THE CALL DIVINE
The Doctor threw off his coat and took charge of the stricken house.He sent his waiting messenger for a faithful nurse, a mountain woman whom he had trained, and began the fight for Mary's life.The collapse into which she had fallen would require weeks of patient care.There was no immediate danger of death, and while he awaited the arrival of help, he turned into the living-room to examine the body of the slain husband.
The head had fallen backward over the side of the lounge and a pool of blood, still warm and red, lay on the floor in a widening circle beneath it.His quick eye took in its significance at a glance.He sprang forward, ripped the shirt wide open and applied his ear to the breast.
"He's still alive!" he cried excitedly.
He examined the ugly wound in the left side and found that the knife had penetrated the lung.The heart had not been touched.The blow on the neck had not been fatal.The shock of the final stroke had merely choked the wounded man into collapse from the hemorrhage of the left lung.The position into which the body had fallen across the couch had gradually cleared the accumulated blood.There was a chance to save his life.
In ten minutes he had applied stimulants and restored respiration, but the deep wheeze from the stricken lung told only too plainly the dangerous character of the wound.It would be a bitter fight.His enormous vitality might win.The chances were against him.
Jim's lips moved and he tried to speak.
The Doctor placed his hand on his mouth and shook his head.The drooping eyelids closed in grateful obedience.
The beat of horses' hoofs echoed down the mountain road.His nurse and messenger were coming.He decided at once to move Mary to his own house.She must regain consciousness in new surroundings or her chance of survival would be slender.To awake in this miserable cabin,the scene of the tragedy she had witnessed, might be instantly fatal.Besides she must not yet know that the brute who had choked her was alive and might still hold the power of life and death over her frail body.She believed him dead.It was best so.He might be dead and buried before she recovered consciousness.The fever that burned her brain would completely cloud reason for days.
He hastily improvised a stretcher with a blanket and two strong quilting-poles which stood in the corner of the room.Nance helped him without question.She obeyed his slightest suggestion with childlike submission.
He placed Mary on the stretcher, wrapped her body in another warm blanket and turned to his nurse and messenger:
"Carry her to my house.Walk slowly and rest whenever you wish.Don't wake her.Tell Aunt Abbie to put her to bed in the south room overlooking the valley.Don't leave her a minute, Betty.She's in the first collapse of brain fever.You know what to do.I'll be there in an hour.You come back here, John.I want you."The mountaineer nodded and seized one end of the stretcher.The nurse took up the other and the Doctor held wide the cabin door as they passed out.
For three weeks he fought the grim battle with Death for the two young lives the Christmas tragedy had thrust into his hands.He gave his entire time day and night to the desperate struggle.
When pneumonia had developed and Jim's life hung by a hair, he slept on the couch in the living-room of the cabin and had Nance make for herself a bed on the floor of the kitchen.
The old woman remained an obedient child.She cooked the Doctor's meals and did the work about the house and yard as if nothing had disturbed her habits of lonely plodding.She believed implicitly all that was told her.Her son had pneumonia from cold he had taken in the long drive from Asheville.The house must be kept quiet.John Sanders was helping her nurse him.She was sure the Doctor would save him.
