CHAPTER XXVII
UNDER ONE ROOF
Nature is not unlike a bank. When drafts exceed deposits comes a protest, and not infrequently, after the protest, bankruptcy. From the buffalo hunt to the recapture of Fort Douglas by the Hudson's Bay soldiers, drafts on that essential part of a human being called stamina had been very heavy with me. Now came the casting-up of accounts, and my bill was minus reserve strength, with a balance of debt on the wrong side.
The morning after the escape from Fort Douglas, when Mr. Sutherland strode off, leaving his daughter alone with me, I remember very well that Frances abruptly began putting my pillow to rights. Instead of keeping wide awake, as I should by all the codes of romance and common sense, I—poor fool—at once swooned, with a vague, glimmering consciousness that I was dying and this, perhaps, was the first blissful glimpse into paradise. When I came to my senses, Mr. Sutherland was again standing by the bedside with a half-shamed look of compassion under his shaggy brows.
"How far," I began, with a curious inability to use my wits and tongue, "how far—I mean how long have I been asleep, sir?"
"Hoots, mon! Dinna claver in that feckless fashion! It's months, lad, sin' ye opened y'r mouth wi' onything but daft gab."
"Months!" I gasped out. "Have I been here for months?"
"Aye, months. The plain was snaw-white when ye began y'r bit nappie. Noo, d'ye no hear the clack o' the geese through yon open window?"
I tried to turn to that side of the little room, where a great wave of fresh, clear air blew from the prairie. For some reason my head refused to revolve. Stooping, the elder man gently raised the sheet and rolled me over so that I faced the sweet freshness of an open, sunny view.
"Did I rive ye sore, lad?" asked the voice with a gruffness in strange contradiction to the gentleness of the touch.