raised his hand, and I heard him say, "_Sh_!" The next minute he was holding the candle over my bed, looking in on my face.

"What's the matter?" I said; "I'm not asleep;" but it did not sound like my voice speaking.

It was Mr Raydon's turn now, and he whispered to me--

"Lie quite still, Mayne. Are you in much pain?"

"No," I said. "I don't know. My shoulder aches."

"Don't talk; try and go to sleep again."

I looked up at him in a confused, puzzled way, and as I looked his face began to grow misty, and the candle to burn more dimly, till both faded slowly away, and all was dark once more.

I opened my eyes once more, and there was Mr Raydon standing by me with a candle, and it was so faint that I could not be sure; and so it was again and again as it seemed to me, and when I opened my eyes at last, the bedroom window was wide, the sun shining in, and bringing with it the sweet lemon-scented odour of the pines, and Esau was seated there watching me.

"Hush!" he said, as I was opening my lips to speak. "Mustn't talk."

"Nonsense," I said; "I want to know."

I stopped there, for my voice puzzled me, and I lay wondering for a few moments, till, like a flash of the sunshine coming into my darkened brain, I recollected the blow, the report of the rifle, and Esau's cry, and knew that the rifle had gone off when he fell, and I was lying there badly wounded.

"Mr Raydon said you wasn't to speak a word," said Esau, softly; and he stole out of the room so quietly that I knew he must be without his boots.

A few minutes pa.s.sed, and the door opened again, with Mr Raydon coming in on tiptoe to advance and take my right hand within his left, and place a couple of fingers on my wrist. I smiled as he played the part of doctor like this, and he smiled back.

"Don't talk," he said; "I'll do that, my lad. Come, this is better.

Not so feverish as I expected. Just whisper when I ask a question.

Feel in much pain?"

"My shoulder aches and burns," I said.

"Yes; it will for a time; but that will soon go off. You remember now about the accident? Yes? That's right. You were a little delirious last night, and made me anxious, for we have no doctor hereabouts."

"Don't want one," said Esau, softly.

Mr Raydon asked me a few more questions, cautioned me not to speak much, and to lie quite still, and then left us together.

Esau sat looking at me for a few minutes with his arms rested upon his extended knees.

"I say, you're not to talk, you know, but I may. I say, I am so sorry.

Hush!--no! You mustn't say you know that, or anything else. I only want to tell you it was an accident. You do know, don't you?"

I nodded, and then lay back with my eyes closed; the pain caused even by that slight movement being agonising.

Dean saw it, and rose to moisten a sponge with cool water, and apply it to my temples, with the effect that the faint sensation coming on died away.

"Don't--please don't try to move again," he whispered, piteously. "You don't know how it hurts."

The idea of its hurting Esau sounded so comical to me in my weak state that I could not help smiling. "That's right," he said; "laugh again, and then I shall know I needn't go and fetch him. I say, do make haste and get better. Shall I tell you all about it? Don't speak; only say 'yes' and 'no' with your eyes. Keep 'em open if you mean _yes_, and shut 'em for _no_. Now then, shall I tell you?"

I kept looking at him fixedly.

"That means yes. Well, I was bringing the gun, when I tripped and fell and it went off, and I wished it had shot me instead."

Esau gave a gulp here, and got up and began to walk up and down the room, pressing first one hand and then the other under his arms as if in pain from a cut at school with the cane; and for some moments the poor fellow was suffering so from emotion that he could not continue. At last he went on in obedience to an eager look from my eyes.

"I run up just as he caught you, and tore off your things. Oh, it was horrid. I felt when I saw what I'd done, and him bandaging you up, as if I'd killed you. But you don't feel so bad now. You ain't going to die, are you? Say you ain't."

I kept my eyes fixed on his, forgetting in my excitement what I ought to have done, when a cry brought me to myself, and I closed my eyes sharply.

"Ah, that's better," cried Esau, and kneeling down by my bed he went on telling me how, as soon as I was bandaged, Mr Raydon cut two light poles and bound short pieces across them. Then on these he laid pine-boughs, and I was lifted up, for them to convey me slowly down the ravine, and back to the Fort.

"I say," whispered Esau, "I thought last night he meant to cheat us, and get all the gold for himself; but I don't think so now. Wish he liked me as much as he likes you. What? Do I think he does like you? Yes; I'm sure of it. He was in a taking last night. And I say--ain't he quite a doctor too? He could do anything, I believe. There, I mustn't talk to you any more, because you were to be kept quiet."

It must not be imagined that Esau had kept on saying all the above to me rapidly, for one of these sentences was whispered very slowly now and then as I lay back feeling not much pain, but hot and feverish, and this change was noticed soon after by Mr Raydon when he came into the room.

"You have been letting him talk," he said, angrily, as soon as he had taken my hand.

"That I ain't, sir," cried Esau, indignantly. "Never let him speak a word."

"That's right. He must be kept very still," said our friend, and he hurriedly left the room.